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AMSTERDAM—AMYGDALOID. 
  
  
  
is the finest ecclesiastical structure in the city, and, 
as the Dutch think, in Europe. Its chancel is espe- 
cially admired. It contains the tombs of Admiral 
de Ruyter, who sailed up the Medway and burned 
the English fleet at Chatham ; of the famous Dutch 
poet Vondel, &c., and of various other notable per- 
sons. The Old Church (Oude Kerk), belonging to 
the 14th c., contains several monuments of naval 
heroes. Literature, science, and recreation are not 
forgotten in the pressure of business; for A. has its 
academy of arts and sciences, an excellent museum 
and library, several harmonic societies, a botanical 
and also a zoological garden, and several theatres. 
The hospital for aged people, the poor-house, house 
of correction, and orphan asylum, a navigation 
school, and many benevolent societies, are well sup- 
ported, and said to be managed on good principles. 
The moist atmosphere and mephitic exhalations 
from the canals, are unfavourable to the health of 
the city, especially in summer. The New Canal 
(Viewwe Diep), or Grand Ship-canal of North Hol- 
land, 21 feet deep and 125 feet in breadth, connect- 
ing the Buiksloot with the North Sea at the Helder, 
a distance of 51 miles, so that the perilous navi- 
jation of the Zuiderzee is avoided, has greatly 
increased the facility of commerce, as even a ship of 
the line can pass through its sluices ; and powerful 
steam-tugs are employed to tow merchant-vessels 
with their full cargoes out to sea. It is the broadest 
canal in the world. Its lock-gates exceed in dimen- 
sions the largest in the docks of Liverpool, and are 
founded upon piles driven through the mud into 
sand. Amsterdam is now connected by railway with 
Rotterdam and the Hague, as well as with Prussia. 
AMSTERDAM, a barren islet in lat. 38° 53’ S., 
and long. 77° 37" E., the home of sea-birds, shell-fish, 
and seals. It is worthy, however, of notice at once 
for its structure and its situation. Manifestly of 
volcanic origin, it still possesses a burning soil and 
hot springs; and along with its single neighbour, 
St Paul, 60 miles to the north-east, it is about mid- 
way in the direct line between the Cape of Good 
Hope and Van Diemen’s Land, being also at nearly 
the same distance from Cape Comorin. 
A'MULET, any object worn as a charm. It is 
often a stone, or piece of metal, with an inscription 
or some figures engraved on it, and is generally 
suspended from the neck, and worn as a preserv- 
ative against sickness, witcheraft, &e. Its origin, 
like its name, seems to be oriental. The ancient 
Egyptians had their amulets, sometimes forming 
necklaces. Among the Greeks, such a protective 
  
Egyptian Amulet. 
charm was styled phylacterion; among the Romans, 
amuletum. This word is probably derived from 
the Arabic hamalet (‘what is suspended’). The 
phylacteries of the Jews (see Matthew, xxiii. 5), slips 
of parchment on which passages of the Law were 
written, were evidently worn as badges of piety by 
the thm;ees ; but were also regarded as wholesome 
preservatives from evil spirits, and from all manner 
of harm. From the heathen, the use of amulets 
passed into the Christian Church, the inscription 
on them being dchthus (the Greek word for a fish), 
because it contained the initials of the Greek words 
  
for Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour. See 
ABBREVIATIONS. Among the Gnostic sects, Abraxas 
stones (q. v.) were much used. Amulets soon 
became so common among Christians that, in the 
4th c., the clergy were interdicted from making 
and selling them on pain of deprivation of holy 
orders ; and in 721, the wearing of amulets was 
solemnly condemned by the Church. Among the 
Turks and many other nations of Central Asia, 
every person considers it necessary to wear a pre- 
servative charm. With the spread of Arabian 
astronomy, the astrological A. or talisman (q. v.) of 
the Arabs found its way to Europe. Kopp, a 
German author, has written a work, Palwographica 
Critica, on amulets and their inscriptions. Among 
amulets in repute in the middle ages were the coins 
attributed to St Helena, the mother of Constantine. 
These and other coins marked with a cross were 
thought specially efficacious against epilepsy, and 
are generally found perforated, for the purpose of 
being worn suspended from the neck.—The belief in 
the virtue of amulets is not yet extinct among the 
uneducated. 
AMY'CLA, an old Laconian town, was situated 
on the eastern bank of the Eurotas, 20 stadia south- 
east of Sparta, in a richly wooded and fertile region. 
It was a famous city in the heroic age, the abode of 
Tyndarus and his spouse Leda, who bore to Jupiter 
the twins, Castor and Pollux (called Amycler Fratres, 
the Amycleean brothers), and also Helena. Long after 
the Dorians had subjugated and peopled the rest of 
the Peloponnesus, A. continued to be a free Achzan 
town. It was conquered by the Spartans only before 
the first Messenian War, and in consequence of a 
curious and absurd law. The inhabitants were so 
often agitated by false rumours of the approach of 
the Spartans, that, growing tired of living in a state 
of continual alarm, they decreed that no one should 
henceforth mention or even take notice of these 
disagreeable fictions. Unfortunately, the Spartans 
did come at length, and according to the Greek 
saying, ¢A. perished through silence.” Hence the 
proverb, Amyclis ipsis taciturnior (More silent 
than A. itself). After its conquest, A. became 
a village, noted only for its annual festival of the 
Hyacinthia, and its temple of Apollo, with the 
colossal statue of the god himself.—A., an ancient 
city on the coast of Campania, Ttaly, said to have 
been built by a colony from the Greek A. It had 
ceased to exist in the time of Pliny. 
AMYGDA'LEZ, or DRUPACEZ, according 
to some botanists, a natural order of dicotyledonous 
plants, but more generally regarded as a sub-order 
of RosAcea. The species are all trees or shrubs. 
They have the tube of the calyx lined with a disk, 
the pistil a solitary simple carpel with a terminal 
style, the fruit a drupe. ]For other botanical charac- 
ters, see Rosacez. The bark yields gum, and 
hydrocyanic acid is present in very notable quantity 
in different parts, as the leaves, kernels, &c.” The A. 
are chiefly natives of the cold and temperate regions 
of the northern hemisphere. Some of them yield 
valuable fruits; and various products of the order 
are used in medicine. See ALMoND, PEACH, NECTA- 
RINE, PLuM, CHERRY, and CHERRY LAUREL. This 
order or sub-order contains about 110 known species. 
AMY'GDALOID (from amygdalus, an almond), 
a rock, consisting of a basis of some kind of trap 
rock, very frequently of greenstone, forming numer- 
ous roundish or oval cells, which are filled with 
nodules, often of calcareousspar or of zeolitic minerals. 
The cells are not of large size, but even those which 
are almost adjacent differ much in this respect. The 
nodules are evidently the result of a sublimation 
and imperfect crystallisation, under the action l(;f the 
2