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ALPUJARRAS ALSACE 355 Semmering railway, from Gloggnitz to Murz- zuschlag, completing the connection between Trieste and Vienna, opened in July, 1854, and remarkable for its numerous tunnels and colos- sal viaducts, passes over the Semmering pass, which is situated on the boundary of Lower Austria and Styria*. A hospice was built by a Styrian duke in the wilderness of the mountain in the 14th century. A carriage road com- pleted in 1728 was superseded in 1840 by a new road. Besides these there are many pass- es of minor importance, though some of them remarkable for beautiful views and scenery. The u Alpine Club," established in London in 1858, gave new impulse to explorations among these summits. The president of the club, Mr. J. Ball, has published " The Alpine Guide " (3 vols., 1863-'7) ; and the " Alpine Journal," re- cording Alpine phenomena and ascents, has been published since 1863. Alpine clubs have since been established in Vienna (1862), Turin (1863), Bern (1863), Aosta (1868), and Munich (1869). The proceedings and explorations of these as- sociations are recorded in various periodical publications, as the Giornale delle Alpi, degli Apennini, e dei Vulcani, published at Turin since 1864 ; the Jahrbuch des osterreichischen Alpenvereins, at Vienna since 1865 ; Jahrbuch des schweizer Alpenclubs, at Bern since 1864; Zeitschrift des deutschen Alpenvereins, at Mu- nich since 1869 ; Alpenfreund, at Gera since 1870 ; ISficho des Alpes, at Geneva since 1870. The explorations in Switzerland are conduct- ed systematically according to Dufour's topo- graphical map, the Alpine club of Bern being divided into committees for expeditions to the different mountainous regions. The committee relating to the Glarus (Todi) district caused a panorama of the Ruchen Glarnisch to be pub- lished by A. Hein (Glarus, 1870), with the statistics of about 350 mountains, peaks, passes, and lakes. Among the principal recent works on the Alps are the brothers Schlagintweit's Untersuchungen uber die physikalische Geogra- phic der Alpen (Leipsic, 1850), andNeue Unter- suchungen uber die physikalische Geographie und Geologie der Alpen (1854) ; Prof. Tyndall's "Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers" (London, 1860- '62), and "Mountaineering in 1861" (1862); Schaubach's "German Alps" (5th ed., 1864-'7); Tschudi's Thierleben der Alpenwelt (8th ed., Jena, 1868); Edward Whymper's "Scrambles on the Alps, 1860-'69, including the First As- cent of. the Matterhorn and the Attempts which preceded it" (London, 1871); Berlepsch's Al- pen (4th ed., 1871); and "The Switzers," by William Hepworth Dixon (London, 1872). Geological descriptions of the Alps are con- tained in Prof. Sedgwick's and Sir Roderick Murchison's contributions to the London geo- logical society. ALPUJARRAS, or Alpnxarras (Ar. Al-Busha- rat, Pasture Mountains ), a mountainous region in the old province of Granada, Spain, lying between the Sierra Nevada and the Medi- terranean, and including part of the modern provinces of Granada and Almeria. After the taking of Granada by Ferdinand, the Moors remaining in the country were driven to this district, whence, after long struggles and des- perate resistance, they were finally expelled by Philip III., in 1610. The Sierra de Gador, the highest summit, rises 6,550 feet above the sea level. ALSACE (Ger. Elsass), formerly a province of France, bounded by Lorraine, the Palatinate, Baden, Switzerland, and Franche-Comt6, and constituting the departments of Haut-Rhin and Bas-Rhin; since the treaty of May 10, 1871, the main part of the German Reichsland (im- perial territory) of Alsace-Lorraine. It is now divided into the departments of Lower Alsace and Upper Alsace, and embraces an area of 3,175 sq. m., and a population of 1,083,886, exclusive of Belfort, formerly in Haut-Rhin, and some other portions of territory, which have been restored to France, and inclusive of some minor portions annexed from Lorraine. The Vosges mountains extend along its west- ern side, and the northeastern offshoots of the Jura cross its southern limits ; but the central and eastern part consists of a fertile plain lying along the western side of the Rhine, which here forms the boundary between it and Ba- den. The 111 and its tributaries are the other principal streams. There are several canals, of which the Rhone canal is the largest. The manufactures are important, comprising cloth of various kinds, cotton yarn, paper, beet-root sugar, beer, brandy, and oil. The principal cities are Strasburg, Miihlhausen, and Colmar. As attested by monuments still extant, Alsace had a dense population of Celts sev- eral years before the Christian era. It was occupied by the Rauraci, the Tribocci, and the Nemetes at the time of the Roman invasion ; was the theatre of the defeat of Ariovistus by Julius Csesar, 58 B. C., and formed part of Celtic Gaul, as the Roman province of Ger- mania Superior, called afterward Germania Prima. The Alemanni first invaded Alsace in the 3d century, and after the close of their long struggle with the Romans, the population, de- cimated by war, was rapidly filled up in the 5th century by Germanic settlers, who were called Ill-Sassen, i. e., dwellers on the 111, the main Al- satian affluent of the Rhine. After the defeat of the Alemanni near Zulpich in 496, Alsace be- came known under Frankish rulers as the duchy of Alsatia. In the 7th century, under the Frank- ish duke Adalric (Etticho) and his daughter Odilia, who became the patron saint of Alsace, great progress was made in Christianizing the country. In the 9th century it was part of Lothaire's empire. In 924 it was annexed to Germany by Henry the Fowler, but it was continually claimed as a Frankish possession until the extinction of the Carlovingian dynasty in 987. It then remained for several centuries in the undisputed possession of Germany as an Alemannian or Swabian duchy, under various rulers and subjected to many vicissitudes. The