Alkena

[Corrupted Arabic.] A fixed star of magnitude 2, called also y Geminorum. ăl-kěn-nạ, ăl-hen-nạ. [HENNA.] ǎl-kěrm'-ěs, s. [In Fr. alkermes; Sp. alker mes, alquermes; Arab. al = the, and kermes.] [KERMES.] O. Med. An imagined remedy made mainly of kermes "berries," really the swelled bodies of insects belonging to the family Coccidæ, that to which the cochineal insect belongs. With this were combined into a confection, pippin-cyder, rose-water, sugar, ambergris, musk, cinnamon, aloes-wood, pearls, and leaf gold. Sometimes, however, the sweets were omitted from this strange confection. Much medicinal virtue was attached to it; but it is almost needle to add that it has disappeared from the modern pharmacopeia. "The other is of beads, made of the scarlet powder, which they call kermes , which is the principal ingre Bacon : dient in their cordial confection alkermes." Baco Nat. Hist., Cent. x., § 965. IMG:content-0365.png:[blocks in formation] "I had rather believe all the fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran , than that this universal frame is without a mind."-Bacon: E ays, Civ. and Mor., chap. xvi. 2. Arch . The name given to a high slender tower in Persian mosques in which the priests at stated times recite aloud prayers from the Koran. ( Gwilt .)