AUGER 4 



tries by personal labor or by publicity to rem- 

 edy shameful political conditions. See HER- 

 CULES; MYTHOLOGY. 

 AUGER, ou-' 0< r, a tool used for boring wood 



.nil. For either purpose the implement 

 has a screw at the point, which draws it into 



; .stance; a spiral pod with a cutting lip 

 at each side of the end next to the screw 



AUGER 



throws out the borings. A steel shank above 

 the pod carries the handle. An auger should 

 i from a bit. The form of the 

 boring part is the same, but a bit is fitted 

 into a brace or bit stock. See BORING MA- 

 CHINK. 



AUGSBURG, owgs' boorK, in Bavaria, a 

 famous free city of the Middle Ages, known 

 as a center of trade between Germany and 

 Italy and for its connection with the Augsburg 

 Confession, the subject of the next article. It 

 is still an important commercial point, with 

 a population of over 100,000. 



Augsburg means the City of Augustus. It 

 stands on the site of a colony founded by the 

 emperor, about 12 B.C. The town became a 

 free city in 1276. It played an important part 

 in the development of German art, and among 

 its treasures numbers the celebrated Golden 

 Hall, a room in the town hall, considered one 

 of the most beautiful in Germany. 



AUGSBURG CONFESSION, the most im- 

 portant statement of their religious beliefs 

 that the Protestants drew up during the 

 Reformation, and at the present time the 

 basis of the Lutheran faith. The Emperor 

 Charles V, hoping to smooth out the difficul- 

 ties between the Catholic and Protestant par- 

 ties in Germany, called a meeting, or diet, at 

 Augsburg in 1530 and requested the Protes- 



AUGUST 



tants at that time to present a statement of 

 their beliefs. Luther was unable to attend 

 the diet, and the confession was therefore 

 drawn up by Philip Melanchthon, one of the 

 great Protestant leaders, and revised by Luther 

 before being read. Charles V and the Catho- 

 lics would not accept the document, and the 

 division in the Church became permanent. 

 Later, when the English religious leaders drew 

 up the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of 

 England, they used the Augsburg Confession 

 as a basis for their work. G.W.M. 



AUGURS, aw' gcrs, a sacred college among 

 the Romans, whose members read the hidden 

 meaning of various signs and omens, and from 

 them made plain the will of the gods and fore- 

 told the future. These omens were signs in 

 the sky, especially thunder and lightning; the 

 flight and cries of birds; the feeding of the 

 sacred chickens; the movements and sounds 

 of serpents and other animals; and chance 

 happenings, such as the gnawing of a mouse 

 or the creaking of a chair, which occurred be- 

 fore or during the augural ceremony. (See 

 SUPERSTITION and its allied subjects.) 



The augurs were consulted when anything 

 of importance was undertaken, and they could 

 dismiss a meeting of the people merely by 

 saying alio die (on another day). In early 

 times, when the college was composed of 

 nobles, the augurs sometimes used their power 

 unjustly to keep the plebeians from holding a 

 meeting. This college at first consisted of 

 three members, but this number had increased 

 to sixteen by the time of Caesar. The augurs 

 were always men of distinction, and wore the 

 toga with the wide purple border (see TOGA). 



In modern speech augur and augury are 

 used in the sense of foretelling or anticipating, 

 and often with an impersonal subject, as, "It 

 augurs ill for our plans that we cannot all 

 agree." 



UGUST was named for the Roman 

 Emperor Augustus, one of the greatest rulers 

 VIT lived; and there is indeed something 

 royal about it. It is a month of gold and 

 purple its sun throws a "golden glory" on the 



yellowing fields, and everywhere there is 

 golden rod and the purple aster; while purple 

 grapes hang ripening on the vines. It is one 

 of the warmest months -of the year in the 

 northern hemisphere, and usually one of the 



