AMERCE′MENT (Angl. Fr. amerciment, from amercier, to be at the mercy of). In old English law, a pecuniary penalty imposed for crime or for the violation of the fealty which the freeholder owed his lord. It was imposed as the result of a judicial conviction of the offense charged, but differed from a fine in that it was a commutation of a sentence of forfeiture of goods, while the fine was a commutation of a sentence of imprisonment of the person. The decree of the court was that the offender was at the mercy (in misericordia, à merci) of the king, the sheriff, or the lord in whose court the judgment as rendered. The amount of the amercement, originally unlimited, as the term implies, was regulated by a provision of Magna Charta (1215), which decreed that all amercements should be set, or fixed, by good men of the neighborhood, the peers of the offender, and that the amount should vary with the gravity of the offense. Consult Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law, second edition (London and Boston, 1899). See Criminal Law; Fine; Punishment.
AME′RIA. The ancient name of Amelia (q.v.), a city in Italy.
AMER′ICA (named after Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian navigator). America, or the New World, is one of the great land divisions of the earth. It has a meridional extent of about 9000 miles, stretching from 72° N. lat. (Boothia Felix) to 56° S. lat. (Cape Horn), without including the Arctic islands. Its extreme northern part extends far within the Arctic Circle, while on the south it stretches to the border of the Antarctic Ocean. Excluding its islands, it lies between the meridians of 34° and 168° west of Greenwich, and has a maximum breadth of about 3300 miles. The entire area is estimated to be 16,000,000 square miles.
General Features. The New World differs from the Old in size, having about half its area. It differs also greatly in outline, in location on the earth's surface, and in the character of its coasts and its relief. The Old World has, very roughly, a triangular form; while the New World consists of two triangles connected with each other. While both grand divisions lie mainly north of the equator, a greater proportion of the Old World is in the northern hemisphere. The coasts of the Old World, taken as a whole, are much more broken than the American coasts. The principal relief feature of the Old World is a great stretch of elevated land crossing most of Europe and Asia in an east and west direction, while the backbone of America traverses its length in a direction nearly north and south, near its western coast.
America is hounded on the north by the Arctic Ocean, on the south by the Antarctic, on the east by the Atlantic, and on the west by the Pacific. While stretching from one polar ocean to the other, it separates the Atlantic and Pacific throughout their whole length. In the extreme northwest it almost touches Asia, from which it is separated by Bering Strait. Very narrow passages separate it from the extensive islands that constitute the Arctic Archipelago of the Western Hemisphere.
Physical Divisions. America is divided into two continents. North and South America, separated in part by the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico, and connected by the narrow Isthmus of Panama, 30 miles in width.
North America has an area of about 8,300.000 square miles, and South America of 7,700,000. The mean altitude above sea level of both continents is not far from 2000 feet.
These two great continents are much alike in some respects, while differing in others. They are both triangular in shape, with the base of the triangle at the north and the opposite apex at the south. Each has its greatest length along meridians, and greatest breadth along parallels of latitude; each has a great mountain system running the whole length of the western side and parallel to it, and a shorter secondary and more disconnected mountain system in the eastern part, also parallel to the coast, the two mountain systems in each case converging toward the lower apex of the continent. In both cases the eastern ranges are the oldest geologically.
While the two American continents thus present certain similarities of configuration, they are very differently placed on the sphere, and thus their climatic differences are marked, and the conditions dependent on climatic influences likewise differ. The broad part of North America lies mainly within the north temperate zone, and only its apex extends into the tropical zone; thus causing a great portion of the continent to be dominated by comparatively low temperature conditions. In South America, on the contrary, the broad part lies within the tropics, and a comparatively small portion of it extends into the temperate zone.
Coasts. With regard to the nature of their coast-lines, North and South America present an extraordinary contrast. North America, in its extreme irregular coast-line and its great peninsulas, is the counterpart of the Eurasiatic continent in the Old World, while South America, with its almost unbroken coast, is the counterpart of Africa. In North America we have the peninsulas of Alaska, Labrador, Nova Scotia, Florida, Yucatan, and Lower California. South America presents but one great peninsula, that of Patagonia. The Atlantic coast of America is far more irregular and broken than that of the Pacific. On the north of North America, Hudson Bay projects far into the interior of Canada, forming a vast inland sea. Farther south, the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Bay of Fundy form deep indentations. On the Atlantic coast of the United States are several large bays and harbors, Massachusetts Bay, Long Island Sound, Delaware and Chesapeake bays, and Albemarle and Pamlico sounds being among them. The Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea have many arms, extending into the land, among them the gulfs of Campeachy, Honduras, and Colon.
The Atlantic coast of South America is simpler, the chief indentations being, on the north the gulfs of Darien and Venezuela, on the northeast the estuary of the Amazon, and on the east the harbors of Bahia and Rio de Janeiro, the estuary of the Rio de la Plata, and the gulfs of Blanca, San Matias, and San Jorge, on the Argentine coast.
The west coasts of both continents are in the main extremely simple. Between latitudes 42° S. and 48° N. there are few harbors. In South America, the Gulf of Guayaquil is almost the only indentation of magnitude. South of latitude 42°, S., however, the character of the coast changes to a fiord coast, with many deep, narrow passages and hundreds of islands. Where the two continents meet, the bend of the Pacific coast forms
