Agamoidea 
Agamoidea (ag-a-moi'de-ii), n.pt. [NL., < 
Agamai + -oidea.j Asuperfamilyot'eriglossate 
lacertiliaus, having concavo-convex vertebrae, 
clavicles not dilated proximally, and no post- 
orbital or postfrontal squamosal arches. The 
group comprise the families .\>m >/ti>l<f. l'i<xnn>ln\ X<-n- 
sauridir, /.fnuti'iilii'. alul ,1m/'"'''"'- See cuts nmler .!;/</- 
iiii'lif and l[iunini. 
agamous (ag'a-mus), n. [< NL. agamus, < Or. 
ayafiof, without nmiTiage, unmarried, < - priv. 
+ ydjUOf, marriage.] 1. In hot., same ;is n</<iiHif. 
2. In zool., having no distinguishable sexual 
organs. See agamic, 1. [Rare.] 
The mollu-SL-aii race are divided into two branches, the 
phanerogamous and the ar/aitwun or cryptogainic. 
Johnston, Introd. to Conchol. 
agamy (ag'a-mi), n. [< Gr. ayafiia, < oj-o^of : see 
agamous.] " Non-marriage ; abstention from 
marriage, or rejection or non-recognition of the 
requirement of marriage in the relation of the 
sexes. 
aganglionic (a-gang-gli-ou'ik), a. [< Gr. a- 
priv. (a- 18 ) 4- ganglionic.~\ Characterized by 
the absence of ganglia, 
agapae, . Plural of agape. 
Agapanthus (ag-a-pan'thus), . [NL., < Gr. 
ayavr/, love (see agape%), + at>6o<;, flower.] A 
small genus of ornamental plants belonging to 
the natural order Liliacca?. The species are peren- 
nial herbs from southern Africa, with strap-shaped radical 
leaves and large umbels of bright-blue flowers. They have 
been long in cultivation. 
agape 1 (a-gap' or a-gap' ), prep. phr. as adv. or a. 
[< 3 + gape.'] With the mouth wide open ; in 
an attitude of wonder, expectation, or eager at- 
tention. 
Dazzles the crowd, and sets them all agape. 
Milton, P. L., v. 3S1. 
A fledgeling priest, 
Beginning life . . . with callow beak 
Agape for luck. Browning, Ring and Book, I. 61. 
agape 2 (ag'a-pe), n. ; pi. agapce (-pe). [L., < 
Gr. dyojr^, love, charity in the abstract sense ; 
ayairav, to love, treat with affection.] 1 . A meal 
107 
Agaphelus (a-gaf'e-lus), . [NL.. < Gr. ayav, 
very, much, + a<j>e/.t/f, smooth. These whales 
lack the usual folds or plaits of the throat.] 
The typical genus of the subfamily Agiipln-limr. 
. 1 . (/ililmxiix is the scrag-whale. E. I). Cope, 1868. 
agaphite (ag'a-fit), n. [So named by Fischer 
in 1816; (.Aguphi, a naturalist who visited the 
regions in Persia where the turquoise is found, 
+ -He%.~\ A name sometimes given to the tur- 
quoise, more especially to the fine blue variety. 
Agapornis (ag-a-por'nis), . [NL.,< Gr. ayanii, 
love (see agape 2 ), + bpvif, a bird.] A genus of 
Agape, or Love-feast. ( From Roller's " Catacombes de Rome." ) 
partaken of in common by the primitive Chris- 
tians, originally in connection with the Lord's 
supper. It was made the occasion of offerings for the 
poor, and closed with devotional exercises, including the 
kiss of love. According to late usage, agapee were also as- 
sociated with weddings, funerals, anniversaries of martyr- 
doms, and the dedication of churches. The loss of their 
original character and the growth of abuses led to the pro- 
hibition of them in church buildings, and in the fourth cen- 
tury to their separation from the Lord's supper and their 
gradual discontinuance. Vestiges of the practice, however, 
remained as late as the Council of Basle in the fifteenth 
century, and customs historically derived from it are still 
observed by some denominations. See love-feast. 
May God speed the universal pentecost and agape of 
his one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. 
Schaf, Christ and Christianity, p. 20. 
2. [cap.] [NL.] In zool., a genus of lepidop- 
terous insects. 
Agapemone (ag-a-pem'o-ne), n. [Irreg. < Gr. 
a-ydm/, love (see "agape?), + fiavri, a staying, a 
stopping-place, dwelling, t/tcvetv, stay, remain: 
see remain.'] Literally, the abode of love; 
specifically, the name of an association of men 
and women established at Charlynch, Somerset- 
shire, England, in 1846, under the direction of 
the Eev. Henry James Prince, the members of 
which lived on a common fund. 
Agapemonian, Agapemonite (ag'a-pe-mo'ni- 
an, ag-a-pem'o-nit), u. An inmate of the Aga- 
pemone (which see). 
agapetae (ag-a-pe'te), n.pl. [LL.,<Gr. d}<nryra(, 
fern. pi. of aya-xi/TOf, beloved, verbal adj. of aya- 
Love-birds {Agapornis cana). 
small African parrots, including the love-birds, 
sometimes made the type of a subfamily Aga- 
pornitkinte. P. J. Seloy, 1836. See love-bird. 
agart, n. Same as acker%, eager^. Sir T. Browne. 
agar-agar (a'gar-a'gar), n. The native name 
of Ceylon moss or Bengal isinglass, consisting 
of dried seaweed of several species, such as 
Gracilaria lichenoides, Eucheuma spinosum, etc. 
It is much used in the East for soups and jel- 
lies. Also called agal-agal. See gelose. 
agaric (ag'a-rik or a-gar'ik), n. and o. [< L. 
agaricum, <fGr. ayapi/Sv, a sort of tree-fungus 
used as tinder, named, according to Dioscori- 
des, from the country of the Agari, in Sarmatia, 
where this fungus abounded.] I. n. A fungus 
of the genus Agaricus. Among the old herbalists the 
name had a wider range, including the corky forms grow- 
ing on trunks of trees, like the " female agaric," Polyporux 
officinalis, to which the word was originally applied, and 
which is still known as agaric in the materia medica. See 
Agaricus, Boletus, and J'ulyporus. Agaric-gnat, a dip- 
terous insect of the family MycetophihdoK (which see). 
II. a. Of or pertaining to agarics ; fungoid. 
Agaric mineral, a very soft and light variety of calcite or 
calcium carbonate. It is generally pure white, found chiefly 
in the clefts of rocks and at the bottom of some lakes in 
a loose or semi-indurated form resembling a fungus. The 
name is also applied to a stone of loose consistence found 
in Tuscany, of which bricks may be made so light as to 
float in water, and of which the ancients are supposed to 
have made their floating bricks. It is a hydrated silicate 
of magnesium, mixed with lime, alumina, and a small 
quantity of iron. Also called mountain-milk and moun- 
tain-meal. 
Agaricia (ag-a-ris'i-a), n. [NL., < Agaricus, q. 
v.] A genus of aporose sclerodermatous stone- 
corals, of the family Fungidat, or mushroom- 
corals. Lamarck, 1801. 
agariciform (a-gar'i-si-f6rm), a. [< NL. Aga- 
ricus, agaric, + L. -formis, < forma, form.] 
Mushroom-shaped. 
agaricin (a-gar'i-sin), n. [< agaric + -in?.] A 
white crystalline substance obtained from the 
white agaric, Polyporus offieinalis. 
Agaricini (a-gar-'i-si'm), . pi. [NL., < Aga- 
ricus.'} An order of fungi having the fruit- 
bearing surface arranged in radiating gills, as 
in the mushrooms and toadstools. 
agaricoid (a-gar'i-koid), a. Of the nature of 
an agaric ; mushroom-like. 
AgariCUS (a-gar'i-kus), n. [NL., masc., < L. 
agaricum, prop. neut. adj.: see agaric.] A large 
7r<n>, to love.] A title given in the early ages 
of the church to virgins who dwelt, in a state of 
so-called spiritual love, with monks and others 
professing celibacy. This intercourse occa- 
sioned scandal, and was condemned by the 
Lateran Council in 1139. 
Agaphelinae (a-gaf-e-li'ne), H. pi. [NL., < Aga- 
plielns + -inee.'] A subfamily of finner whales, 
family Bakenopterida, having the skin of the 
throat not plicated and no dorsal fin. 
Cummuti Mushroom (Agaricus camftstris). 
agate 
and important genus of fungi, characterized by 
having a fleshy cap or pileus, and a number of 
radiating plates or gills on which are produced 
the naked spores. The majority of the species are 
furnished with stems, hut s an- attached by their pilei 
to the objects on which they grow. Over a thousand species 
arc known, which are arranged in five swth.ii>, according as 
the color of their spores is white, pink, brown, pnrplej or 
black. Many of the species are edible, like the common 
mushroom, A . tamfHMt, while others are deleterious and 
even poisonous. See mushroom. 
Agarista (ag-a-ris'ta), n. [NL.] The typical 
genus of the family Agaristida;. Leach. 
Agaristidas (ag-a-ris'ti-de), n. pi. [NL., < Aga- 
rista + -zrf<E.] A family of heterocerous lepi- 
dopterous insects, or moths, typified by the 
genus Agarista. 
agastt, v. t. [< ME. agasten, pp. agast: see 
aghast, gast, ghost.'] 1. To frighten; terrify: 
usually in past participle agast, now written 
aghast (which see). 
Or other grisly thing that him aghast. 
Spenser, F. Q., I. ix. 21. 
2. Reflexively, to be terrified. 
The rynges on the temple dore that honge, 
And eek the dores, clatereden ful faste, 
Of which Arcita somwhat hym agaste. 
Chaucer, Knight's Tale, 1. 2424. 
Agastreae (a-gas'tre-e), n. pi. [NL. : see Agas- 
tria.] A term proposed in 1874 by Huxley as 
a provisional designation of one of two divisions 
of metazoic animals (the other being Gastreai), 
by which the orders Cestoidea and Acantho- 
cephala, which have no alimentary canal or 
proper digestive cavity, are contrasted with 
all other Metazoa. Jour. Linn. Soc., XII. 226. 
Some alterations in this scheme have since been made ; 
. . . the Agastrece are relegated, the Cestoidea to Trema- 
toda and Acanthocephala to the Nematoidea. 
Paseoe, Zool. Class., p. 4. 
Agastria (a-gas'tri-a), n. pi. [NL., < Gr. a- 
priv. + yaoTtip, stomach.] A term of no exact 
signification in modern biology, but formerly 
employed to designate certain low organisms 
which have no proper digestive cavity. Also 
called Agastrica. 
agastric (a-gas'trik), a. [< Gr. a- priv. + yaa- 
r^p, stomach: see gastric.'] Without a stomach 
or proper intestinal canal, as the tapeworm. 
Agastrica (a-gas'tri-ka), . pi. Same as Agas- 
tria. 
agate 1 (a-gaf), prep. phr. as adv. [< ME. on 
gate: on. E. a 3 , on; grate, E. gate?, way: see 
gate% and gait.'] On the way ; going ; agoing ; 
in motion : as, " set him agate again," Lingua, 
iii. 6; "set the bells agate," Cotgrave. [Old 
and prov. Eng. and Scotch.] 
agate 2 (ag'at), n. [Early mod. E. aggat, ag- 
get.aggot, aggott, agat, agot, agath (=D. agaat 
= Sw. Dan. agat), < OF. agate, later "agathe, 
an agate" (Cot- 
. grave), mod. F. 
agate = Pr. aga- 
thes,achates=Sp. 
Pg. It. agata = j 
MHG. G. achat, 
< L. achates, < Gr. 
axdrjif, an agate : 
so called, accord- 
ing to Pliny, be- 
cause first found 
near the river Agate, polished, sho 
&<rn7f,in Sicily.] 
1. A variety of quartz which is peculiar in 
consisting of bands or layers of various colors 
blended together. It is essentially a variegated chal- 
cedony, but some of the bands may consist of other varie- 
ties of quartz, for the most part cryptocrystalline. The 
varied manner in which these materials are arranged causes 
the agate when polished to assume characteristic differ- 
ences of appearance, and thus certain varieties are distin- 
guished, as ribbon-agate, fortification-agate, zone-agate, 
star-agate, moss-agate, clouded agate, etc. See also cut 
under concentric. Agate is found chiefly in trap-rocks 
and serpentine, often in the form of nodules, called ge- 
odes. It is esteemed the least valuable of the precious 
stones. Agates are cut and polished in large quantities 
at Oberstein in Oldenburg, Germany, where also artificial 
means are used to produce striking varieties of color in 
these stones. In Scotland also they are cut and polished, 
under the name of Scotch pebbles. They are used for rings, 
seals, cups, beads, boxes, handles of small utensils, bur- 
nishers, pestles and mortars, and, In delicate mechanism, 
as bearing-surfaces, pivots, and the knife-edges of weigh- 
ing apparatus. In Shakspere agate is a symbol of little- 
ness or smallness, from the little figures cut in these stones 
when set in rings. 
I was never manned with an agate till now. 
Shak., 2 Hen. IV., i. 2. 
2. A draw-plate used by gold-wire drawers, 
named from the piece of agate through which 
the eye is drilled. 3. In iirinting, type of a size 
between pearl and nonpareil, giving about 160 
