The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 298

MALAGROWTHER, an old courtier in the "Fortunes of Nigel" soured by misfortune, and who would have every one be as discontented as himself.

MALAISE, an uneasy feeling which often precedes a serious attack of some disease.

MALAPROP, MRS., a character in Sheridan's "Rivals," noted for her blunders in the use of fine or learned words, as in the use of "allegory"

for "alligator."

MaLAR LAKE, large and beautiful Swedish lake, stretching 80 m.

westward from Stockholm; its sh.o.r.es are deeply indented with bays, and the surrounding hills as well as the thousand islands it contains are well wooded.

MALAY ARCHIPELAGO or INDIAN ARCHIPELAGO is that group of many hundred islands stretching from the Malay Peninsula SE. to Australia between the North Pacific and the Indian Ocean, of which Borneo, Sumatra, Java, and Celebes are the largest.

MALAYS, a branch of the human family now cla.s.sed among the Mongols, and which inhabit the Malay Peninsula, the islands of the Indian Archipelago, as well as Madagascar, and many of the islands in the Pacific; they are of a dark-brown or tawny complexion, short of stature, have flat faces, black coa.r.s.e hair, and high cheek-bones; there are three cla.s.ses of them, distinguished from each other in character and habits of life; the more civilised of them are Mohammedans.

MALCOLM, SIR JOHN, Indian soldier and statesman, born in Dumfriess.h.i.+re; went as cadet to the Madras army in 1785, and for over 30 years was an important figure in Eastern affairs; he was amba.s.sador to Persia 1800, governor of Mysore 1803, again in Persia as plenipotentiary in 1807 and 1810, political agent in the Deccan 1817, and governor of Bombay 1827-30; he distinguished himself also in several wars; wrote "A History of Persia" and other historical works, and returning to England entered Parliament in 1831, opposed to the Reform Bill; two years later he died in London (1769-1833).

MALCOLM CANMORE, son of Duncan, whom Macbeth slew, succeeded his father in 1040 as king of c.u.mbria and Lothian, and in 1057, on Macbeth's death, became king of all Scotland; till 1066 his reign was peaceful, but thereafter it was one long conflict with the Normans in England; raids and counter-raids succeeded each other till, in 1091, Malcolm was forced to do homage to William Rufus; next year he lost his possessions S. of the Solway, and in 1093 he was slain in battle at Alnwick; the influence of his second wife, the saintly Margaret, did much to promote the civilisation of Scotland and to bring the Scottish Church into harmony with the rest of Christendom.

MALDIVE ISLANDS (20), a chain of several hundred tiny coral islands in the Indian Ocean stretching 550 m. southward from a point 300 m. SW.

of Cape Comorin, 200 of which are inhabited; Male is the residence of the sultan, who is a tributary of the governor of Ceylon; the natives are akin to the Singhalese, and occupy themselves gathering cowries, cocoa-nuts, and tortoise-sh.e.l.l for exportation.

MALEBOLGE, the name given to the eighth circle in Dante's "Inferno,"

as consisting of "evil pits," which the name means, 10 in number, for those guilty of frauds: contains (1) seducers, (2) flatterers, (3) simonists, (4) soothsayers, (5) bribers and receivers of bribes, (6) hypocrites, (7) robbers, (8) evil advisers, (9) slanderers, (10) forgers.

MALEBRANCHE, NICHOLAS, a French metaphysician, born in Paris; determined to embrace a monastic life, entered the congregation of the Oratory at the age of 22, and devoted himself to theological study, till the treatise of Descartes on "Man" falling into his hands, he gave himself up to philosophy; his famous work "De la Recherche de la Verite"

was published in 1673, the main object of which was to bridge over the gulf which separates mind from matter by the establishment of the thesis that the mind immediately perceives G.o.d, and sees all things in G.o.d, who in Himself includes the presumed irreconcilable ant.i.thesis (1638-1715).

MALESHERBES, LAMOIGNON DE, French statesman, born in Paris; a good and upright man; was twice over called to be one of Louis XVI.'s advisers, but his advice was not taken and he retired; defended Louis at his trial; pled for him "with eloquent want of eloquence, in broken sentences, in embarra.s.sment and sobs," and was guillotined for it; he had been censor of the press, and to his liberal-minded censors.h.i.+p the world owes the publication of the "Encyclopedie" (1721-1794).

MALHERBE, FRANcOIS DE, a French lyric poet and miscellaneous writer of great industry, born at Caen, is, from his correct though affected style, regarded as one of the reformers of the French language (1555-1628).

MALIGNANTS, the advisers of Charles I., chief among whom were Strafford and Laud; were so called by the Parliamentarians, who blamed them for the evils of the country; the name was afterwards applied to the whole Royalist party.

MALINES or MECHLIN (52), a Belgian city on the Dyle, 14 m. S.

of Antwerp; has lost its old commercial activity, and is now the quiet ecclesiastical capital; masterpieces of Van Dyck and Rubens adorn its churches.

MALINGERING, a name given in the army to the crime of feigning illness to evade duty or obtain a discharge.

MALLET, DAVID, originally MALLOCH, Scottish litterateur, born in Crieff; wrote several plays, and is remembered for his ballad ent.i.tled "William and Margaret"; he was a friend of Thomson, and divided with him the honour of the authors.h.i.+p of "Rule Britannia," the merit of which, however, is more in the music than in the poetry, about which they contested (1702-1765).

MALLOCK, WILLIAM HURRELL, author, born in Devons.h.i.+re, educated at Oxford; published "The New Republic," 1876, a masterly satire on prominent contemporaries, which none of his subsequent work has excelled; _b_. 1849.

MALMAISON, a historical chateau 10 m. W. of Paris; belonged originally to Richelieu; saw the last days of Josephine, whose favourite residence it was, and was the scene of the repulse of Ducrot's sortie in October 1870.

MALMESBURY, WILLIAM OF, an English chronicler of the 12th century; his chief work "Gesta Regum Anglorum" and "Gesta Pontific.u.m Anglorum,"

followed by his "Historia Novella."

MALMo (50), important seaport and third town of Sweden, opposite Copenhagen; s.h.i.+ps farm produce, cement, and timber; imports machinery, textile fabrics, and coffee; has cigar and sugar factories, and some s.h.i.+pbuilding.

MALONE, EDMUND, a Shakespearian critic and editor, born in Dublin, was a stickler for literary accuracy and honesty (1741-1812).

MALORY, SIR THOMAS, flourished in the 15th century; was the author of "Morte d'Arthur," being a translation in prose of a labyrinthine selection of Arthurian legends, which was finished in the ninth year of Edward IV., and printed fifteen years after by Caxton "with all care."

MALPIGHI, MARCELLO, Italian anatomist and professor of Medicine; noted for his discovery of the corpuscles of the kidney and the spleen, named after him (1628-1694).

MALSTRoM, or MAELSTRoM, a dangerous whirlpool off the coast of Norway, caused by the rus.h.i.+ng of the currents of the ocean in a channel between two of the Loffoden Islands, and intensified at times by contrary winds, to the destruction often of particularly small craft caught in the eddies of it, and sometimes of whales attempting to pa.s.s through it.

MALTA (with Gozo) (177), a small British island in the Mediterranean, 80 m. S. of Sicily; is a strongly fortified and a most important naval station, head-quarters of the British Mediterranean fleet, and coaling-station for naval and mercantile marine; with a history of great interest, Malta was annexed to Britain in 1814. The island is treeless, and with few streams, but fertile, and has many wells. Wheat, potatoes, and fruit are largely cultivated, and filigree work and cotton manufactured. The people are industrious and thrifty; population is the densest in Europe. The Roman Catholic Church is very powerful. There is a university at Valetta, and since 1887 Malta has been self-governing.

MALTEBRUN, CONRAD, geographer, born in Denmark; studied in Copenhagen, but banished for his revolutionary sympathies; settled in Paris; was the author of several geographical works, his "Geographic Universelle" the chief (1775-1826).

MALTHUS, THOMAS R., an English economist, born near Dorking, in Surrey; is famous as the author of an "Essay on the Principle of Population," of which the first edition appeared in 1798, and the final, greatly enlarged, in 1803; the publication provoked much hostile criticism, as it propounded a doctrine which was disastrous to the accepted theory of perfectibility, and which aimed at showing how the progress of the race was held in check by the limited supply of the means of subsistence, a doctrine that admittedly antic.i.p.ated that struggle for life on a larger scale which the Darwinian hypothesis requires for its "survival of the fittest" (1766-1834).

MALVERN, GREAT (6), a watering-place in Worcesters.h.i.+re, on the side of the Malvern Hills, with a clear and bracing air, a plentiful supply of water, and much frequented by invalids.

MAMBRINO, a Moorish king, celebrated in the romances of chivalry, who possessed a helmet of pure gold which rendered the wearer of it invulnerable, the possession of which was the ambition of all the paladins of Charlemagne, and which was carried off by Rinaldo, who slew the original owner; Cervantes makes his hero persuade himself that he has found it in a barber's bra.s.s basin.

MAMELUKES, originally slaves from the regions of the Caucasus, captured in war or bought in the market-place, who became the bodyguard of the Sultan in Egypt, and by-and-by his master to the extent of ruling the country and supplying a long line of Sultans of their own election from themselves, many of them enlightened rulers, governing the country well, but their supremacy was crushed by the Sultan of Turkey in 1517; after this, however, they retained much of their power, and they offered a brilliant resistance to Bonaparte at the battle of the Pyramids in 1798, who defeated them; but recovering their power after his withdrawal and proving troublesome, they were by two treacherous ma.s.sacres annihilated in 1811 by Mehemet Ali, who became Viceroy of Egypt under the Porte.