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The symbol 'M' was formerly used as a brand or stigma impressed on people convicted of manslaughter and admitted to the benefit of clergy.
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MASH (properly M*A*S*H) was an American anti-war situation comedy television show about a mobile army surgical hospital during the Korean War. MASH was created by Larry Gelbart, and Gene Reynolds and projected Alan Alda in the starring role of 'Hawkeye' to international fame. MASH was produced by CBS and TCF and ran from 1972 to 1983, becoming more and more shocking and anti-war until its highly disturbing final episode.
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Ma'am is a colloquial contraction of madam (my lady) often used in direct address, and sometimes as an appellation.
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Mabble is an archaic term meaning 'to wrap up'.
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Mac is a prefix in modern Irish and Gaelic signifying 'son', as MacDonald, son of Donald. But there are numerous historical uses of the prefix in the sense of 'great', evidently a corruption of the 'mag' in 'magnus'. The Welsh equivalent is Map or Ap, the Norman equivalent Fitz and the Irish O'.
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Macadamising is a form of road surfacing introduced to Britain by John McAdam, in 1816. The process involves covering the road surface with small, broken stones, so as to form a smooth, hard, convex surface - the surface being convex so as to allow water to run off to the sides. Today the stones are mixed with molten asphalt and compressed by a roller.
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Macaranga gum is a crimson coloured gum obtained from the Macaranga Indica tree that grows in the East Indies. It was formerly used in taking impressions of coins, medallions, etc. and sometimes as a medicine.
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The Macaroni Club was an 18th century London club of dandies which sought to introduce foppish elegance in dress and bearing.
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Macassar oil is a kind of oil that was formerly used in dressing the hair. It was so called because it was originally obtained from Macassar, a district of the Island of Celebes. The term is also applied to an imitation of the real oil made of perfumed castor oil and olive oil.
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The maccabees are two ancient historical books, which give accounts of Jewish affairs in or about the time of the Maccabean princes. They are received as canonical books in the Roman Catholic Church, but are included in the Apocrypha by Protestants.
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Maccaboy is a kind of snuff named after the district where it is made in the Island of Martinique.
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Maceration is an infusion or soaking of a substance in water or another liquid either in order to soften it or to draw out the substance's virtues.
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A machine screw is a screw or bolt which is specially adapted for screwing into metal, rather than wood.
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Macilent is an archaic term for thin or lean.
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A mackinaw blanket was a thick blanket formerly in common use in the western part of the USA.
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The Macon Bill No 2 was an American bill so called from its author, Nathaniel Macon, which was passed by Congress on May the 1st, 1810, as a means of extricating the United States from the difficulties caused by the aggressions of England and France. It provided that commerce should be free, but that if either England should withdraw her Orders in Council or France her Berlin and Milan Decrees, intercourse should be prohibited with the nation which retained them.
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Mactation is an archaic term for sacrificing a victim.
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The Mad Parliament was the Parliament held at Oxford in 1258 and broke out into open rebellion against Henry III. The king was declared deposed, and the government was vested in the hands of twenty-four councillors with Simon Montfort at their head.
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Madoc or Madog, was a legendary Welsh prince, a son of Owain Gwynedd, who is said, in accordance with a tradition first published in the sixteenth century, to have sailed west about 1171 and discovered America. The first mention of this Madog is in a Welsh poem of the fourteenth century. The legend is highly dubious.
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The maelstrom is an ocean current between the Norwegian islands of Moskenas and Mosken, in the Lofoden group.
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The Magen David is a six-pointed star of David adopted as a Jewish symbol around the 17th century.
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Magenta is a brilliant, purple-red dye extracted from coal-tar and named after the Battle of Magenta which was fought in 1859 shortly before the dye was discovered.
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Magnetic north is the pole of the lines of magnetic force that run north and south through the earth. It changes its position slightly from year to year, but in general it is in an area north of Canada, roughly at longitude 97 degrees West and latitude 71 degrees North.
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Maguey is a fibre derived from various species of American agave plants, and used for making rope.
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A mahlstick is a wooden rod with a round padded end, used as a rest by decorative artists and sign writers upon which to steady the hand holding the paint brush.
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Mahogany is a light hard wood from trees of the family Meliaceae, that was first introduced to Britain as ballast cargo from Cuba and Central America and became popular for making furniture during the 18th century. Mahogany is valuable as it shrinks very little when it dries, and suffers very little from warping or twisting.
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A maid-of-all-work is a general domestic servant. They were typically employed by lower income households who could not afford a reticule of servants, and as such the maid-of-all-work carried out all the house work, from cooking to washing up, making beds, cleaning the fire places, making the beds, sweeping and cleaning.
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The maiden was a type of guillotine constructed at Edinburgh in 1564 and used until 1710 or possibly later for beheading criminals. The maiden consisted of a broad square of iron, about 12 inches square, very sharp at the lower edge and weighted above with a very heavy piece of lead. At the time of execution, the blade was hoisted up a wooden frame about ten feet tall with mouldings on each side for the blade to slide in. A convenience was made about four feet above the ground for the condemned to lay his neck, and he was then fixed with a bar to prevent him stirring. Upon a signal being given, the blade was released and falling separated the victim's head from his body.
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In grammar, a main clause is a clause which can stand on its own and make complete sense. For example 'the boy ate his lunch'. Main clauses are often combined with conjunctions or subordinate clauses to make for a more interesting, though complex sentences.
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The Maine Law was a law prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, first adopted in the Americans state of Maine in 1851. Maine Law was passed after a lengthy campaign by the mayor of Portland, Neal Dow. In 1855 twelve other American states adopted Maine Law and declared prohibition.
In June 1855 Portland, Maine was the scene of a riot when an angry pro-liquor crowd congregated outside Portland City Hall. The Governor, Anson Morrill, a prohibitionist, called out the militia and Mayor Dow the leader of the militia force, ordered the militia to open fire on the crowd, killing one man and injuring several others.
In 1885 the state of Maine adopted Maine Law into its constitution, and in 1919 the American Congress through the Volstead Act introduced the Eighteenth Amendment thereby adopting Maine Law nationwide. So began American prohibition on January the 16th 1920. However, by 1930 it was clear that most Americans were ignoring the law and were continuing to drink liquor illegally, and in 1933 the ' noble experiment', was repealed by the twenty-first Amendment. Almost a year later Maine repealed its own Maine Law, although it was not until 1970 that liquor could be sold on a Sunday in Maine and then only in Class A restaurants. In 1973 Sunday trading of beer and wine was finally allowed in Maine.
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Makutu is the Polynesian form of witchcraft.
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Malacca is the stem of the rattan palm. The term is also applied (and sometimes as a Malacca cane) to a walking stick made from this stem.
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Something which is malleable can be hammered into a new shape with out fracturing or returning to its original shape.
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A mandate is a written authority given by one person (the mandator) to another (the mandatory) giving the mandatory the power to act on behalf of the mandator. It comes to an end on the death, mental illness, or bankruptcy of the mandator.
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A mangle is a machine for wringing or squeezing water out of wet washing. A
mangle is comprised of two heavy cylinders, worked by a handle which roll over each other.
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Manichaeism (Manicheism) was a religious system containing elements of Christianity, Gnosticism, and paganism. Manichaeism was founded by Manes, a Persian. in the 3rd century and became widespread through the Roman Empire and Asia until the 5th century when it started to decline, eventually disappearing around the 13th century. Manichaeism was based on a supposed primeval conflict between the forces of light and of darkness, and represented the evil Satan as coeternal with the good God.
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The Manifest Destiny was a cant American phrase enjoying much vogue in the 1840's, signifying the manifest destiny of the United States to acquire complete supremacy upon the American continent. The notion, though in some aspects a patriotic and noble one, was made a cover for unscrupulous aggressions upon weaker powers, as in the case of the Mexican War.
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Manism is the worship of ancestors.
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In Britain, a manor was a landed estate granted on such terms that the right of property carried with it rights of jurisdiction. It was of the nature of a feudal lordship, and the holder of the manor, the lord, could extract certain fees etc from his tenants, the ordinary people living on the land.
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In ancient Greece, mantike was a form of divination used to seek advice concerning a future action. It was popular until the introduction of astrology, and was used by both individuals and states. Popular methods employed were the interpretation of sacrificial victims' entrails (hieroscopia) or by the flight of birds (oionoscopia).
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Marbury Vs Madison was a famous American legal case. William Marbury and others, having been appointed justices of the peace in the District of Columbia by President Adams, with the consent of the Senate, and having, on President Jefferson's accession, failed to receive their respective commissions of appointment, moved the Supreme Court to issue a mandamus to James Madison, Secretary of State, commanding him to deliver their several commissions. The court decided that William Marbury was legally entitled to his commission, but that the Constitution did not invest it with the authority to issue a mandamus in such a case. The rule was discharged in February, 1803. Thus the court declared unconstitutional a portion of an Act of Congress, the Judiciary Act of 1789, which purported to grant such authority. This was the first important case in which the Court set aside an act of Congress because of conflict with the Constitution.
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In the USA, March the fourth is the day chosen for the Presidential inauguration. Its choice dates from the year 1788, that day being designated, after the ratification of the Constitution by the States, as inauguration day, by the Congress of the old Confederation. They fixed on the first Wednesday in January, 1789, for the choice of the electors; the first Wednesday in February for the voting by the electors; the first Wednesday in March (March 4th that year) for the inauguration. The Twelfth Amendment made this the constitutional day.
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Marine soap was a former variety of soap made from coconut oil and intended to be used with salt water.
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Mariolatry is worship of the virgin Mary. It began in the 4th century and greatly increased in the 10th.
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During the 17th century it was claimed that witches possessed the
Mark of Satan on their body.
There were claimed to be two kinds of this mark: visible and invisible. Visible marks included moles, warts, birth-stains, supernumerary teats and spots of an unusual appearance. In an effort to find these visible marks, a woman suspected of witch craft was stripped naked and had all her hair shaved off. The witch finders claimed that the invisible kind of mark could be found because at that point the flesh of the victim was unsusceptible to pain, and would not bleed when punctured. If there existed on any part of the skin surface a spot that did not bleed when cut, then that was deemed evidence of a witch.
In searching for an invisible mark of Satan, a witch finder systematically pricked all parts of the victim's body so as to discover a spot that failed to yield blood, or until the accused woman ceased to cry out in pain. The test was usually successful because the torture was so severe that the woman would either pretend not to feel any pain so as to end the ordeal, or would become insensitive to pain and delirious. An account of such a trial appears in the 1785 edition of Beccaria's 'Essay on Crimes and Punishments':
'In the year 1652, a country woman, named Michelle Chaudron, of the little territory of Geneva, met the Devil in her way from the city. The Devil gave her a kiss, received her homage, and imprinted on her upper lip, and on her right breast, the mark which he is wont to bestow upon his favourites. This seal of the Devil is a little sign upon the skin, which renders it insensible, as we are assumed by all the demonographical civilians of those times. The devil ordered Michelle Chaudron to bewitch two young girls. She obeyed her master punctually, the parents of the two girls accusing her of dealing with the devil. The girls being confronted with the criminal, declared that they felt a continual pricking in some parts of their bodies, and that they were possessed. Physicians were called, at least men that passed for physicians in those days. They visited the girls. They sought for the seal of the devil on the body of Michelle, which seal is called, in the verbal process, the Satanical mark. Into one of these marks they plunged a long needle, which was already no small torture. Blood issued from the wound and Michelle testified by her cries, that the part was not insensible.
The judges not finding sufficient proof that Michelle Chaudron was a witch, ordered her to be tortured, which infallibly produced the proof they wanted. The poor wretch overcome by torment, confessed, at last, everything they desired. The physicians sought again for the Satanical mark, and found it in a little black spot on one of her thighs. Into this they plunged the needle. the poor creature, exhausted and almost expiring with the pain of the torture, was insensible to the needle, and did not cry out. She was instantly condemned to be burnt, but the world beginning at this time to be a little more civilised, she was previously strangled.'
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Most British boroughs came into being through the action of the King or some great noble or bishop in selecting a strong point, primarily as a centre of defence, in late Anglo-Saxon or early Norman times. In the more peaceful days, the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, town burgesses began to increase their freedom to control markets and trade by purchasing charters, or documents setting out the town's right to the status of borough, free to conduct its own affairs in return for an annual payment to the King. The wording of the charter often included the right to hold a weekly market and an annual fair. The market was the most important weekly event in the life of a mediaeval town, and the essential nucleus of the town became the market square. This was the place where agricultural produce from the surrounding countryside could be sold, and where the town craftsmen could display their wares. Stalls and booths, at first temporary and later permanent, began to be erected in the centre of the market place, and outlying parts of the
market were set aside for the sale of livestock. Later, many towns acquired a market hall, or town hall, with a meeting hall for the transaction of business on the upper floor and open arches at ground level where goods might be displayed out of the rain. The market was concerned with supplying local needs; a similar form of business held in certain towns was the fair which had a wider significance because they attracted traders from other parts of England and even from the Continent. At fairs one might buy the specialised products of certain parts of England, such as Sussex iron, Worcestershire salt, Derbyshire lead or Cornish tin, or spectacle lenses ground at Augsburg in Germany, beaten copperware from Dinant in modern Belgium or cutlery from Solingen in Germany.
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The Marmion Case was an American legal case involving slaves. Under an act of the South Carolina Legislature passed in 1822, any free negroes entering the ports of the State on ships could be imprisoned until the ship departed. This was done in the case of the Marmion. In 1824 the Attorney-General and in 1823 the District Court of the United States rendered opinions that this law was incompatible with the Constitution and the international obligations of the United States.
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The Marprelate Controversy was a pamphlet warfare carried on in 1589 and 1590 by the Elizabethan Puritans against the established system of Episcopacy. The pamphlets were by various writers, but were generally issued under the generic pen-name of Martin Marprelate. The authorities endeavoured to repress their licence by severe measures, and some of the writers were executed. These pamphlets were met by others defending Episcopacy, and Bacon intervened to make peace with an essay in favour of moderation and tolerance.
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Marquetry is the art of veneering or inlaying with wood. The art was known in Egypt and the East two thousand years ago and was introduced from Persia into Venice during the 14th century, whence it spread to Florence, France, Germany and Holland. As intarsia it is conspicuous in church woodwork of the 15th century.
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Marquis or marques is the second order in the peerage of England, ranking below a duke and above an earl. The title was originally applied to certain officers appointed to defend the marches or borders of Wales. The first marques proper was Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford, who was created Marques of Dublin by Richard II in 1386. In 1397 Richard made John Beaufort, earl of Somerset, Marques of Dorset. The oldest existing marquisate is that of Winchester, dating from Edward VI in 1551. The eldest son of a marquis is generally by courtesy an earl, and the younger sons and the daughters are styled lords and ladies. His wife is a marchioness. Marquis is often the courtesy title of the eldest son of a duke during his father's lifetime.
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Martin Vs Hunter's Lessee was an American legal case heard in Virginia, which questioned the jurisdiction of the US Supreme Court. In 1791 Martin brought a suit of ejectment against the defendant in the District Court of Virginia for the recovery of certain lands. This court decided for the defendant. The Court of Appeals of Virginia reversed this decision, and their judgment was in turn reversed by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1816. This judgment the Court of Appeals of Virginia refused to execute, being 'of the unanimous opinion that the appellate power of the Supreme Court of the United States does not extend to this court under a sound construction of the Constitution of the United States', and 'that the Act of Congress to that effect is not in pursuance of the said Constitution'. The Supreme Court overruled this decision and established its prerogative upon such points.
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Martinmas was the feast of St Martin, held on November the 11th. The feast was celebrated by great debauchery and boozing, the revellers becoming very drunk. The feast of Martinmas originated from the Anglo-Saxon slaughtering time, when the sheep and pigs were slaughtered and the meat salted for winter.
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The Maryland Gazette was the earliest newspaper published in Maryland, USA. It was established at Annapolis in 1727 by William Parks, and continued irregularly as a weekly until about 1736, when it was suspended. In 1745 another Gazette appeared, which, with the exception of a short suspension in 1765 on account of the Stamp Act, was published regularly during the American Revolution, and still existed as a weekly journal at the end of the 19th century. Maryland was the fourth American colony in which a newspaper was established.
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The Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser was the third newspaper established in Maryland, USA. It appeared in Baltimore in 1773, and together with the Maryland Gazette constituted the entire Revolutionary press of the State of Maryland. This paper was edited and published by William Goddard. Its publication was finally suspended in 1797.
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Mason and Dixon's Line was the boundary line between Pennsylvania and Maryland, so called from the names of the two English surveyors, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, who were employed by William Penn and Lord Baltimore to mark it off in 1766, after the settlement of the case of Pennsylvania Vs Baltimore. Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon marked the line with boundary posts, having on one side the arms of Pennsylvania and on the other those of Baltimore. The line was famous as the line between free States and slave States of the USA.
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A masquerade is a party or dance at which fancy masks and costumes are worn. In early times it was connected with religion, but was afterwards discouraged by the fathers of the church. Originating in Italy, the
masquerade was introduced into France by Catherine de'Medici; it reached England during the reign of Henry VIII, and flourished under Elizabeth I, giving rise to a special kind of play - the masque. Masquerading was forbidden in France in 1535 owing to its abuses, but was very popular with Louis XIV. It was again proscribed by the republicans in 1789.
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Mass production is the manufacture of large quantities of identical articles that may or may not be of high quality but that do not involve individual craftsmanship. Usually making use of continuous automated processes in which high-speed machines are operated by relatively small numbers of relatively unskilled employees, mass production methods are used for an increasingly wide range of products.
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The Massachusetts Centinel or Columbian as it was afterward called, was an American newspaper founded by Benjamin Russell at Boston, on March the 24th, 1784 and issued semi-weekly. It is considered the best type of the early political newspaper of the United States. The most eminent Federalist statesmen and writers contributed to this journal, which wielded no little influence in the early history of New England. It was united with the New England Palladium in 1830 and with the Boston Gazette in 1836. In 1840 it became merged in the Boston Daily Advertiser under which title it was still published daily, tri-weekly and weekly at the end of the 19th century.
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The Massachusetts Company was an English colony in North America. On March the 19th, 1628, there was granted to six patentees, of whom John Humphrey and John Endicott were destined to be most prominent, territory in America extending from the Atlantic to the Western Ocean, and in width from a line running three miles north of the Merrimac to one running three miles south of the Charles. This was the Massachusetts Bay Company. John Endicott was sent over the same year and effected a settlement at Naumkeag, or Salem, on September the 6th. On March the 4th, 1629, a charter was granted to the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay, and under this instrument Massachusetts conducted her affairs for fifty-five years. The colony was ruled by the Governor and thirteen councillors. The charter was transferred from England to America with Winthrop.
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The Massachusetts Spy was an American newspaper founded at Boston, on August 1st, 1770. This newspaper was established to support the Whig element in the New England colonies in opposition to the Boston Chronicle which favoured the British Government. It was edited by Isaiah Thomas, and was suspended in six months for a time, but was begun again and removed to Worcester. Contributions were at first made by members of both political parties, but its sympathies were so evidently revolutionary that the royalist writers withdrew.
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The Massacre of St Bartholomew was the slaughter of the French Protestants, which began on the 24th of August, 1572, by secret orders from Charles IX, at the instigation of his mother, Catharine de Medici, and in which, according to Sully, 70,000 Huguenots, including women and children, were murdered throughout the country. During the minority of Charles and the regency of his mother a long war raged in France between the Catholics and Huguenots, the leaders of the latter being the Prince of Conde and Admiral Coligny.
In 1570 overtures were made by the court to the Huguenots, which resulted in a treaty of peace. This treaty blinded the chiefs of the Huguenots, particularly the Admiral Coligny, who was wearied with civil war. The king appeared to have entirely disengaged himself from the influence of the Guises and his mother; he invited Coligny to his court, and honoured him as a father. The most artful means were employed to increase this delusion. The sister of the king was married to the Prince de Beam on August the 18th 1572 in order to allure the most distinguished Huguenots to Paris. On August the 22nd a shot from a window wounded the admiral. The king hastened to visit him, and swore to punish the author of the villainy; but on the same day he was induced by his mother to believe that the admiral had designs on his life. 'God's death!' he exclaimed; 'kill the admiral; and not only him, but all the Huguenots; let none remain to disturb us.' The following night Catharine held the bloody council, which fixed the execution for the night of St Bartholomew, August the 24th, 1572. After the assassination of Coligny a bell from the tower of the royal palace at midnight gave to the assembled companies of burghers the signal for the general massacre of the Huguenots. The Prince of Conde and the King of Navarre saved their lives by going to mass and pretending to embrace the Catholic religion. By the king's orders the massacre was extended throughout the whole kingdom; and the horrible slaughter continued for thirty days in almost all the provinces.
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Matricide is the term for the murder of a mother.
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A matt was a British measure of clover equivalent to about 80 lbs, in use during the 19th century.
In painting and decorating, the term matt means without gloss or sheen.
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Matthew's bible was a version of the Bible, in English, edited by John Rogers, superintendent of the English church in Germany, and published by him in 1537 under the pseudonym of Thomas Matthews.
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The mattock is an agricultural implement comprised of a metal head having blades at each end presented in different planes, and an eye in the middle into which a handle is inserted perpendicularly to the head. The cutting edges are presented like those of an axe and an adze, and the mattock was used formerly in forests and plantations for grubbing among stumps and trees whose roots prevented the use of a spade.
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The maund was a unit of measurement used in India around 1900. It is equivalent to 40 seer.
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Maunds are gifts distributed to the poor on Maundy Thursday. The number of doles corresponds to the number of years the monarch has been regnant, and the doles used to be distributed by the Lord High Almoner. In 1883 the doles were changed to money payments distributed by the Clerk of the Almonry Office. The custom began in 1368 in the reign of Edward III. James I distributed the doles personally. By the reign of Elizabeth II the doles were little more than symbolic.
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Maundy Thursday is the day before Good Friday. It was a tradition of the Christian church that on Maundy Thursday, food was distributed by the practitioners to the poor.
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In America, a maverick is a cattle found straying, which may be branded and claimed by the finder. The word is derived from Samuel Maverick, a Texan, who appropriated a good many head found straying at the end of the civil-war.
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Mazda are a Japanese motor car manufacturing company. Mazda The name Mazda comes from 'Ahura Mazda', the highest Zoroastrian God of reason who granted wisdom and united man, nature and the other gods. Mazda was founded by Jujiro Matsuda in 1920 as 'Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd' which started manufacturing machine tools in 1929, and in 1931 produced its first motor vehicle, a three-wheel truck called the Mazdago. The first car produced by Mazda was the 1960 Mazda R360 Coupe, a two-door passenger vehicle, while in 1962 appeared the four-door Mazda Carol. In 1989 Mazda produced the Mazda MX-5, which quickly became famous as the world's best selling roadster. In 1979 the American motor car company Ford acquired a ten percent stake in Mazda and the company proceeded as a joint Japanese-American venture.
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The Mazda MX-5 is a Japanese-American two seater front-engined, rear-wheel drive roadster produced in various engine sizes since 1989, in both soft top and hard top coupe models. The Mazda MX-5 has a top speed in the region of 130 mph and can reach 60 mph from still in about 7.9 seconds. The Mazda MX-5 was developed in California and Tokyo, with the prototype - code named V705 - first driven in Santa Barbara, California in 1985. Since its introduction the Mazda MX-5 has achieved cult status and is the most popular roadster ever created.
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A maze is a confusing network of passages and winding interconnecting paths.
A maze was a British measurement for herring equal to 615 fish.
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Mazer-bowls, also known simply as a mazer or a mazer cup, we drinking vessels first introduced to Britain in the 14th century. They were a bowl made of spotted maple wood, whence their name, and normally mounted in latten metal, silver or silver-gilt, with a wide band around the rim. Often a circular medallion was mounted in the bottom of the bowl, and the whole was finished by a foot or set upon a baluster. By the end of the 16th century were the most popular drinking vessels in Britain.
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The Mazzei letter was a private business letter written by Thomas Jefferson to an Italian named Mazzei in 1796. The paragraph therein contained, to the effect that 'an Anglican monarchical aristocratical party' had sprung up in America, whose avowed object was 'to draw over us the substance, as they had already done the forms, of the British Government', did much toward arousing animosity against Thomas Jefferson, when the letter became public property in 1797. It had been translated into Italian, then into French, and finally appeared in an English paper. An allusion in it to men who had been 'Samsons in the field and Solomons in the council' was construed as an attack on George Washington.
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McCulloch Vs Maryland was a famous legal case in the US Supreme Court, brought by writ of error from the Court of Appeals of Maryland to the Supreme Court in 1819.
McCulloch was cashier of a branch established in Baltimore by the Bank of the United States, of Philadelphia, which had been incorporated by an act of Congress in 1816. The action was one of
debt brought by the State of Maryland against McCulloch, who, it was averred, had refused to comply with an act of the Maryland General Assembly of 1818, which imposed a 'tax upon all banks or branches thereof in the State of Maryland, not chartered by the Legislature." The decision of the Court of Appeals of Maryland had been against the plaintiff. The Supreme Court reversed this decision, declaring that the Bank Act of 1816 was constitutional, and that therefore the act of the Maryland Legislature of 1818 was contrary to the Constitution of the United States, and therefore void, because States have no power, by taxation or otherwise, to impede or control the operations of constitutional laws enacted by Congress to carry into execution any of the powers of the Federal Government.
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McFingal is a famous American political satire of the Revolutionary period. It written by John Trumbull, of Connecticut and published in 1782. It is an imitation of Butler's Hudibras.
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The McKinley Act was an American bill submitted in Congress by Representative William McKinley, of Ohio, and which became law on October 1st, 1890. It provided for a high rate of duty on a large number of articles imported from foreign countries, but made sugar free. This act was designed to reduce the national revenue and increase protection.
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Meal times in Britain have varied greatly over the years. In the fourteenth century breakfast was taken at five; dinner at nine and supper at four.
In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries breakfast had advanced to seven; dinner eleven and supper six. Towards the end of the sixteenth century dinner advanced to midday.
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The Meal Tub Plot was a plot in 1679 against the then duke of York, afterwards James II, contrived by a man called Dangerfield, who hid a bundle of seditious letters in the lodgings of colonel Maunsell, and then gave customs officers information that smuggled goods were hidden there. Dangerfield was arrested on suspicion of forging the letters, and subsequently papers were found hidden in a meal tub at the house of a woman with whom he cohabited, which contained the scheme to be sworn to, accusing the most eminent Protestants at the time, who were opposed to the duke of York's succession, of treason. Particularly accused were the earls of Shaftsbury, Essex and Halifax. Dangerfield had been previously whipped for a similar offence, and so on this occasion on the 1st of June 1685 he had one of his eyes struck out, the punishment conducted by the barrister Robert Francis. This caused Dangerfield's death, and his assailant was hanged.
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In statistics, mean deviation is the arithmetic mean of the deviations (all taken as positive numbers) of all the numbers in a set of numbers from their arithmetic mean. For example, the arithmetic mean of 5, 8, 9, and 10 is 8, and therefore the deviations from this mean are 3, 0, 1, and 2, giving a
mean deviation of 1.5.
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The Mecklenburg Declaration was an alleged resolution passed on May the 20th, 1775, by a convention of the inhabitants of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, favouring independence from Great Britain, and actually declaring the independence of Mecklenburg County. The declaration first became generally known in 1818. It was alleged, however, that the original documents were destroyed by fire in 1800. The probability is that the story arises from action taken on May the 31st, 1775, when resolutions were passed importing resistance to the royal governor, but not independence.
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The Normans in Britain concentrated the defence of the country in castles, which began to be built all over. In many places where a castle was built in a strategically important position, especially in regions liable to attack such as the Scottish and Welsh borders, a new town began to cluster round it, seeking its protection and supplying its daily needs. Such towns as Arundel, Alnwick, Devizes, Barnard Castle, Launceston, Ludlow, Newcastle upon Tyne, Pontefract and Richmond in Yorkshire all grew up in the shelter of great Norman castles, and many of them were provided with walls.
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A median is a form of mean in which a set of numbers is arranged in an ascending or descending scale and the middle number (if there are an odd number in the set) or the arithmetic mean of the middle two numbers (if there are an even number) is taken as the median. This can give a more representative average in some circumstances than an arithmetic mean or a geometric mean.
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Mediation is the intervention of a neutral third party in an industrial dispute. The object is to enable the two sides to reach a compromise solution to their differences, which the mediator usually does by seeing representatives of each side separately and then together. If the mediator has power to make binding awards the process is known as arbitration; if he can only suggest means of settling the dispute it is known as conciliation.
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The Medjidieh was an Ottoman order and decoration instituted in 1852 by Sultan Abdul Medjid as both a civil and military award. There were five classes in the order, and the decoration consisted of a silver sun, with seven threefold rays, which alternate with the crescent and the star.
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Megilp is a substance added to graining colour to prevent it from flowing together and to help it to retain its sharpness of definition after it has been combed or figured. Skilled grainers often prepare their own meglip to secret recipes.
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Meliorism is the doctrine that the world may be made better by human effort.
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Melissophilia is the sexual arousal by bee stings.
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The mell supper was a former harvest supper at which master and servants sat together at the table.
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In psychology, a meme is a unit of idea, behaviour, culture or philosophy, etc which can self-replicate, change, and be transmitted to other people by non-genetic means, such as by imitation.
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Memetic evolution is the theory of the spread and development of memes (units of ideas, behaviours, habits and culture that are self-replicating and changeable. That pass through the ages from person to person by non-genetic means). Religion is an example of a meme, the development of Christianity through the ages may be seen as the memetic evolution of Christianity, as new ideas are proposed and accepted, and as interpretations of dogmas are amended, suggested and adopted. The word 'meme' was first proposed by the British biologist Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book, 'The Selfish Gene'. A key supporter of the concept of memes and of memetic evolution is the psychologist Susan Blackmore. Memes are still a theoretical abstract providing a label to group together those parts of behaviour and philosophy which are passed from generation to generation and person to person. Many scientists believe that describing abstract entities in such a physical manner, liking ideas to biological genes, is misleading.
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Men Behaving Badly was a British television comedy series that ran from 1992 to 1998 starring Martin Clunes, Harry Enfield (during the first series), Neil Morrissey (in the second and subsequent series), Leslie Ash and Caroline Quentin in a situation comedy about two young men who share a flat in London and their relationships with two local women. Men Behaving Badly was written by Simon Nye and first produced by Thames television, later switching to the BBC when ITV dropped the show.
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Menkar (Ceti) is the chief star of the constellation Cetus.
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A menorah is a seven-branched candelabrum used in Jewish worship.
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In geography a meridian is an imaginary circle on the earth's surface passing through the two poles; on it all places have noon at the same
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The Merlin chair was a 19th century three-wheeled invalid chair, or wheelchair, with a double tyre to the two front wheels, the outer tyre being somewhat smaller than that on which the chair rested, so that by turning it by hand the chair could be propelled by the user. The Merlin chair was named after its inventor.
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A merry thought (or wish-bone) is the forked bone of a fowl's breast which is used in sport by unmarried persons, each taking hold of and pulling at one of the forks, the possession of the longest piece being an omen of an early marriage to the one who gets it. In other folk-lore, the holder of the longest piece gets to make a wish.
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The Merryman's Case was a famous case before the US Supreme Court. The petitioner was arrested at his home in Maryland, in 1861, for treason, by order of a major-general of the National army. He was imprisoned at Fort McHenry, Baltimore. Chief Justice Taney, of the Supreme Court of the United States, granted a writ of habeas corpus, which the officer in charge at Fort McHenry refused to execute, on the ground that the President had suspended the writ of habeas corpus. The majority of the court decided that no such power was vested in the President, Congress alone having such privilege; that a military officer has no right to arrest a person not subject to the rules and articles of war, except in the aid of judicial authority.
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In geography, a mesa is a flat, table-like mass with steep sides all round. Eventually, by wearing away, mesas becomes buttes.
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Mesmerism (or hypnosis) was a system popularised by Franz Anton Mesmer who called it Animal Magnetism. He believed that the stars exercised an influence over men, and identifying this with magnetism sought to effect cures by stroking his patients with magnets. Finding that Gassner effected cures by stroking with his hand, Mesmer abandoned the use of magnets. The Marquis de Puysagur discovered that sleep could be induced by gentle manipulation and pioneered the scientific study of mesmerism away from Mesmer's mysterious approach.
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A metaphor is a figure of speech in which instead of comparing (as in a simile) the qualities common to two objects, we bodily transfer the qualities of the one to the other, as in 'The man was a lion in the fight'.
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Metaphysics (from Greek, 'the things after the physics', from the ordering of Aristotle's works), is the branch of philosophy which studies the most general categories and concepts which are presupposed in descriptions of ourselves and the world. Examples are causality, substance, ontology, time, and reality. Metaphysical questions have a very broad scope. Whereas the physical scientist might ask 'How does x cause y?', the metaphysician asks ' What does it mean for anything to cause anything else?' Whereas the chemist might investigate particular substances, the metaphysician asks what it means to be a substance, and whether there is one basic substance, or many. Metaphysical questions can become the subject of more specialised philosophical inquiry. We can ask whether our actions are subject to causality, which gives rise to the problem of free will. And the question of whether our mental experiences involve a separate substance from body is a major issue in the philosophy of mind.
Although metaphysics dates back to the ancient Greeks, there have been occasions on which its status as a legitimate inquiry have been questioned. The rise of science in the 17th century led to attempts by philosophers such as Hume and Locke to limit the claims of metaphysics, and earlier this century scientifically minded philosophers such as the logical positivists claimed that metaphysical assertions were meaningless.
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In linguistics, metathesis is the transposition of sounds or letters in a word - an error popularly known as a Spoonerism.
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The Metayer system is a system of farming land in which the cultivator pays his rent in kind - generally as a fixed proportion of the product, not a fixed amount. The system was common in France during the 19th century where 14 percent of the land was cultivated in the system. In Italy at the same time the system was even more popular, accounting for half the farmland.
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A meteor is a small solid body which sails through space.
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A meteorite is a piece of rock or metal from space.
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The Meteorological Office was established in 1854 originally as a department of the Board of Trade. It deals with the meteorology of the British Isles, including the service of weather forecasts and storm warnings for shipping.
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Methodism is a religious movement. It was founded by John Wesley, Charles Wesley and George Whitfield in reaction to apathy within the Church of England.
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The Methuen Treaty was a commercial treaty between Portugal and England negotiated by Paul Methuen in 1703 by which wines from Portugal were received at a lower rate of duty than those from France. The treaty was abandoned in 1836.
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The metric system is a system of measurement based on the decimal system. It was first formalised in France at the end of the 18th century and by the 1830s was being widely adopted in Europe. In Britain, bills for its compulsory adoption were defeated in 1871 and 1907 and Imperial units remained supreme until 1963, when the yard was redefined as 0.9144 metre and the pound as 0. 45359237 kilogram. The Metrication Board set up in 1969 failed to achieve its target of the metrication of British industry by 1975 and metrication now proceeds on a voluntary basis, in which it was correctly envisaged that pints of beer, miles per hour, yards, and feet would persist until the end of the century, they have and perhaps will continue for many years to come. However, the Weights and Measures Act (1985) lists certain units that may no longer be used for trade: these include the hundredweight, ton, bushel, square mile, cubic yard, and cubic foot. It is hoped that before the end of the century such units as the therm and British thermal unit will have been abandoned. For all scientific purposes and many trade and industrial purposes the form of the metric system known as SI units is now in use. In the USA metrication has been even slower than in the UK. The metre was intended to be equal to one ten-millionth part of the distance from the pole to the equator, but was found to have been made too short and so is now set upon a certain length of iridio-platinum.
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The micron is a unit of length equal to one thousandth part of a millimetre.
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Microscopium is a small southern constellation, east of Sagittarius, formed by Lacaille in 1752.
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The Midnight Appointments were American official appointments of sixteen circuit judges and other inferior officers made by John Adams during the last three weeks of his Presidential term, many of the papers being signed just before midnight of March the 3rd, 1801. These appointments were made in a spirit of pique at Jefferson's success, and the officers chosen were in every instance Federalists, bitterly opposed to Jefferson's principles.
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The Milan Decree was a decree issued by Napoleon on December the 7th, 1807, in which he declared to be 'denationalized', whether found in Continental ports or on the high seas, any vessel which should submit to search by a British vessel, or should touch or set sail for or from Great Britain or her colonies. This was in retort to the British Orders in Council of November 11th, 1807, which declared, among their provisions, any vessel and cargo good prize if it carried a French consular certificate of the origin of the cargo.
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The mile is a unit of the imperial scale of measurement of length equivalent (as set in 1593) to 8 furlongs, 1760 yards or 1.6093 kilometres. The mile was first used by the Romans, whose mile was 1617 English yards. A nautical mile is one minute of the equator, or 2026.334 yards.
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The Milky Way is the large, disk-shaped aggregation of stars, or galaxy , that includes the sun and its solar system. Its name is derived from its appearance as a faintly luminous band that stretches across earth's sky at night. This band is the disk in which the solar system lies. Its hazy appearance results from the combined light of stars too far away to be distinguished individually by the unaided eye. The individual stars that are distinct in the sky are those in the Milky Way galaxy that lie sufficiently close to the solar system to be discerned separately. From the middle northern latitudes, the Milky Way is best seen on clear, moonless, summer nights, when it appears as a luminous, irregular band circling the sky from the north-eastern to the south-eastern horizon. It extends through the constellations Perseus, Cassiopeia, and Cepheus. In the region of the Northern Cross it divides into two streams: the western stream, which is bright as it passes through the Northern Cross, fades near Ophiuchus, or the
Serpent Bearer, because of dense dust clouds, and appears again in Scorpio; and the eastern stream, which grows brighter as it passes southward through Scutum and Sagittarius. The brightest part of the Milky Way extends from Scutum to Scorpio, through Sagittarius. The centre is in the direction of Sagittarius and is about 26,000 light-years from the sun.
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Millbank Prison was built between 1813 and 1816 as 'the Penitentiary Pimlico, London' as the outcome of the efforts of John Howard and others for prison reform. The intention was that by well-regulated hard labour and religious instruction the criminal inmates should be reformed. The system was a complete failure, and in 1843 ordinary prison methods were adopted. In 1870 it was made a military prison, and finally condemned as unsanitary, was demolished in 1891 and the prisoners transferred to the newly built Wormwood Scrubs prison.
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Millboard is a type of cardboard made from paper refuse material. The best quality, used for book bindings, was made from hemp, rope, yarn, cotton or linen rags hand formed in moulds.
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Millennium is a period of measurement being 1000 years.
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Milligan's Case was a legal case decided by the US Supreme Court in 1866. This case involved the right of a citizen to demand a writ of habeas corpus under particular circumstances. In October, 1864, during the American Civil War, Milligan was brought before a military commission convened at Indianapolis by General Hovey. He was tried and sentenced to death for participation in rebellious schemes. By the Habeas Corpus Act of Congress, 1863, lists were to be furnished in each State of persons suspected of violating national laws. But any such persons, arrested and no indictment found against them by the Circuit Court, should be freed on petition verified by oath. Milligan was not indicted by the Circuit Court. He objected to the authority of the military commission and sued for a writ of habeas corpus in the Circuit Court. There was a division of opinion and the case came before the Supreme Court in 1866. That body decided that the writ should be issued and the prisoner discharged. Regarding the military commission, it was maintained that such power of erecting military jurisdictions remote from the seat of war was not vested in Congress, and that it could not be exercised in this particular case; that the prisoner, a civilian, was exempt from the laws of war and could only be tried by a jury; and finally, that the writ of habeas corpus could not be suspended constitutionally, though the privilege of that writ might be.
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A millstone is one of a pair of circular stones that are used for grinding grain or other substances. The surface of a millstone usually has a series of radial grooves in which the powdered material collects, and the stones are generally buhrstone or some kind of lava, such as Niedermendig, or another other firm rock with rough texture. Milling grain with stones introduces small quantities of stone into the flour, and this helps to accelerate the rate at which the teeth of consumers of such flour are worn away.
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Mind reading, formerly called thought reading or the willing game, is a performance that was popularised in Britain in 1881 by the professional entertainers Stuart Cumberland and Bishop. In the original performance, the thought reader, often blindfolded, performed any simple action decided on in his absence by the spectators, provided that his hand after he entered the room was in contact with a person who knows what the performer is required to do. In London in 1907, a Danish couple, the Zancigs, impressed audiences with their variation in which the couple were not in contact, thus eliminating the possibility of passing physical information. Later the performance developed into the performer guessing objects chosen in secret by the audience, often with the assistance of his assistant who would pass visual and verbal clues in secret to the performer, thus giving the impression that the performer can read the thoughts or minds of the audience.
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The Minerva Press was a printing establishment in Leadenhall Street, London, which was noted in the 18th century for the publication of trashy sentimental novels, with complicated plots. These novels obtained an extraordinary circulation.
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Ming is the name of the Chinese dynasty which ruled from 1368 to 1644.
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The Minnesota Register was the first newspaper of any importance issued in Minnesota. It was printed at Cincinnati and dated St Paul. McLean and Owens edited and published this journal. In August, 1849, it was consolidated with the Chronicle and was then called the Chronicle and Register. Its publication was continued until 1851.
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Originally a minster was the church of a monastery, the name is now frequently given to cathedral churches.
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Mira was the fist-known variable star. It was discovered by David Fabricus in August 1596.
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Miranda's Plot was a scheme devised by some of the American Federalist leaders of 1798, notably King and Hamilton, to join Great Britain in obtaining possession of the French and Spanish lands in America. One Miranda, of Caracas, undertook to secure the disaffection of the Spanish provinces. By this joint enterprise Great Britain was to obtain the West Indies, and the United States Florida and Louisiana east of the Mississippi. The plot fell through because President Adams refused to favour it.
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Miscibility is the ability of two or more liquids to mix and form a single, homogenous mixture.
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In law, misprison of felony or treason consists in concealing or not revealing to the proper authorities a felony or treason of which the party is cognisant. As to felony, it is obsolete. The term was formerly applied to any heinous misdemeanour which had no specific name.
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Missiones were Spanish religious establishments conducted by Franciscan friars for 'the civilization and conversion' of the Indians in Mexico and California. The first mission founded in California was at San Diego, in 1769; a second was established at Monterey a few months later. Before many years had elapsed there was a line of twenty-one prosperous missiones between San Diego and Point Reyes. In 1834 there were 30,650 Indians connected with the missiones. The property of the missiones was very extensive. Their decline began in the attempt at secularisation by the Spanish Government. The priests had absolute control over the Indians, treating them more like slaves than free men.
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The Missouri Compromise was a compromise in America effected by the Act of Congress of March the 3rd, 1830, between those who desired the extension of slavery into the regions beyond the Mississippi and those who desired its restriction. Missouri having applied for admission as a State, Tallmadge, of New York, in February, 1819, proposed an amendment which would ultimately destroy slavery in the new State. The House passed the bill with this amendment; the Senate refused to concur. Next year the bill, in the same form, passed the House again. The Senate voted to admit Maine, provided Missouri was admitted as a slave State. The House rejected the proposal. Thomas, of Illinois, proposed as a compromise that Missouri be admitted as a slave State, but that in future slavery should be prohibited in all territory forming part of the Louisiana cession north of 36 degrees 30 minutes. When Missouri's Constitution was laid before Congress, however, it appeared that she had introduced clauses excluding free negroes from the State. The House then refused to admit Missouri. Clay effected a further compromise, whereby Missouri agreed not to deprive of his rights any citizen of another State.
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The mistral is the violent north wind that blows from the cold, snow-covered plateau of central France down the valley of the Rhone to the Gulf of Lions.
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A Mitta was an old English unit of measurement for salt. A mitta being a single horse-load of salt, the measurement being employed for toll purposes.
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Molybdomancy is divination from the observation of the motions of molten lead.
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Monday is the first day of the week.
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The Moniteur was the first newspaper issued in Louisiana, USA. Printing was introduced into the State in 1804, and the Moniteur was established the same year by a Frenchman named Fontaine.
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After the overthrow of the empire of the first Napoleon, France, Russia, Prussia and Austria formed an alliance for preserving the balance of power and suppressing revolutions within each other's dominions. The Spanish colonies in America having revolted, it was rumoured that this alliance contemplated their reduction, although the United States recognized their independence. George Canning, the English Secretary of State, proposed that the United States join England in the prevention. of such suppression.
After consulting with Jefferson, Madison, John Quincy Adams and Calhoun, President James Monroe embodied in his annual message to Congress in 1823 a clause which has since become celebrated as the 'Monroe Doctrine'. Referring to the proposed intervention of the allied powers the message stated that America 'should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety'; and again, 'that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers'. The doctrine thus set forth has been maintained by the United States on many subsequent occasions, notably in matters relating to the Isthmus of Panama and in the case of the French intervention in Mexico under Maximilian.
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A monsoon is a seasonal wind of the Indian Ocean and nearby lands blowing from the north-east in October to March, and from the south-west in April to September, occasioned by the deflection of permanent winds from their normal path through the heating of a neighbouring land mass.
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Montanism was a schismatic movement which arose in the Christian church during the 2nd century. Montanus, the originator of the movement, was a Mysian, and about 130 began to make the claim of being a divinely commissioned prophet, the bearer of a fresh influx of the Spirit. He soon gained a large following, and with two women, Maximilla and Priscilla, likewise possessors of the new charism of the Spirit, proclaimed the imminent return of Christ at Pepuza in Phrygia, and demanded a radical transformation of the church's life, for example by fasting, by regarding marriage as an inferior state, and by refusing to absolve from post- baptismal sin.
The spread of Montanism in Asia Minor soon compelled the church to take action. But the condemnation of its tenets only disseminated them more widely: they gained adherents in Italy and Gaul, and in North Africa won over Tertullian of Carthage. A synod at Iconium, in 235, declared Montanism to be a heretical system, and the council of Constantinople in 381 refused to sanction the baptism of Montanism, thereby putting it on the same footing as paganism. By 400 the movement was practically extinct.
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The month is a unit of measurement of time based upon the motion of the moon around the earth.
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The moon is the natural satellite of the earth. It is 3476 km in diameter and has a mass 1/8th that of the earth. It orbits the earth every 27.32 days.
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A moped is a motorised bicycle developed during the1960s. Mopeds are equipped with motors of up to two horsepower, and they travel at maximum speeds of only about 50 km/hr. Their advantage lies in their fuel efficiency. The pedals are used only to start and assist the motor.
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In geography, a moraine is a continuous line of rocks and gravel along the edges of a glacier.
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The Moral and Physical Thermometer was a chart produced by a Dr Lettsom, author of the once popular tract 'The Bad Effects of a Little Drop' and a fervent temperance campaigner. The chart showed a scale of the progression between temperance to intemperance of liquors with their effects in terms of well being or vices, diseases and punishments.
The scale ranged from -70 (gin, brandy, rum, whisky consumed both during the day and night) through to +70 (water) through strong beer (+10), porter (+20), wine (+30) and cider and perry (+40) offering cheerfulness, strength and nourishment when taken only at mealtimes and in moderation.
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The Morals and Health Act was passed in 1802 as the first legislation in Britain to improve the appalling conditions in British factories.
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The Moravian Bretheren form an evangelical church which flourished in Bohemia before the Reformation, was stamped out about 1627 and revived during the first half of the eighteenth century. They first settled in Georgia, America in 1735, but soon moved to Pennsylvania. They instituted a communism of labour; the lands were owned by the church, and its members worked them, receiving in return the necessities of life. This plan existed until 1762, and greatly enriched the church enabling it to send out its itinerant ministers and missionaries. They also for a long time excluded from their communities all outsiders, but this system gradually died out and had altogether disappeared by about 1880.
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The Morey Letter was a letter published in a New York newspaper in 1880, near the end of the Garfield campaign, purporting to have been written by Garfield to H. L. Morey, Employers' Union, Lynn, Massachusetts. It expressed sympathy with capital rather than labour. It was proved to be a forgery.
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The Morgan Roadster V6 is a British, hand-crafted two-seater sports car first produced in 2004 and modelled on the 1930's sports car style. The Morgan Roadster V6 is powered by a three litre Jaguar engine providing a top speed of 134 mph and an acceleration of 0 to 60 in just under five seconds and a combined fuel economy of 29 mpg. Critics of the Morgan Roadster V6 complain that the interior is inferior, with plastic buttons and a plastic steering column which detract from the walnut dashboard and steering wheel and are 'reminiscent of a Ford Mondeo'. The Morgan Roadster V6 lacks power steering which makes steering difficult, but it handles well on country roads.
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The Morning Post was the first penny paper established in America. It was founded in New York City on January the 1st, 1833, by Horatio David Shepard, with Horace Greeley and Francis V Story as partners, printers and publishers. It was suspended after one month.
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A Morris chair is a large armchair with an adjustable back and loose, removable cushions, invented around 1897.
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The Morris Minor was a series of incredibly popular British small cars first shown at the 1948 Earl' s Court Motor Show, and the first British car to reach a production of one million, with a total of 1.6 million cars made until production stopped in 1971. The Morris Minor was designed by Alec Issigonis who worked for the Nuffield Organisation owned by William Morris (Lord Nuffield). Originally designed to be powered by an 1100cc flat-four water-cooled engine, the Morris Minor was fitted with the same 918cc side valve engine as had been used successfully in the Morris Eight series E car, resulting in space in the engine compartment which made the Morris Minor a very easy car to maintain. Today the Morris Minor has a cult status with enthusiasts and fan clubs.
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A mort-safe was a wrought-iron frame formerly used to prevent dead bodies from being exhumed by resurrectionists.
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Morticians wax is a soft wax used by morticians for filling holes in dead bodies, and also used by special effects artists for producing artificial wounds in the cinema and theatre. Morticians' wax is a soft, naturally coloured wax which blends with the flesh of the wearer, and can be sculpted to form the appearance of bullet holes and cuts when treated with other colouring makeups.
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A mortise and tenon joint is a widely used joint in woodworking, consisting, in its simplest form, of a rectangular shaped hole called the mortise and a tenon of the same section to fit into the mortise.
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A mosaic is a pattern or picture made of small pieces of coloured glass, stone or other material. The Romans decorated the floors of their palaces and important buildings with elaborate mosaics made of abaculi. Impressive Roman floor mosaics can still be seen preserved at the remains of the Roman palace at Fishbourne near Chichester in Sussex.
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Mother of pearl is the iridescent pearly substance which forms the internal layer of many kinds of sea shell. Mother of pearl is widely used in jewellery and other decorative work.
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The first patent for a 'horseless carriage' was taken out by Ramsay and Wildgoose in 1619, but the first man to successfully make a vehicle run along a road was the Frenchman Cugnot in 1770 when his carriage carried two people at 2 mph. In 1884 Gottlieb Daimler patented an engine based upon combustion on the Otto principle, revolutionary the motor vehicle industry which had previously been based upon steam engines.
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Mottling is the representation of the highlights and shades characteristic of natural wood, in its representation in graining.
Mottling is a defect in sprayed film. The mottling defect appears as a uniform series of imperfections of a roughly circular shape.
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The Moulin Rouge is a revue theatre in the Montmartre district of Paris, France. Built in 1885 it became a dance hall in 1900, and became famous for its soft-porn revue shows of the 'cancan' immortalised in the posters and drawings of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Today, the revue shows are still soft-porn, with naked and semi-naked dancers prancing about to the sounds of music and accompanied by computer-controlled light shows, and interspersed with magic shows.
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A mound or orb is a sign of sovereign authority and majesty. It consists of a ball or globe surmounted by a cross and encircled with a horizontal band, from the upper edge of which springs a semi-circular band, both of which are enriched with precious stones. The mound forms part of a sovereigns royal regalia.
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The Mountain Meadow Massacre occurred in the autumn of 1857 when a body of thirty-six Arkansas and Missouri emigrants en route to California, were brutally murdered at Mountain Meadow, Utah, by a band of Indians, who were incited thereto by Lee, a Mormon fanatic. It was the period of the first troubles between the United States Government and the Mormons. Brigham Young had made threats of turning the Indians loose upon west-bound emigrants, but the Mormons, as a body, were innocent of the massacre. The emigrant party was encamped at Mountain Meadow when the attack began on September the 7th. They threw up earthworks and defended themselves for four days. Lee, under pretence of friendship, succeeded in drawing them out and murdering the whole party.
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Mountaineering is the practice of climbing mountains.
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Mountains are often classified according to their mode of formation: Fold
mountains; Block mountains; Residual mountains; Volcanic mountains.
High mountain chains such as the Himalayas, Andes, Alps, and Rockies are known as new fold mountain systems. The term 'fold' is a reference to the way in which such mountains have been formed. Throughout millions of years slow movements of the earth's crust have caused these
mountains to be raised. The movements which have resulted in mountain buildings were not, however, vertical uplifts. They were primarily horizontal movements, the effect of which was to cause the crust of the earth to 'wrinkle', in a similar way to which a tablecloth wrinkles if it is pushed along the table. The arched or upraised parts of the folds are known as anticlines and the troughs as synclines. These folds can vary greatly in size. Mountain building is undoubtedly due to some deep-seated cause. For a long period the most simple explanation was that folding was entirely due to the cooling and contraction of the earth, so that the crust, already cold and shrunken, had to wrinkle to fit itself to the still cooling and contracting 'core'. One of the objections advanced against this theory is that the amount of shrinking necessary to account for the Himalayas, Alps, etc., seems to be greater than the mere contraction of the earth would allow. While the theory of contraction cannot be completely rejected, serious consideration must be given to the more recent explanations of mountain building. For instance, Wegener suggests that mountain building may be due to the 'wrinkles' produced by the drifting of a continental mass, e.g. that the Alps were formed by the northward drift of the African continent towards the more stable blocks of Central Europe. As the African mass drifted slowly northward the zone between it and the European mass became narrower, and the land was raised into high ridges or folds. The raising of the Alps was accompanied by the formation of the deep trough which contains the Mediterranean Sea. The same hypothesis would account for the building of the Himalayas and the depression of the Indo-Gangetic trough by the northward drift of the Deccan mass.
During the physical history of the earth, mountain building appears to have proceeded more actively at some periods than others. Fold mountains are, therefore, not all of the same age. The newest group of fold mountains include the Himalayas, Alps, Rockies, and Andes. During an earlier period of folding (the Carboniferous) the Pennines, Appalachians, the Cape Ranges of South Africa, and the Dividing Range of Australia were uplifted. A still earlier period of folding accounted for the original mountains of Scotland and Norway, of which the present mountains are merely the worn down stumps. The older fold mountains, which have been subjected to the forces of denudation (such as the weather, rivers, glaciers, etc.) for long geological periods, are much lower and less rugged than the newer fold mountains. The term 'new fold' is applied to the mountain ranges which have been folded most recently, but they seem very old when their age in actual years is considered because they were uplifted many millions of years before historic time. Mountain building is a very long and slow process; and in the case of certain mountain chains, such as the Andes and the mountains of Japan, is probably still proceeding.
The new fold mountain systems of the world, except in such instances as the simple low folds of the Weald (South-east England), usually consist of high parallel ranges, the average height being well over 3000 metres. In the Himalayas' the highest peak rises to 8840 metres; in the Andes 7000 metres; in the Rockies 6000 metres; in the Alps to 4600 metres. Vast though these heights appear, the wrinkles of the earth's crust are only slight. The highest mountain in the world (Mount Everest) is about five miles high, so that on a globe of 40 cm, diameter it would protrude only 2.5 mm. Most of the active volcanoes are found in the neighbourhood of fold mountains, where the crust of the earth has been fractured during the process of folding. All around the Pacific Ocean there are many active and extinct volcanoes, as in New Zealand, the East Indies, Japan, and North, Central, and South America. Another belt of active volcanoes is associated with the fold mountains of the West Indies. The mountains of this type are characterised by ruggedness of relief in contrast to the smooth and rounded contours of mountain areas which have been subjected to weathering agents for long periods of time. This is obvious if pictures of the Alps and the Scottish Highlands are compared.
Mountains are effective climatic barriers, and the climates of regions on either side of a high mountain range are very different. For example, the coast lands of British Columbia have an equable climate and a heavy rainfall, while the lands to the east of the Rockies have an extreme climate and light rainfall. Again, the climate of the mountainous areas differs from that of the adjacent lowlands. The great mountain systems of the world are mainly important for their minerals, and, in the temperate zone, for their lumber. In the plateau regions of some mountain systems agriculture has been made possible by irrigation, and above the forests in temperate areas there are valuable alpine pastures. The swift streams of mountains are frequently sources of hydro-electric power, especially in countries which have no coal, such as Switzerland and Norway. In North America, the Western Cordillera provides gold, copper, lead, and silver, especially in the states of Nevada and Montana. The Andes provide tin and copper (Bolivia), gold and platinum
(Colombia), and silver (Peru). The Highlands of East Australia are important for copper and gold. The lumbering industry is specially important in British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon (soft woods), the Central American mountainous lands (hard woods), the Himalayan slopes (teak and sal), and the Scandinavian mountains (soft woods).
To provide food for the mining communities in inaccessible mountain areas, agriculture has been developed. There are numerous irrigation schemes in operation in most of the mountain states of the USA, e.g. at Salt Lake City in Utah. Similarly, the Andean states, e.g. Bolivia, grow small quantities of cereals in the plateau areas. Mountain pastures have been utilised most extensively for cattle rearing in Switzerland and Scandinavia. The vast central plateau of Asia is, owing to difficulty of access and climatic extremes, so isolated from other regions that very little development of any kind, on modern lines, has taken place. High mountain ranges are also barriers to communication, and so tend to separate peoples. Traffic across mountains is limited to the passes, which are often so high as to be snowbound in winter. Such ranges as the Alps, Andes, etc. can only be crossed with great difficulty or by expensive tunnelling.
It sometimes happens that movement of the earth's crust occurs along cracks or faults. Where such movement leaves a block of higher land standing between two areas of lower land, the highland is known as a 'Block Mountain' or horst. The Vosges and Black Forest Mountains are examples of such formations These mountains are usually very steep-sided, and often the summit levels are roughly the same.
When an area of highland remains standing above the general level after rivers and other natural agents have lowered the surface of the surrounding area, the name residual mountain is used. Sometimes such highlands are called 'mountains of denudation'. This term can usually be applied to the mountain ridges associated with 'dissected plateaux'. Included in this class are the mountain ridges of the Highlands of Scotland, the Sierras of Central Spain, and the Mesas and Buttes of the western plateau lands of the United States.
Mountains may be formed by volcanic material piled up around a crater, such mountains are popularly known as volcanoes.
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A moving average is a series of arithmetic means calculated from data in a time series, which reduces the effects of temporary seasonal variations. For example, a moving average of the monthly sales figures for an organisation might be calculated by averaging the 12 months from January to December for the December figure, the 12 months from February to January for the January figure, and so on.
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In the 18th century a mug-house was an ale-house where a hundred persons or so assembled in a large tap-room to drink, sing, and socialise. One of the number was made chairman. Ale was served to the guests in their own mugs, and the place where the mug was to stand was chalked on the table.
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Mulatto refers to a mixed race person with one 'black' and one 'white' parent.
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The Mulligan letters were political letters which James Mulligan, bookkeeper for Warren Fisher, of Boston, testified before an American Congressional committee in 1876, had been written by James G Blaine to Mr. Fisher. The importance of the letters during the campaign of 1884 was due to the discussion as to whether they were or were not discreditable to Blaine.
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A mummy is any dead body, human or animal, that has been naturally or artificially preserved. Natural mummification can occur through freezing, drying, or preservation in bogs or oil seeps. Artificial mummification may be achieved by embalming (for example, the mummies of ancient Egypt) or by freeze-drying.
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Munn Vs Illinois was an American legal case, known as one of the 'elevator cases'. The case was decided by the Supreme Court of the US. In 1872, Munn and Scott, lessees of a grain elevator and warehouse in Chicago, were found guilty in the Criminal Court of Cook County, Illinois, of violating Article thirteen of the State Constitution relating to the storage of grain. They had neglected to take out a license and give bond, and were charging rates higher than prescribed in the above-mentioned act. They were fined, and the decision was confirmed by the Supreme Court of Illinois, whence the case was transferred to the Supreme Court of the United States. That body confirmed the judgment on the ground that the Act of the Illinois Legislature was not repugnant to the national Constitution, and that a State could lawfully determine how a man. might use his own property, when the good of other citizens was involved.
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The Murcheson Letter was a 19th century political scandal in America. A was letter received in October, 1888, by Lord Sackville-West, British Minister at Washington, from one Charles Murcheson, representing himself to be a naturalized citizen of English birth, and asking the Minister how he should vote in the impending Presidential election. Lord Sackville openly advised, as favourable to British interests, Cleveland. This caused great indignation. Sackville's recall was requested and his passports sent him.
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Murder Incorporated was an American business of assassins who would kill anyone for money. Murder Incorporated was started by Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky, and was widely used by the National Crime Syndicate to eliminate troublesome individuals.
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Murphy's Law reads: 'If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it.'
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Murrine vases were priceless vessels brought from Carmania in Persia and used in ancient Rome as wine cups where it was believed they would break if poison was mixed with the wine.
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The word 'museum' means a temple of the Muses, and in ancient times was applied to any building for the study of literature or art, and so was applied to institutions such as the university of ancient Alexandria which was founded in 280 BC. Generally in English speaking countries the term
museum is not generally understood to include picture and sculpture galleries. Books and manuscripts in so far as they convey ideas by language, pertain to the library; but as examples of printing, binding or illumination they are suitable items for a museum.
Museums may be classified according to their contents, thus there is a broad distinction between art and science museums, but the technical collections, illustrating the application of science to art, belong as much to one side as to the other. A piece of pottery may be said to be art pure and simple, or may be viewed from the scientific in respect of the potters craft, as archaeological evidence or as an illustration of ethnology. Thus this division is based upon ideas rather than materials. To this end we find
museums of all topics; religion, nature, the evolution of man, toys and so on.
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The mutchkin is a Scottish unit of liquid measure equal to slightly less than one pint.
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The My Lai Massacre was the killing of some 300 civilians - including women and children - in My Lai, a village in South Vietnam, by American troops in March 1968. An investigation in 1969 produced enough evidence to charge 30 soldiers with war crimes, but the only soldier convicted was Lieutenant William Calley, commander of the platoon. Sentenced to life imprisonment in 1971, for the murder of 22 civilians, Calley was released less than five months later on parole. His superior officer was acquitted but the trial revealed an American Army policy of punitive tactics against civilians. News of the massacre contributed to domestic pressure for the USA to end its involvement in Vietnam.
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