ARETHUSA 



333 



ARGENTA 



of Peru. It was founded by Pizarro in 1540. 

 In 1600 and again in 1868 it was nearly de- 

 stroyed by earthquakes. Population in 1910, 

 35,000. 



ARETHUSA, airethu'sa, in Greek myth- 

 ology, a beautiful nymph, one of the attend- 

 ants of the goddess Diana, who changed her 

 into a fountain to free her from the too 

 ardent courtship of the river god Alpheus. But 

 the god, changing himself into a swift tor- 

 rent, still pursued her, and Diana in pity 

 opened for her an underground passage 

 through which she fled until she came to the 

 upper world on the plains of Sicily. The god, 

 however, followed her in the regions below, 

 and, passing from Greece to Sicily, joined his 

 loved one where the fountain sparkled under 

 the bright Sicilian skies. 



The Greeks based the pretty story on the 

 peculiar course of the Alpheus River, which, 

 as it flows through Arcadia toward the Ionic 

 Sea, now and then disappears below the sur- 

 face. Near the seacoast on the Sicilian plains 

 a beautiful fountain bubbled up, and the 

 imaginative Greeks liked to believe that it 

 contained the waters of the Alpheus. Shelley 

 wrote the story of Arethusa in his poem of that 

 name. 



Arethusa is also the name of two species of 

 the orchid family, one growing in North Amer- 

 ica, the other in Japan. See NYMPH. 



AREZZO, a city of Northern Italy, capital 

 of the province of Arezzo, in Tuscany. It is 

 fifty-four miles southeast of Florence and has 

 a beautiful situation on the slopes of a hill, 

 commanding a charming view of the surround- 

 ing fertile country. Arezzo is the episcopal 

 see of Tuscany, and its cathedral, a fine ex- 

 ample of Italian Gothic, was begun in the 

 thirteenth century. Many imposing buildings, 

 broad streets, a museum and picture gallery, a 

 noted academy of science and a library arc 

 among the attractions of the city. It has 

 manufactures of cloth, silk fabrics and leather. 

 In the ancient times Arezzo, then called Arrv- 

 n, waa one of the richest cities of Etruria, 

 and was especially famed for its pottery and 

 copper work. The city waa the birthplace of 

 Petrarch and other famous men. Population 

 (city and suburbs) in 1911, 48,170. 



AR'GAND LAMP, a lamp invented about 

 1784 by the Swiss chemist Aime Argand, wln< h 

 was one of the earliest improvements on i lu- 

 cid-fashioned oil lamp. The old-style lamp was 

 .simply a shallow vessel containing oil, 

 which a short rounded wick was dipped. The 



light was obtained by the burning of the oil 

 vapor which rose from the wick. The amount 

 of surface of the oil-vapor that came in contact 

 with the air was so small that only a little (if 

 the carbon of the oil burned, and the rest rose 

 in the form of 

 smoke which gave 

 off unpleasant 

 odors. 



Argand's lamp 

 had a burner that 

 created enough 

 heat to burn up 

 all of the carbon. 

 He made a wick 

 in the form of a 

 hollow cylinder, 

 which he placed 

 between two 

 metal tubes, one 

 within the other. 

 A circular flame 

 was thus pro- 

 duced, and both 

 the inside and 

 outside of this 

 flame were sup- 

 plied with air; 

 the result was a 

 clearer light and ^ ARGAND LAMP 



... (a) burner; (b) wick; (c) 

 a lamp that did name; (d) chimney. Arrows 

 not smoke. One indlcate alr currents, 

 of Argand's workmen discovered by accident 

 that a glass chimney placed around the flame 

 created a draft and made the light steadier and 

 brighter. The Argand burner is widely used 

 to-day. 



ARGENTA, ARK., in Pulaski County, is 

 centrally located in the state, on the north 

 bank of the Arkansas River, almost directly 

 opposite Little Rock, the state capital. It is 

 on the Saint Louis Southwestern; the Saint 

 Louis, Iron Mountain & Southern, and the 

 Chicago, Rock Island A Pacific railroads. The 

 population, \\hii-li in 1910 was 11,138, was 

 13,693 in 1914. The area is three square miles. 



Argcnta has a city hall, built in 1915 at a 

 cost of $100,000, two parks and a United States 

 military poet, Fort Logan H. Roots. The 

 principal industries include railroad shops, 

 cotton compresses, cotton-seed oil mills, hard- 

 wood mills, stove factory, cooperage and boiler 

 and iron works. Natural gas is used for 

 manufactories and for domestic purposes. The 

 town was founded in 1870 and became a city 

 in 1906. NJL 



