and ants, upon which it principally subsists. These are taken by means of the long tongue, which is covered with a sticky secretion from great salivary glands; this tongue is thrust among the disturbed ants or laid in their path, and, when a number have adhered to it, is drawn into the mouth.

Only one young one is said to be produced annually, so that the creature is nowhere numerous; nor is this to be regretted, for it has few, if any, qualities to recommend it to man's attention. Another species, the tamandua (Tamandua tetradactyla), is much smaller, has a shorter head and short, bristly hair, and a slender, prehensile tail; its body is black, while the head, neck, fore-limbs, and hind-quarters are yellowish-white -a strange dress, varying a good deal among individuals. It also dwells in the equatorial for est of America, but is wholly arboreal, seeking its insect food and making its home in trees. A third species, the little, or two-toed, ant-eater (Cycloturus didactylus), is not larger than a rat, is clothed in silky fur, and dwells altogether in trees, for which its long, prehensile tail and curious feet have become especially modified; another species inhabits Costa Rica. For portraits of the three species mentioned above, see plate of

ANT-EATERS.

Other animals called ant-eaters are: (1) The manids, or scaly ant-eaters. (See MANIS.) (2) The aard-vark (q.v.). (3) The porcupine ant-eaters, or Echidna. (See ECHIDNA.) (4) The Australian insectivorous marsupials of the genus Myrmecobius, as Myrmecobius fasciatus, of West Australia, about as large as a squirrel, chestnut ed, with white and dark stripes on the back. It has a long, slender tongue, like a true ant-eater, but it has more teeth than any other living mam mal. It scratches open ant-hills for its food. (See plate of PHALANGERS.) (5) Any of various ant-eating birds.

di

AN'TEDILU'VIAN (Lat. ante, before luvium, flood). A word used to denote whatever existed before the Flood. The antediluvian ages are those which elapsed before the Flood; and in theological language, the antediluvian religion means the religion of the patriarchs from Adam to Noah. In geology, the antediluvian period had no reference to the Deluge recorded in the Mosaic narrative, but signified only the final transformation of the earth by means of water. The term is not in current use at the present

time.

AN'TEDON. See CRINOIDEA.

AN'TEFIX (Lat. neut. pl. antefixa, from ante, before + fixus, fastened, fixed). A terracotta or marble decoration along the edge of the

ANTEFIX.

roof of classic buildings, covering the end of the row of semi-circular tiles placed over the joints

of the flat tiles on the roof. They were upright slabs, usually decorated with a single head or an anthemion, although sometimes they were composed of entire figures or even groups. The Etruscans developed this form of roof ornament even more than the Greeks.

ANTELAMI, än'tâ-lä'mê, BENEDETTO. A north Italian architect and sculptor of the twelfth century; one of the most notable artists preceding Nicola Pisano. His masterpiece is the baptistery at Parma with its numerous and important sculptures.

horned animal). Any of many hollow-horned AN'TELOPE (Gk. avvóλop, antholops, a the family Antilopidae) within the family Boruminants forming a group (formerly esteemed vida, and usually classified between the cattle ular use, often includes on the one hand a group and goats. The English word, in its widest poprepresented by the chamois and the Rocky Mountain goat, preferably designated goat-antelopes; and on the other the American antelope or prongfamily. Scientifically, as now restricted by R. horn (q.v.), which belongs to a quite different Lydekker and recent students, the term excludes from other bovines by definite characters, yet these forms. The group cannot be demarked as a whole it is easily recognized by the graceful build of its members (exhibited in the accompanying illustrations), their short hair, lively colors, manner of carrying the head uplifted, and which may or may not be present in the females, the absence of a goat-like beard. "The horns, are generally long, more or less cylindrical, and often lyrate in shape; while they are frequently marked with prominent rings and have an upright direction. Their bony internal cores, instead of being honeycombed, as in the oxen, sheep and goats, are nearly solid throughout. These animals generally have a gland beneath the eye, and goats."-(Lydekker). In size they vary from by which they are distinguished from the oxen a foot in height to the bigness of a large horse. Almost all are timid, peaceable animals, with small means of defense, and trusting for safety to the agility and fleetness in which they excel. Most of them inhabit plains, and these are highly gregarious; a few are found only in mountainous regions, while others dwell in pairs or small bands in jungles and deep forests. Paleontologists inform us that antelopes are the most generalized members of the Bovidæ now existing, and "since they are also its oldest known representatives, it is probable that from them have been derived the more specialized types," oxen, sheep, goats, etc.

Though now wholly restricted to Asia and Africa, the antelopes had formerly a wide distribution in Europe and Asia alone. Their disappearance from Europe and spread into Africa within recent times (geologically speaking), and their enormous multiplication there, form one of the most remarkable incidents in the history of the mammalia. When South Africa was first penetrated by Europeans, many species were found ranging its grassy plains in enormous herds, which formed the principal resource for animal food of the natives and a great number of carnivorous animals. This continued until the middle of the nineteenth century, when the rapid spread of English and Dutch colonization swept them away. Vast numbers were wasted by sportsmen and reckless colonists, or were killed for the sake of their flesh and hides, until

now the great herds have disappeared from the remotest veldts, many species a few years ago numbered by tens of thousands are reduced to scattered bands, and others have become wholly extinct. The wide and rapid destruction of these abundant, valuable, and beautiful animals can be paralleled elsewhere only by the swift extermination of the American bison. Several species are represented only by small bands preserved upon private estates.

Antelopes fall into certain groups having a common resemblance. These will be outlined here, leaving the reader to consult for details the separate articles upon individual species, the most important of which will be found described in their alphabetical places. One collocation is that of the antelopine gazelles, including a large number of species elegantly shaped and colored, as a rule not exceeding 30 inches in height, with hairy muzzles and teeth resembling those of goats, and with ringed and usually lyrate or spiral horns; they inhabit deserts from the Cape of Good Hope to India. Here among less noteworthy kinds, fall the familiar ariel and other gazelles, the black-buck of India, the saiga, chiru, springbok, impalla, and the like. Another group (cervicaprine) is represented by the small African reed-bucks, the larger water-bucks, cobus, etc., the smaller rehboks and klipspringer, and the diminutive steinboks. A third (cephalophine) group is composed of the duikerboks and other forest-ranging species of Africa, among which are the smallest known ruminants, the least (see BLUEBUCK) being only 13 inches tall. Only the males of these are provided with horns, and one species (see CHOUSINGHA) has four horns. These pygmies are connected with the cattle by the alcephaline antelopes, all large African species characterized by their much greater height at the withers than at the rump, and by

having horns in both sexes, the cores of which are

cellular as in oxen; prominent examples are the hartbeests, blesbok, bontebok, and gnus. Diverg, ing oppositely from the typical gazelles toward the goats, the hippotragine section has been made to include very large African antelopes having long, stout, ringed horns in both sexes, such as the sable and roan antelopes, the extinct blaubok, addax, gemsbok and allied species. Another set of large species is the tragclaphine, represented in India by the nilgai, and in Africa by the bushbuck, koodoo, eland, etc. They are the largest, most valuable, and handsomest of all, their ground colors being bright and often ornamented or "harnessed" with conspicuous stripes, while their faces are beautifully marked. Consult: For former abundance in Africa, Harris, Game Animals of Africa (London, 1840), with colored folio plates; Lichtstein, Säugethiere und Vögel aus dem Kaffernlande (Berlin, 1842); and the narratives of Livingstone, Gordon Cumming, Andersson, Drummond, Baker, Schweinfurth, Selous, and similar explorers and sportsmen. For more modern conditions. Millais, A Breath from the Veldt (London, 1895); and Bryden, Nature and Sport in South Africa (London, 1897). For Asiatic species, Baker, Wild Beasts and their Ways (London, 1890); Blanford, Fauna of British India: Mammals (London, 1888). For zoology, Sclater and Thomas, The Book of the Antelopes (London, 1896); Brooke, Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London (1871-73).

For the so-called antelope of western North America, see PRONGHORN.

AN'TENA'TI (Lat. nom. plur. of antenatus, from ante, before + natus, born). In law and history, persons born before a certain time or event, especially with reference to the existence of rights which are claimed. The term is specifically applied: (a) To children born before the marriage of their parents. By the common law of England such children are held to be bastards and do not become legitimate upon the subsequent marriage of their parents, whereas in the civil and canon law antenati are legitimate and capable of inheriting the real property of the father as if born after marriage. The commonlaw rule prevails in the United States excepting where it has been changed by statute. (See BASTARD; HEIR; LEGITIMACY.) (b) In English history, to those natives of Scotland who were born before the accession of the Scotch King James VI. to the throne of England as James I., and whose status as English citizens was therefore disputed. (c) In American history, to Americans born in this country before the Declaration of Independence; and, also, to those citizens of the colony of New York who were born during the period of Dutch sovereignty and who survived the transfer of the territory and government to the English crown. The property rights of the antenati, and, to a certain extent, the benefits of the Dutch law were expressly preserved to them by the articles of capitulation, 1664. Consult the historical introduction to the Grolier Club, Facsimile of Bradford's Laws of New York, 1694 (New York. 1894). See the articles ALLEGIANCE; AN

AN'TENNA'TA (Lat. antenna, sail-yard, Neo-Lat. a feeler; horn of an insect). A class of

Arthropoda characterized by the possession of one and head distinctly marked off from the trunk; pair of preoral feelers, three parts of oral limbs respiration by tubular trachea, opening exter stigmata. The class is divided into two subnally by segmentally arranged openings called classes: Myriapoda, or centipedes, etc., and Hexapoda, or insects (qq.v.).

ANTEʼNOR (Gk. 'Avrývap, Antenōr). The wise Trojan who advised his fellow-citizens to send Helen back to her husband. In return for his friendliness to the Greeks, his house was spared during the sack of Troy. A later version represents him as betraying the city. Legends differ about him: one is that he built a city on the site of Troy; others make him the founder of various cities in northern Italy, or Cyrene.

ANTENOR ('Avrηvwp). An Athenian sculptor of the sixth century B.C. He made the original statues of Harmodius and Aristogiton, which were carried to Susa by Xerxes (480 B.C.). After the conquest of Persia, they were restored by Alexander the Great, and were set up in the Ceramicus, where they were placed originally.

AN'TEPEN'DIUM (Lat. ante, before + pendere, to hang). A hanging in front of the altar. As the earliest Christian altars were usually tables of wood or marble, it was customary during service to hang or set in front of them a richly decorated piece of stuff or metal relief. See ALTAR.

ANTEQUERA, än'tâ-kä'rà (anciently Antiquaria). An important manufacturing town in the province of Malaga, Spain, situated in a fer