ALEXANDRIA 



178 



ALEXANDRIA 



mother of England. Alexandra was born at 

 Copenhagen. When nineteen years old she 

 was married to the Prince of Wales, and hoi- 

 first public act, as the Princess of Wales, was 

 the opening of the Cambridge School of Art 

 (1865). A year later she was present at 

 the opening of Parliament. The death of the 

 Prince Consort in 1861 was followed by the 

 practical retirement of Queen Victoria from 

 active social duties, and this talented daughter 

 of King Christian, after her marriage to the 

 Prince of Wales, took the queen's place in 

 society, carrying out her task with dignity and 

 grace. Alexandra was crowned with Kdward 

 VII on August 9, 1902, and reigned with him 

 as queen until his death. She is an accom- 

 plished musician and is everywhere respected 

 and loved by the English people. In 1913 she 

 celebrated her fiftieth wedding anniversary. 



ALEXANDRIA, alexan' dree ah, an ancient 

 city and seaport in Egypt, long the center of 

 Greek learning and civilization. It was 

 founded by Alexander the Great in 332 B. c., 

 and lay at the northwest angle of the Nile 



MAP OF ANCIENT ALEXANDRIA 



(a) Canal 



(b) City walls , 



(c) City dockyards and quays 



(d) Amphitheater 



(e) Gymnasium 



f/) Library and museum 



(a) Hall of justice 



(7i) Stadium 



(t) Aqueduct from the Nile 



( Hippodrome 



delta, on a ridge of land between the sea and 

 Lake Mareotis. Its growth was rapid and it 

 speedily became a center of commerce between 

 the East and West, with a population at one 

 time of perhaps 1,000,000. It was especially 

 celebrated for its great library and also for 

 its famous lighthouse, one of the wonders of 

 the world (see LIGHTHOUSE). Under Roman 

 rule it was the second city of the Empire, and 

 when Constantinople became the capital of 

 the East it still remained the chief center of 

 trade; but it received a blow from which it 



never recovered when captured by Ainru, gen- 

 eral (if Caliph Omar, in 641, after a m 

 fourteen months. Its ruin was finally com- 

 pleted by the discovery of the passage to 

 India by the Cape of Good Hope, which 

 opened up a new route for the Asiatic trade. 



Modern Alexandria is built on a peninsula 

 which was formerly the island of Pharos. It is 

 divided into two parts, one of which is inhab- 

 ited by Mohammedans and the other by Euro- 

 peans. The former portion is crowded and 

 squalid, while the latter is better built, and 

 is supplied with gas, and with water brought 

 by the Mahmudieh Canal from the western 

 branch of the Nile. Its two ports, with fine 

 docks and other accommodations, make it one 

 of the chief commercial ports on the Mediter- 

 ranean and the great emporium of Egypt. Its 

 trade is large and varied, the exports being 

 cotton, beans, peas, rice, wheat; the imports, 

 chiefly manufactured goods. At the beginning 

 of the nineteenth century Alexandria was an 

 insignificant place of 5000 or 6000 inhabitants, 

 but under Mohammed Ali renewed prosperity 

 began for it. In 1882 the insurrection of Arabi 

 Pasha and the massacre of Europeans led to 

 the intervention of the British and the bom- 

 bardment of the forts by the British fleet, in 

 July. When the British entered the city they 

 found the finest parts of it sacked and in 

 flames, but the damage was repaired. Popula- 

 tion in 1907, 332,246, of whom only about 

 50,000 were Europeans. 



Alexandrian Library, the largest and most 

 famous of all the ancient collections of books, 

 planned by Ptolemy Soter, king of Egypt, who 

 died about 283 B.C. Succeeding rulers devel- 

 oped and enlarged the library, which at its most 

 flourishing period is said to have numbered 

 700,000 volumes. Most of these were burned 

 at the invasion of Alexandria by the Romans, 

 and the remainder were destroyed by the 

 Christians in 391 A. D. A.MC c. 



ALEXANDRIA, LA., a manufacturing and 

 commercial center, with a population of 13,583 

 in 1914, an increase of 2,369 since 1910. It is 

 the seat of government for Rapides parish, 

 situated in about the center of the state, on 

 the right of the Red River, about 200 miles 

 from its confluence with the Mississippi River. 

 New Orleans is about 170 miles southeast, in a 

 direct line, and 360 miles by water; Baton 

 Rouge is about 113 miles southeast, and 

 Shreveport is 123 miles northwest. The city 

 is served by seven railroads and a river, naviga- 

 tion company. The Red River is navigable 



