ill 
ALL 
plants, resembling young onions, and used 
as substitutes for them. It is easily in- 
creased by dividing the roots in spring, and 
planting eight or ten of them together in 
holes, at six inches distance ; in this way, by 
autumn, they will multiply into bunches of 
a large size. 
Escalot or shallot. This is a species of 
onion which is bulbous-rooted, and which 
increases greatly by off-sets, the largest of 
which are the proper parts of the plant for 
use. The bulbs are oblong, irregular, and 
seldom grow large; as they generally in- 
crease into clusters, they do not swell like 
roots that grow singly. From the roots are 
produced many long, narrow, infirm leaves 
in the spring, and which wither in July or 
August, when the roots are full grown ; they 
are then taken up, made dry and housed, 
when they keep in good perfection till the 
following spring. 
Canada or tree-onion. This deserves to 
be cultivated, both as a curiosity in pro- 
ducing the onion at the top of the stalk, 
and for the use of the onions, especially for 
pickling, in which they are excellent and 
superior in flavour to the common onion. 
It is perennial, and propagated by planting 
the bulbs in spring or autumn. Either the 
root bulbs, or those produced on the top of 
the stalk, being planted in a bed or beds of 
any good earth, in rows a foot asunder, six 
inches distance in each row, and two or 
three inches deep, they shoot up leaves and 
stalks in the spring and summer, and pro- 
duce the bulbs for use in July or August • 
and the root-bulbs remaining, furnish a pro- 
duction of top-bulbs, annually in that sea- 
son ; the root-bulb increasing by off-sets, 
may be taken up occasionally at the time 
the stem decays in autumn ; or once in two 
or three years, in order to separate the off- 
sets, and replant them when necessary. 
The leek is the third division of the ge- 
nus, the general characters of which are the 
same as those before described, and the 
species and varieties are the porrum, or 
common leek, which may be said to be an 
annual-biennial plant, for although the roots 
often survive after perfecting seeds, yet the 
plants always attain perfection the same 
year they are sown, and the year afterwards 
run up to stalk, and become unfit for use. 
The seed-stalk of this plant does not belly 
like that of the onion. The best of the va- 
rieties of this plant for general culture is the 
broad-leaved or London leek, which attains 
a large growth, the neck acquiring a thick 
substance, in length from six to nine or ten 
ALL 
inches, dividing upwards into many large, 
long, thick leaves, arranging themselves in 
somewhat a fan-shape. 
ALLODIAL, an epithet given to an in- 
heritance held without any acknowledg- 
ment to a lord or superior, in opposition to 
feudal. 
ALLODIUM, or Alleud, denotes lands 
which are the absolute property of their 
owner, without being obliged to pay any 
service or acknowledgment whatever to a 
superior lord ; in which sense they stand 
opposed to feudal lands, which pay a fee to 
some superior. 
ALLOPHYLUS, in botany, a genus of 
the Octandria Monogynia class of plants, 
the calyx of which is a perianthium com- 
posed of four leaves of an orbicular figure, 
and two opposite ones smaller than the 
others ; the corolla consists of four petals 
less than the cup, of an orbicular figure, and 
equal one to another, with large ungues of 
the same length with the smaller leaves of 
the cup. There are three species : A. zey- 
lanicus is a tree having the appearance of 
persea, and a native of Ceylon. A cominia 
rises 30 feet in height, with a stem as thick 
as a man’s thigh, with numerous flowers, to 
which succeed berries the size of a pin’s 
head, with shell and kernel : grows plenti- 
fully in Jamaica. A. ternatus is a native of 
Cochin China. 
ALLOY, or Allay, a proportion of a 
baser metal mixed with a finer one. Thus, 
all gold coin has an alloy of silver and cop- 
per, as silver coin has of copper alone ; file 
proportion in the former case, for standar d 
gold, being two carrats of alloy in a pound 
troy of gold; and in the latter 18 penny- 
weights of alloy for a pound troy of silver. 
According as gold or silver has more or 
less alloy than that mentioned above, it is 
said to be coarser or finer than the standard. 
However, it ought to be remarked, that the 
coin of different nations varies greatly in 
this respect ; some using a larger, and others 
a less proportion of alloy, the original inten- 
tion of which was to give the coin a due de- 
gree of hardness. 
Alloy, in a chemical sense, may be 
defined a combination of two or more me- 
tals into one homogeneous mass, not separa- 
ble from each other by mere heat The 
most valuable and useful of these are brass, 
type-metal, tutenag, bronze, speculum-me- 
tal, for which see the different articles. If 
two metals being fused together produce a 
mass, whose specific gravity is either greater 
or less than the mean specific gravity of its 
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