Alliga′tion, a rule of arithmetic, chiefly found in the older books, relating to the solution of questions concerning the compounding or mixing together of different ingredients, or ingredients of different qualities or values. Thus if a quantity of tea worth 10d. the pound and another quantity worth 18d. are mixed, the question to be solved by alligation is, what is the value of the mixture by the pound?
Alliga′tor (a corruption of Sp. el lagarto, lit. the lizard—Lat. lacertus), a genus of reptiles of the family Crocodilidæ, differing from the true crocodiles in having a shorter and flatter head, in having cavities or pits in the upper jaw, into which the long canine teeth of the under jaw fit, and in having the feet much less webbed. Their habits are less perfectly aquatic. They are confined to the warmer parts of America, where they frequent swamps and marshes, and may be seen basking on the dry ground during the day in the heat of the sun. They are most active during the night, when they make a loud bellowing. The largest of these animals grow to the length of 18 or 20 feet. They are covered by a dense armour of horny scales, impenetrable to a bullet, and have a large mouth, armed with strong, conical teeth. They swim with wonderful celerity, impelled by their long, laterally-compressed, and powerful tails. On land their motions are proportionally slow and embarrassed because of the length and unwieldiness of their bodies and the shortness of their limbs. They live on fish, and any small animals or carrion, and sometimes catch pigs on the shore, or dogs which are swimming. They even sometimes make man their prey. In winter they burrow in the mud of swamps and marshes, lying torpid till the warm weather. The female lays a great number of eggs, which are deposited in the sand or mud, and left to be hatched by the heat of the sun, but after this has taken place the mother alligator is very attentive to her young. The most fierce and dangerous species is that found in the southern parts of the United States (Alligator Lucius), having the snout a little turned up, slightly resembling that of the pike. The alligators of South America are there very often called Caymans. A. sclerops is known also as the Spectacled Cayman, from the prominent bony rim surrounding the orbit of each eye. The flesh of the alligator is sometimes eaten, the tail being considered a great delicacy by the
negroes. Among the fossils of the south of England are remains of a true alligator (A. Hantoniensis) in the Eocene beds of the Hampshire basin.
Alligator-apple (Anōna palustris), a fruit allied to the custard-apple, growing in marshy districts in Jamaica, little eaten on account of its narcotic properties.
Alligator-pear (Persēa gratissima), an evergreen tree of the nat. ord. Lauraceæ, with a fruit resembling a large pear, 1 to 2 lb. in weight, with a firm marrow-like pulp of a delicate flavour; called also avocado-pear, or subaltern's butter. It is a native of tropical America and the West Indies.
Al′lingham, William, an Irish poet, born in Ireland in 1824 or 1828, died in 1889. He published his first volume (Poems) in 1850; Day and Night Songs in 1855; Lawrence Bloomfield in Ireland, narrative poem, in 1864; Songs, Poems, and Ballads in 1877 (including a number of new poems). He was a frequent contributor to periodicals, and for some time edited Fraser's Magazine.
Allitera′tion, the repetition of the same letter at the beginning of two or more words immediately succeeding each other, or at short intervals; as "many men many minds"; "death defies the doctor". "Apt alliteration's artful aid" (Churchill). "Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, billet-doux" (Pope). "Weave the warp and weave the woof" (Gray). In the ancient German and Scandinavian and in early English poetry alliteration took the place of terminal rhymes, the alliterative syllables being made to recur with a certain regularity in the same position in successive verses. In the Vision of William Concerning Piers the Ploughman, for instance, it is regularly employed as in the following lines:—
Hire robe was ful riche . of red scarlet engreyned,
With ribanes of red gold . and of riche stones;