Albracca (äl-bräk´kä).—In Bojardo’s Orlando Innamorato, a castle of Cathay to which Angelica retires in grief at being scorned and shunned by Rinaldo, with whom she is deeply in love. Here she is besieged by Agricane, King of Tartary, who resolves to win her, notwithstanding her indifference to his suit.
Alceste (äl-sest´).—The principal character in Molière’s comedy The Misanthrope: a disagreeable but upright man who scorns the civilities of life and the shams of society.
Alcina (äl-che´na).—A fairy, the embodiment of carnal delights, in Boiardo’s Orlando Innamorato and Ariosoto’s Orlando Furioso the sister of Logistalla (reason) and Morgana (lasciviousness). When tired of her lovers she changed them into trees, beasts, etc., and was finally, by means of a magic ring, displayed in her real senility and ugliness. Compare Acrasia, Armida, and Circe.
Aldine (al´din) Press.—The press established at Venice by Aldus Manutius. See Manutius.
Aldingar (al´ding-gär), Sir.—A character in Percy’s Reliques. This ballad relates how the honor of Queen Elianor, wife of Henry Plantagenet, impeached by Sir Aldingar, her steward, was submitted to the chance of a duel, and how an angel, in the form of a little child, appeared as her champion, and established her innocence.
Alhambra (al-ham´brä).—A volume of legends and descriptive sketches by Washington Irving. “The account of my midnight rambles about the old place,” says the author, “literally true, yet gives but a feeble idea of my feelings and impressions, and of the singular haunts I was exploring. Everything in the work relating to myself and to the actual inhabitants of the Alhambra is unexaggerated fact; it was only in the legends that I indulged in romancing, and these were founded on material picked up about the place.”
Ali Baba (ä´lē bä´bä).—A character in The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments, in the story “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves” a poor wood-cutter who, concealed in a tree, sees a band of robbers enter a secret cavern, and overhears the magic words “open sesame” which opens its door. After their departure he repeats the spell and the door opens, disclosing a room full of treasures with which he loads his asses and returns home. His brother Cassim, who discovers his secret, enters the cave alone, forgets the word “sesame,” and is found and cut to pieces by the robbers. The thieves, discovering that Ali Baba knows their secret, resolve to kill him, but are outwitted by Morgiana, a slave.
Alice in Wonderland.—A little girl through whose dream pass the scenes of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Behind the Looking-glass, two popular stories for children by Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson). They have been translated into several European languages.
Alice Brand.—In Scott’s Lady of the Lake, Alice signed Urgan the dwarf thrice with the sign of the cross, and he became “the fairest knight in all Scotland”; when Alice recognized in him her own brother.
Allan-a-Dale.—A friend of Robin Hood’s in the ballad. He is introduced into Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe as Robin Hood’s minstrel.