_Alasnam's Mirror_. When Alasnam was in search of his ninth statue, the king of the Genii gave him a test mirror, in which he was to look when he saw a beautiful girl; "if the glass remained pure and unsullied, the damsel would be the same, but if not, the damsel would not be wholly pure in body and in mind." This mirror was called "the touchstone of virtue."--_Arabian Nights_ ("Prince Zeyn Alasnam"). ALAS'TOR, a surname of Zeus as "the Avenger." Or, in general, any deity or demon who avenges wrong done by man. Shelley wrote a poem, _Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude_. Cicero says he meditated killing himself that he might become the Alastor of Augustus, whom he hated.--Plutarch, _Cicero, etc._ ("Parallel Lives.") God Almighty mustered up an army of mice against the archbishop [_Hatto_], and sent them to persecute him as his furious Alastors.--Coryat, _Crudities_, 571. AL'BAN (_St._) of Ver'ulam, hid his confessor, St. Am'phibal, and changing clothes with him, suffered death in his stead. This was during the frightful persecution of Maximia'nus Hercu'lius, general of Diocle'tian's army in Britain, when 1000 Christians fell at Lichfield. Alban--our proto-martyr called. Drayton, _Polyolbion_, xxiv. [1622]. AL'BERICK OF MORTEMAR, the same as Theodorick the hermit of Engaddi, an exiled nobleman. He tells king Richard the history of his life, and tries to dissuade him from sending a letter of defiance to the archduke of Austria.--Sir W. Scott, _The Talisman_ (time, Richard I.). _Al' berick_, the squire of prince Richard, one of the sons of Henry II. of England.--Sir W. Scott, _The Betrothed_ (time, Henry II.). ALBERT, commander of the _Britannia_. Brave, liberal, and just, softened and refined by domestic ties and superior information. His ship was dashed against the projecting verge of Cape Colonna, the most southern point of Attica, and he perished in the sea because Rodmond (second in command) grasped one of his legs and could not be shaken off. Though trained in boisterous elements, his mind Was yet by soft humanity refined; Each joy of wedded love at home he knew, Abroad, confessed the father of his crew.... His genius, ever for th' event prepared, Rose with the storm, and all its dangers shared. Falconer, _The Shipwreck_, i. 2 (1756). _Albert_, father of Gertrude, patriarch and judge of Wyo'ming (called by Campbell Wy'oming). Both Albert and his daughter were shot by a mixed force of British and Indian troops, led by one Brandt, who made an attack on the settlement, put all the inhabitants to the sword, set fire to the fort, and destroyed all the houses.--Campbell, _Gertrude of Wyoming_ (1809). _Albert_, in Goethe's romance called _The Sorrows of Werther_, is meant for his friend Kestner. He is a young German farmer, who married Charlotte Buff (called "Lotte" in the novel), with whom Goethe was in love. Goethe represents himself under the name of Werther (_q. v._).