only once in a hundred years. After flowering the plant dies down to the ground and new plants spring up from the roots. It has no stem proper, or a very short one, bearing a crowded head of large fleshy leaves, which are spiny at the edge. From the midst of these shoots up the straight, upright scape, 24 to 36 feet high, and at the base frequently a foot through, along which are lance-like flower branches, ending in clusters of blossoms often numbering 4,000 flowers.
Although agaves are decorative plants in the United States and Europe, in their native home in Mexico they are among the most useful plants. There they are called maguey, and are a regular farm crop and valued highly. Some of the species supply fiber which is used in making rope, cordage, matting, clothing, thread, hammocks, bagging, burlap and other coarse textile stuffs, and the old Mexicans used it to make a coarse paper. Its introduction on our arid western plains is highly recommended, for it will grow-in the dry lands of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and southern California. When pasturage is scarce the leaves are cut up and fed to cattle. From some of the species soap is made, while the two most common Mexican drinks, pulque and mescal, are obtained from still others. When the young flower-bud is cut out, the sap keeps on flowing into the cavity. This juice is quite sweet. It is gathered daily and fermented, and becomes the great Mexican drink known as pulque. It is milky, sour and bad smelling, looking like thin buttermilk, and has a rank taste; yet even Americans soon find it agreeable and refreshing. A distilled liquor is also made from it. The unfermented maguey, called honey-water, is used as a substitute for milk.
Agesander (aġ-e-săn′der) of Rhodes, See Lacoön.
Agesilaus (ä-ges′ĭ-lā′ŭs), one of the most warlike of the kings of Sparta. Though not the lawful heir, he became king in 398 B. C., and reigned 38 years. He was small, lame and mean-looking, but had a wonderful amount of energy. His first war against the Persians, whom he defeated in Asia Minor, led to his forming the project of entering the heart of the Persian Empire, which Alexander the Great afterward carried out. But he had to give up the attempt in order to defend Sparta against her enemies at home. In the later years of his life Sparta lost her power, but he remained faithful, and devoted his fortune to her service. He died at the age of eighty on the coast of Africa, while returning from a last effort against his enemy, Persia.
Agincourt (a-zhăn-kōōr′), a village in the north of France, known in history as the scene of the battle between the English under Henry V and the French under the Duke D’Albert, commanding for the Dauphin Charles, Oct. 25, 1415. Having driven the French cavalry by strategy into a swamp, Henry V turned his archers upon them and almost annihilated them. The fugitives threw the army into confusion, and the battle of three of four hours ended in a terrible defeat for the French. More than 10,000 French were killed, including many princes and nobles, while the English lost only 600. This decisive battle so crippled the power of France that Henry V soon had control of the entire kingdom.
Agra (ä′grä), a city on the Jumna River, in the British Northwestern provinces of India. It contains the Taj Mahal, or Pearl Mosque Mausoleum, the finest piece of Indian Mohammedan architecture in the East. Population 185,449.
Agric′ola (born 37, died 93 A. D.), a Roman general, born in the south of France. He was made governor of Aquitania by the Emperor Vespasian, then elected consul, and later given the province of Britain to govern. He spent seven years there, completing the conquest of the island. He built a chain of forts as a defense against the northern tribes, and was the first Roman to send his fleet around Britain, proving it to be an island. He introduced Roman customs and the Roman language. He was recalled by the Emperor Domitian, who was jealous of his popularity. His life has been written by his son-in-law, the historian Tacitus.
Ag′riculture comprehends the tillage of the soil, the cultivation and harvesting of crops, the rearing, breeding, feeding and management of the various domesticated animals, and the manufacture of numerous products of the farm into commodities suitable for home use or for commercial purposes. No other of the arts antedates this, which not only feeds and clothes the world but contributes in ways innumerable to its wealth and welfare.
History. Wherever husbandry has been in highest esteem there has been found a people advanced in civilization. Apart from the present-day advantages of knowledge that centuries of research and investigation have given, and those contributed by agricultural chemistry, new and improved machinery and modern transportation facilities, the husbandmen of some of the nations of antiquity were in many essentials so advanced as to make comparison of their practices with those of to-day appear by no means discreditable. The ancient Egyptians, we are informed, knew the wisdom of crop rotation, were skilled in their methods of suiting these to soils and seasons, and even the rearing of poultry hatched by artificial incubation was not uncommon. The exceeding care in their execution of deeds of conveyance, minute description of both the seller and realty and explicitness of terms warrant the belief that land was held in earliest times at high value as a means of producing wealth. Farming operations were
