MARSHALL, ALFRED(1842- ), English economist, was born in London on the 26th of July 1842. He was educated at the Merchant Taylors’ School and St John’s College, Cambridge, being second wrangler in 1865, and in the same year becoming fellow of his college. He became principal of University College, Bristol, in 1877, and was lecturer and fellow of Balliol College, Oxford in 1883-1884. He was professor of political economy at Cambridge University from 1885 to 1908, and was a member of the Royal Commission on Labour in 1891. He became a fellow of the British Academy in 1902. He wrote (in conjunction with his wife)Economics of Industry(1879), whilst hisPrinciples of Economics(1st ed., 1890) is a standard English treatise.
MARSHALL, JOHN(1755-1835), American jurist, chief-justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, was born on the 24th of September 1755 at Germantown (now Midland), in what four years later became Fauquier county, Virginia. He was of English descent, the son of Thomas Marshall (1732-1806) and his wife Mary Isham Keith. Marshall served first as lieutenant and after July 1778 as captain in the Continental Army during the War of Independence. He resigned his commission early in 1781; was admitted to the bar after a brief course of study, first practised in Fauquier county; and after two years began to practise in Richmond. In 1786 we find him counsel in a case of great importance,Hitev.Fairfax, involving the original title of Lord Fairfax to that large tract of country between the headwaters of the Potomac and Rappahannock, known as the northern neck of Virginia. Marshall represented tenants of Lord Fairfax and won his case. From this time, as is shown by an examination of Call’sVirginia Reportswhich cover the period, he maintained the leadership of the bar of Virginia. He was a member of the Virginia Assembly in 1782-1791 and again in 1795-1797; and in 1788, he took a leading part in the Virginia Convention called to act on the proposed constitution for the United States, with Madison ably urging the ratification of that instrument. In 1795 Washington offered him the attorney-generalship, and in 1796, after the retirement of James Monroe, the position of minister to France. Marshall declined both offers because his situation at the bar appeared to him “to be more independent and not less honourable than any other,” and his “preference for it was decided.” He spent the autumn and winter of 1797-1798 in France as one of the three commissioners appointed by President John Adams to adjust the differences between the young republic and the directory. The commission failed, but the course pursued by Marshall was approved in America, and with the resentment felt because of the way in which the commission had been treated in France, made him, on his return, exceedingly popular. To this popularity, as well as to the earnest advocacy of Patrick Henry, he owed his election as a Federalist to the National House of Representatives in the spring of 1799, though the feeling in Richmond was overwhelmingly in favour of the opposition or Republican party. His most notable service in Congress was his speech on the case of Thomas Nash, alias Jonathan Robbins, in which he showed that there is nothing in the constitution of the United States which prevents the Federal government from carrying out an extradition treaty. He was secretary of state under President Adams from the 6th of June 1800 to the 4th of March 1801. In the meantime he had been appointed chief-justice of the Supreme Court, his commission bearing date the 31st of January. Thus while still secretary he presided as chief-justice.
At the time of Marshall’s appointment it was generally considered that the Supreme Court was the one department of the new government which had failed in its purpose. John Jay, the first chief-justice, who had resigned in 1795, had just declined a reappointment to the chief-justiceship on the ground that he had left the bench perfectly convinced that the court would never acquire proper weight and dignity, its organization being fatally defective. The advent of the new chief-justice was marked by a change in the conduct of business in the court. Since its organization, following the prevailing English custom, the judges had pronounced their opinions seriatim. But beginning with the December term 1801, the chief-justice became practically the sole mouthpiece of the court. For eleven years the opinions are almost exclusively his, and there are few recorded dissents. The change was admirably adapted to strengthen the power and dignity of the court. The chief-justice embodied the majesty of the judicial department of the government almost as fully as the president stood for the power of the executive. That this change was acquiesced in by his associates without diminishing their goodwill towards their new chief is testimony to the persuasive force of Marshall’s personality; for his associates were not men of mediocre ability. After the advent of Mr Justice Joseph Story the practice was abandoned. Marshall, however, still delivered the opinion in the great majority of cases, and in practically all cases of any importance involving the interpretation of the Constitution. During the course of his judicial life his associates were as a rule men of learning and ability. During most of the time the majority were the appointees ofDemocratic presidents, and before their elevation to the bench supposed to be out of sympathy with the federalistic ideas of the chief-justice. Yet in matters pertaining to constitutional construction, they seem to have had hardly any other function than to add the weight of their silent concurrence to the decision of their great chief. Thus the task of expounding the constitution during the most critical period of its history was his, and it was given to him to preside over the Supreme Court when it was called upon to decide four cases of vital importance:Marburyv.Madison,M‘Cullochv.Maryland,Cohensv.VirginiaandGibbonsv.Ogden. In each of these cases it is Marshall who writes the opinion of the court; in each the continued existence of the peculiar Federal system established by the Constitution depended on the action of the court, and in each the court adopted a principle which is now generally perceived to be essential to the preservation of the United States as a federal state.
InMarburyv.Madison, which was decided two years after his elevation to the bench, he decided that it was the duty of the court to disregard any act of Congress, and, therefore, a fortiori any act of a legislature of one of the states, which the court thought contrary to the Federal Constitution.InCohensv.Virginia, in spite of the contention of Jefferson and the then prevalent school of political thought that it was contrary to the Constitution for a person to bring one of the states of the United States, though only as an appellee, into a court of justice, he held that Congress could lawfully pass an act which permitted a person who was convicted in a state court, to appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States, if he alleged that the state act under which he was convicted conflicted with the Federal Constitution or with an act of Congress.InM‘Cullochv.Maryland, though admitting that the Federal government is one of delegated powers and cannot exercise any power not expressly given in the Constitution, he laid down the rule that Congress in the exercise of a delegated power has a wide latitude in the choice of means, not being confined in its choice of means to those which must be used if the power is to be exercised at all.Lastly, inGibbonsv.Ogden, he held that when the power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce was conferred by the Constitution on the Federal government, the word “commerce” included not only the exchange of commodities, but the means by which interstate and foreign intercourse was carried on, and therefore that Congress had the power to license vessels to carry goods and passengers between the states, and an act of one of the states making a regulation which interfered with such regulation of Congress was,pro tanto, of no effect. It will be seen that in the first two cases he established the Supreme Court as the final interpreter of the Constitution.The decision inM‘Cullochv.Maryland, by leaving Congress unhampered in the choice of means to execute its delegated powers, made it possible for the Federal government to accomplish the ends of its existence. “Let the end be legitimate,” said Marshall in the course of its opinion, “let it be within the scope of the Constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, are constitutional.”If the decision inM‘Cullochv.Marylandgave vigour to all Federal power, the decision inGibbonsv.Ogden, by giving the Federal government control over the means by which interstate and foreign commerce is carried on, preserved the material prosperity of the country. The decision recognizes what the framers of the Constitution recognized, namely that the United States is an economic union, and that business which is national should be under national, not state, control.
InMarburyv.Madison, which was decided two years after his elevation to the bench, he decided that it was the duty of the court to disregard any act of Congress, and, therefore, a fortiori any act of a legislature of one of the states, which the court thought contrary to the Federal Constitution.
InCohensv.Virginia, in spite of the contention of Jefferson and the then prevalent school of political thought that it was contrary to the Constitution for a person to bring one of the states of the United States, though only as an appellee, into a court of justice, he held that Congress could lawfully pass an act which permitted a person who was convicted in a state court, to appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States, if he alleged that the state act under which he was convicted conflicted with the Federal Constitution or with an act of Congress.
InM‘Cullochv.Maryland, though admitting that the Federal government is one of delegated powers and cannot exercise any power not expressly given in the Constitution, he laid down the rule that Congress in the exercise of a delegated power has a wide latitude in the choice of means, not being confined in its choice of means to those which must be used if the power is to be exercised at all.
Lastly, inGibbonsv.Ogden, he held that when the power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce was conferred by the Constitution on the Federal government, the word “commerce” included not only the exchange of commodities, but the means by which interstate and foreign intercourse was carried on, and therefore that Congress had the power to license vessels to carry goods and passengers between the states, and an act of one of the states making a regulation which interfered with such regulation of Congress was,pro tanto, of no effect. It will be seen that in the first two cases he established the Supreme Court as the final interpreter of the Constitution.
The decision inM‘Cullochv.Maryland, by leaving Congress unhampered in the choice of means to execute its delegated powers, made it possible for the Federal government to accomplish the ends of its existence. “Let the end be legitimate,” said Marshall in the course of its opinion, “let it be within the scope of the Constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, are constitutional.”
If the decision inM‘Cullochv.Marylandgave vigour to all Federal power, the decision inGibbonsv.Ogden, by giving the Federal government control over the means by which interstate and foreign commerce is carried on, preserved the material prosperity of the country. The decision recognizes what the framers of the Constitution recognized, namely that the United States is an economic union, and that business which is national should be under national, not state, control.
Though for the reasons stated, the four cases mentioned are the most important of his decisions, the value of his work as an expounder of the Constitution of the United States is not to be measured by these cases alone. In all he decided forty-four cases involving constitutional questions. Nearly every important part of the Constitution of the United States as it existed before the amendments which were adopted after the Civil War, is treated in one or more of them. The Constitution in its most important aspects is the Constitution as he interpreted it. He did not work out completely the position of the states in the Federal system, but he did grasp and establish the position of the Federal legislature and the Federal judiciary. To appreciate his work, however, it is necessary to see that it was the work not of a statesman but of a judge. Had Marshall been merely a far-seeing statesman, while most of his important cases would have been decided as he decided them, his life-work would have been a failure. It was not only necessary that he should decide great constitutional questions properly, but also that the people of the United States should be convinced of the correctness of his interpretation of the Constitution. His opinions, therefore, had to carry to those who studied them a conviction that the constitution as written had been interpreted according to its evident meaning. They fulfilled this prime requisite. Their chief characteristic is the cumulative force of the argument. The ground for the premiss is carefully prepared, the premiss itself is clearly stated; nearly every possible objection is examined and answered; and then comes the conclusion. There is little or no repetition, but there is a wealth of illustration, a completeness of analysis, that convinces the reader, not only that the subject has been adequately treated, but that it has been exhausted. His style, reflecting his character, suits perfectly the subject matter. Simple in the best sense of the word, his intellectual processes were so clear that he never doubted the correctness of the conclusion to which they led him. Apparently from his own point of view, he merely indicated the question at issue, and the inexorable rules of logic did the rest. Thus his opinions are simple, clear, dignified. Intensely interesting, the interest is in the argument, not in its expression. He had, in a wonderful degree, the power of phrase. He expressed important principles of law in language which tersely yet clearly conveyed his exact meaning. Not only is the Constitution interpreted largely as he taught the people of the United States to interpret it, but when they wish to express important constitutional principles which he enunciated they use his exact words. Again, his opinions show that he adhered closely to the words of the Constitution; indeed no one who has attempted to expound that instrument has confined himself more strictly to an examination of the text. In the proper, though not in the historical, sense he was the strictest of strict constructionalists, and as a result his opinions are practically devoid of theories of government, sovereignty and the rights of man.
A single illustration of his avoidance of all theory and his adherence to the words of the Constitution will suffice. In the case of theUnited Statesv.Fisherthe constitutional question involved was the power of Congress to give to the United States a preference over all other creditors in the distribution of the assets of a bankrupt. Such an act can be upheld on the ground that all governments have necessarily the right to give themselves priority. Not so Marshall. To him the act must be supported, if supported at all, not on any theory of the innate nature of the government, national or otherwise, but as a reasonable means of carrying out one of the express powers conferred by the Constitution on the Federal government. Thus, he upholds the act in question because of the power expressly conferred on the Federal government to pay the debts of the union, and as a necessary consequence of this power the right to make remittances by bills or otherwise and to take precautions which will render the transactions safe.
A single illustration of his avoidance of all theory and his adherence to the words of the Constitution will suffice. In the case of theUnited Statesv.Fisherthe constitutional question involved was the power of Congress to give to the United States a preference over all other creditors in the distribution of the assets of a bankrupt. Such an act can be upheld on the ground that all governments have necessarily the right to give themselves priority. Not so Marshall. To him the act must be supported, if supported at all, not on any theory of the innate nature of the government, national or otherwise, but as a reasonable means of carrying out one of the express powers conferred by the Constitution on the Federal government. Thus, he upholds the act in question because of the power expressly conferred on the Federal government to pay the debts of the union, and as a necessary consequence of this power the right to make remittances by bills or otherwise and to take precautions which will render the transactions safe.
It is important to emphasize the fact that Marshall adhered in his opinions to the Constitution as written, not only because it is a fact which must be recognized if we are to understand the correct value of his work in the field of constitutional law, but also because there exists to-day a popular impression that by implication he stretched to the utmost the powers of the Federal government. This impression is due primarily to the ignorance of many of those who have undertaken to praise him. During his life he was charged by followers of the States Rights School of political thought with upholding Federal power in cases not warranted by the constitution. Later, however, those who admired a strong national government, without taking the trouble to ascertain whether the old criticism by members of the States Rights Party was just, regarded the assumption on which it was founded as Marshall’s best claim to his country’s gratitude.
As a constitutional lawyer, Marshall stands without a rival. His work on international law and admiralty is of first rank. But though a good, he was not a great, common law or equity lawyer. In these fields he did not make new law nor clarify what was obscure, and his constitutional opinions which to-day are found least satisfactory are those in which the question to be solved necessarily involves the discussion of some common-lawconception, especially those cases in which he was required to construe the restriction imposed by the Constitution on any state impairing the obligation of contracts. His decision in the celebrated case ofDartmouth Collegev.Woodward, in which he held that a state could not repeal a charter of a private corporation, because a charter is a contract which a subsequent act of the state repealing the charter impairs, though of great economic importance, does not touch any fundamental question of constitutional law. The argument which he advances lacks the clearness and finality for which most of his opinions are celebrated. It is not certain with whom he thought the contract was made: with the corporation created by the charter, with the trustees of the corporation, or with those who had contributed money to its objects.
Of the wonderful persuasive force of Marshall’s personality there is abundant evidence. His influence over his associates, already referred to, is but one example though a most impressive one. From the moment he delivered the opinion inMarburyv.Madisonthe legal profession knew that he was a great judge. Each year added to his reputation and made for a better appreciation of his intellectual and moral qualities. The bar of the Supreme Court during his chief-justiceship was the most brilliant which the United States has ever known. Leaders, not only of legal, but political thought were among its members; one, Webster, was a man of genius and commanding position. To a very great degree Marshall impressed on the members of this bar and on the profession generally his own ideas of the correct interpretation of the Constitution and his own love for the union. He did this, not merely by his arguments but by the influence which was his by right of his strong, sweet nature. Statesmen and politicians, great and small, were at this time, almost without exception, members of the bar. To influence the political thought of the bar was to a great extent to influence the political thought of the people.
In 1782 he married Mary Willis Ambler, the daughter of the then treasurer of Virginia. They had ten children, six of whom grew to full age. For the greater part of the forty-eight years of their married life Mrs Marshall suffered intensely from a nervous affliction. Her condition called out the love and sympathy of her husband’s deep and affectionate nature. Judge Story tells us: “That which, in a just sense, was his highest glory, was the purity, affectionateness, liberality and devotedness of his domestic life.” For the first thirty years of his chief-justiceship his life was a singularly happy one. He never had to remain in Washington for more than three months. During the rest of the year, with the exception of a visit to Raleigh, which his duties as circuit judge required him to make, and a visit to his old home in Fauquier county, he lived in Richmond. His house on Shockhoe Hill is still standing.
On Christmas Day 1831 his wife died. He never was quite the same again. On returning from Washington in the spring of 1835 he suffered severe contusions, from an accident to the stage coach in which he was riding. His health, which had not been good, now rapidly declined and in June he returned to Philadelphia for medical attendance. There he died on the 6th of July. His body, which was taken to Richmond, lies in Shockhoe Hill Cemetery under a plain marble slab, on which is a simple inscription written by himself. In addition to his decisions Marshall wrote a famous biography of George Washington (5 vols., 1804-1807; 2nd ed., 2 vols., 1832), which though prepared hastily contains much material of value.
The principal sources of information are: an essay by James B. Thayer (Boston and New York, 1904);Great American Lawyers(Philadelphia, 1908), ii. 313-408, an essay by Wm. Draper Lewis; and Allan B. Magruder,John Marshall(Boston, 1885), in the “American Statesmen Series.” The addresses delivered on Marshall Day, the 4th of February 1901, are collected by John F. Dillon (Chicago, 1903). In the “Appendix” to Dillon’s collection will be found the “Discourse” by Joseph Story and the “Eulogy” by Horace Binney, both delivered soon after Marshall’s death. For a study of Marshall’s decisions, theConstitutional Decisions of John Marshall, edited by Joseph P. Collon, Jr. (New York and London, 1905), is of value.
The principal sources of information are: an essay by James B. Thayer (Boston and New York, 1904);Great American Lawyers(Philadelphia, 1908), ii. 313-408, an essay by Wm. Draper Lewis; and Allan B. Magruder,John Marshall(Boston, 1885), in the “American Statesmen Series.” The addresses delivered on Marshall Day, the 4th of February 1901, are collected by John F. Dillon (Chicago, 1903). In the “Appendix” to Dillon’s collection will be found the “Discourse” by Joseph Story and the “Eulogy” by Horace Binney, both delivered soon after Marshall’s death. For a study of Marshall’s decisions, theConstitutional Decisions of John Marshall, edited by Joseph P. Collon, Jr. (New York and London, 1905), is of value.
(W. D. L.)
MARSHALL, JOHN(1818-1891), British surgeon and physiologist, was born at Ely, on the 11th of September 1818, his father being a lawyer of that city. He entered University College, London, in 1838, and in 1847 he was appointed assistant-surgeon at the hospital, becoming in 1866 surgeon and professor of surgery. He was professor of anatomy at the Royal Academy from 1873 till his death. In 1883 he was president of the College of Surgeons, also Bradshaw lecturer (on “Nerve-stretching for the relief or cure of pain”), Hunterian orator in 1885, and Morton lecturer in 1889. In 1867 he published his well-known textbookThe Outlines of Physiologyin two volumes. He died on the 1st of January 1891. “Marshall’s fame,” wrote Sir W. MacCormac in his volume on theCentenary of the College of Surgeons(1900), “rests on the great ability with which he taught anatomy in relation to art, on the introduction into modern surgery of the galvano-cautery, and on the operation for the excision of varicose veins. He was one of the first to show that cholera might be spread by means of drinking water, and issued a report on the outbreak of cholera in Broad Street, St James’s, 1854. He also invented the system of circular wards for hospitals, and to him are largely owing the details of the modern medical student’s education.”
MARSHALL, STEPHEN(c.1594-1655), English Nonconformist divine, was born at Godmanchester in Huntingdonshire, and was educated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge (M.A. 1622, B.D. 1629). After holding the living of Wethersfield in Essex he became vicar of Finchingfield in the same county, and in 1636 was reported for “want of conformity.” He was a preacher of great power, and influenced the elections for the Short Parliament of 1640. Clarendon esteemed his influence on the parliamentary side greater than that of Laud on the royalist. In 1642 he was appointed lecturer at St Margaret’s, Westminster, and delivered a series of addresses to the Commons in which he advocated episcopal and liturgical reform. He had a share in writingSmectymnuus, was appointed chaplain to the earl of Essex’s regiment in 1642, and a member of the Westminster Assembly in 1643. He represented the English Parliament in Scotland in 1643, and attended the parliamentary commissions at the Uxbridge Conference in 1645. He waited on Archbishop Laud before his execution, and was chaplain to Charles I. at Holmby House and at Carisbrooke. A moderate and judicious presbyterian, he prepared with others the “Shorter Catechism” in 1647, and was one of the “Triers,” 1654. He died in November 1655 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, but his body was exhumed and maltreated at the Restoration. His sermons, especially that on the death of John Pym in 1643, reveal eloquence and fervour. The only “systematic” work he published wasA Defence of Infant Baptism, against John Tombes (London, 1646).
MARSHALL,a city and the county-seat of Saline county, Missouri, U.S.A., situated a little W. of the centre of the state, near the Salt Fork of the La Mine River. Pop. (1890), 4297; (1900), 5086 (208 being foreign-born and 98 negroes); (1910) 4869. It is served by the Missouri Pacific and the Chicago & Alton railways. The city is laid out regularly on a high, undulating prairie. It is the seat of Missouri Valley College (opened 1889; co-educational), which was established by the Cumberland Presbyterian church, and includes a preparatory department and a conservatory of music. The court-house (1883), a Roman Catholic convent and a high school (1907) are the principal buildings. The Missouri colony for the feeble-minded and epileptic (1899) is at Marshall. The principal trade is with the surrounding farming country. The municipality owns and operates the waterworks. Marshall was first settled and was made the county seat in 1839; it became a town in 1866 (re-incorporated 1870) and a city in 1878.
MARSHALL,a city and the county-seat of Harrison county, Texas, U.S.A., about 145 m. E. by S. of Dallas. Pop. (1890), 7207; (1900) 7855 (3769 negroes); (1910) 11,452. Marshall is served by the Texas & Pacific and the Marshall & East Texas railways, which have large shops here. Wiley University wasfounded in 1873 by the Freedman’s Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and Bishop College, was founded in 1881 by the American Baptist Home Mission Society and incorporated in 1885. Marshall is situated in a region growing cotton and Indian corn, vegetables, small fruits and sugar-cane; in the surrounding country there are valuable forests of pine, oak and gum. In the vicinity of the city there are several lakes (including Caddo Lake) and springs (including Hynson and Rosborough springs). The city has a cotton compress, and among its manufactures are cotton-seed oil, lumber, ice, foundry products and canned goods. The municipality owns and operates the waterworks. Marshall was first settled in 1842, was incorporated in 1843, and received a city charter in 1848; in 1909 it adopted the commission form of government.
MARSHALL ISLANDS,an island group in the western Pacific Ocean (Micronesia) belonging to Germany. The group consists of a number of atolls ranged in two almost parallel lines, which run from N.W. to S.E. between 4° and 15° N. and 161° and 174° E. The north-east line, with fifteen islands, is called Ratak, the other, numbering eighteen, Ralik. These atolls are of coralline formation and of irregular shape. They rise but little above high-water mark. The highest elevation occurs on the island of Likieb, but is only 33 ft. The lagoon is scarcely more than 150 ft. deep and is accessible through numerous breaks in the reef. On the outward side the shore sinks rapidly to a great depth. The surface of the atolls is covered with sand, except in a few places where it has been turned into soil through the admixture of decayed vegetation. The reef in scarcely any instance exceeds 600 ft. in width.
The climate is moist and hot, the mean temperature being 80.50° F. Easterly winds prevail all the year round. There is no difference between the seasons, which, though the islands belong to the northern hemisphere, have the highest temperature in January and the lowest in July. Vegetation, on the whole, is very poor. There are many coco-nut palms, bread-fruit trees (Artocarpus incisa), various kinds of bananas, yams and taro, and pandanus, of which the natives eat the seeds. From the bark of another plant they manufacture mats. There are few animals. Cattle do not thrive, and even poultry are scarce. Pigs, cats, dogs and rats have been imported. There are a few pigeons and aquatic birds, butterflies and beetles. Crustacea and fish abound on the reefs.
The natives are Micronesians of a dark brown colour, though lighter shades occur. Their hair is not woolly but straight and long. They practise tattooing, and show Papuan influence by distending the ear-lobes by the insertion of wooden disks. They are expert navigators, and construct curious charts of thin strips of wood tied together with fibres, some giving the position of the islands and some the direction of the prevailing winds. Their canoes carry sails and are made of the trunk of the bread-fruit tree. The people are divided into four classes, of which only two are allowed to own land. The islands lie entirely within the German sphere of interest, and the boundaries were agreed upon between Great Britain and Germany on the 10th of April 1889. Their area is estimated at 160 sq. m., with 15,000 inhabitants, who are apparently increasing, though the contrary was long believed. All but about 250 are natives. The administrator of the islands is the governor of German New Guinea, but a number of officials reside on the islands. There is no military force, the natives being of peaceful disposition. The chief island and seat of government is Jaluit. The most populous island is Majeru, with 1600 inhabitants. The natives are generally pagans, but a Roman Catholic mission has been established, and the American Mission Board maintains coloured teachers on many of the islands. There is communication with Sydney by private steamer, and a steamer sails between Jaluit and Ponape to connect with the French boats for Singapore. The chief products for export are copra, tortoise-shell, mother-of-pearl, sharks’ fins and trepang. The natives are clever boat-builders, and find a market for their canoes on neighbouring islands. They have made such progress in their art that they have even built seaworthy little schooners of 30 to 40 tons. The only other articles they make are a few shell ornaments.
The Marshall Islands may have been visited by Alvaro de Saavedra in 1529, Captain Wallis touched at the group in 1767, and in 1788 Captains Marshall and Gilbert explored it. The Germans made a treaty with the chieftains of Jaluit in 1878 and annexed the group in 1885-1886.
See C. Hager,Die Marshall-Inseln(Leipzig, 1886); Steinbach and Grösser,Wörterbuch der Marshall-Sprache(Hamburg, 1902).
See C. Hager,Die Marshall-Inseln(Leipzig, 1886); Steinbach and Grösser,Wörterbuch der Marshall-Sprache(Hamburg, 1902).
MARSHALLTOWN,a city and the county-seat of Marshall county, Iowa, U.S.A., near the Iowa River and about 60 m. N.E. of Des Moines. Pop. (1890), 8914; (1900), 11,544, of whom 1590 were foreign-born; (1910 census) 13,374. Marshalltown is served by the Chicago & North-Western, the Chicago Great Western, and the Iowa Central railways, the last of which has machine shops here. At Marshalltown are the Iowa soldiers’ home, supported in part by the Federal Government, and St. Mary’s institute, a Roman Catholic commercial and business school. The city is situated in a rich agricultural region, and is a market for grain,meatcattle, horses and swine. There are miscellaneous manufactures, and in 1905 the factory product was valued at $3,090,312. The municipality owns and operates its waterworks and its electric-lighting plant. Marshalltown, named in honour of Chief Justice John Marshall, was laid out in 1853, and became the county-seat in 1860. It was incorporated as a town in 1863, and was chartered as a city in 1868.
MARSHALSEA,a prison formerly existing in Southwark, London. It was attached to the court of that name held by the steward and marshal of the king’s house (seeLord StewardandMarshal). The date of its first establishment is unknown, but it existed as early as the reign of Edward III. It was consolidated in 1842 with the queen’s bench and the Fleet, and was then described as “a prison for debtors and for persons charged with contempt of Her Majesty’s courts of the Marshalsea, the court of the queen’s palace of Westminster, and the high court of admiralty, and also for admiralty prisoners under sentence of courts martial.” It was abolished in 1849. The Marshalsea Prison is described in Charles Dickens’Little Dorrit.
MARSHBUCK,a book-name proposed for such of the African bushbucks or harnessed antelopes as have abnormally long hoofs to support them in walking on marshy or swampy ground. (SeeBushbuckandAntelope.)
MARSHFIELD,a city of Wood county, Wisconsin, about 165 m. N.W. of Milwaukee. Pop. (1890), 3450; (1900), 5240, of whom 1161 were foreign-born; (1905) 6036; (1910) 5783. It is served by the Chicago & North-Western, the Chicago, St Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha, and the Minneapolis, St Paul & Sault Ste Marie railways. It contains the mother-house of the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother. Lumbering is the most important industry, and there are various manufactures. The city is situated in a clover region, in which dairying is important, and Guernsey and Holstein-Friesland cattle are raised. The municipality owns and operates the waterworks and the electric-lighting plant. The site of Marshfield was part of a tract granted by the Federal government to the Fox River Improvement Company, organized to construct a waterway between the Mississippi river and Green Bay, and among the original owners of the town site were Samuel Marsh of Massachusetts (in whose honour the place was named) and Horatio Seymour, Ezra Cornell, Erastus Corning, and William A. Butler of New York. Marshfield was settled about 1870, and was first chartered as a city in 1883.
MARSH GAS(methane), CH4, the first member of the series of paraffin hydrocarbons. It occurs as a constituent of the “fire-damp” of coal-mines, in the gases evolved from volcanoes, and in the gases which arise in marshy districts (due to the decomposition of vegetable matter under the surface of water). It is found associated with petroleum and also in human intestinal gases. It is a product of the destructive distillation of complex organic matter (wood, coal, bituminous shale, &c.), forming in this way from 30 to 40% of ordinary illuminatinggas. It may be synthetically obtained by passing a mixture of the vapour of carbon bisulphide with sulphuretted hydrogen over red-hot copper (M. Berthelot,Comptes rendus, 1856, 43, p. 236), CS2+ 2H2S + 8Cu = 4Cu2S + CH4; by passing a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide over reduced nickel at 200-250° C., or hydrogen and carbon dioxide at 230-300° C. (P. Sabatier and J. B. Senderens,Comptes rendus, 1902, 134, pp. 514, 689); by the decomposition of aluminium carbide with water [H. Moissan,Bull. Soc. Chim., 1894, (3) 11, p. 1012]; and by heating phosphonium iodide with carbon bisulphide in a sealed tube to 120-140° C. (H. Jahn,Ber., 1880, 13, p. 127). It is also obtained by the reduction of many methyl compounds with nascent hydrogen; thus methyl iodide dissolved in methyl alcohol readily yields methane when acted on by the zinc-copper couple (J. H. Gladstone and A. Tribe,Jour. Chem. Soc., 1884, 45, p. 156) or by the aluminium-mercury couple. It may be obtained in an indirect manner from methyl iodide by conversion of this compound into zinc methyl, or into magnesium methyl iodide (formed by the action of magnesium on methyl iodide dissolved in anhydrous ether), and decomposing these latter substances with water (E. Frankland, 1856; V. Grignard, 1900),
Zn(CH4)2+ H2O = 2CH4+ ZnO; 2CH3MgI + H2O = 2CH4+ MgI2+ MgO.
In the laboratory it is usually prepared by J. B. A. Dumas’ method (Ann., 1840, 33, p. 181), which consists in heating anhydrous sodium acetate with soda lime, CH3CO2Na + NaOH = Na2CO3+ CH4. The product obtained by this method is not pure, containing generally more or less ethylene and hydrogen.
Methane is a colourless gas of specific gravity 0.559 (air = 1). It may be condensed to a colourless liquid at −155° to −160° C. under atmospheric pressure (S. Wroblewsky,Comptes rendus, 1884, 99, p. 136). It boils at -162° C. and freezes at −186° C. Its critical temperature is −99.5° C. (J. Dewar). The gas is almost insoluble in water, but is slightly soluble in alcohol. It decomposes into its constituents when passed through a red-hot tube, small quantities of other hydrocarbons (ethane, ethylene, acetylene, benzene, &c.) being formed at the same time. It burns with a pale flame, and when mixed with air or oxygen forms a highly explosive mixture. W. A. Bone (Jour. Chem. Soc., 1902, 81, p. 535; 1903, 83, p. 1074) has shown that in the oxidation of methane by oxygen at 450-500° C. formaldehyde (or possibly methyl alcohol) is formed as an intermediate product, and is ultimately oxidized to carbon dioxide. Methane is an exceedingly stable gas, being unaffected by the action of chromic acid, nitric acid, or a mixture of nitric and sulphuric acids. Chlorine and bromine, however, react with methane, gradually replacing hydrogen and forming chlor- and brom-substitution products.
MARSHMAN, JOSHUA(1768-1837), English Baptist missionary and orientalist, was born on the 20th of April 1768, at Westbury Leigh, in Wiltshire. He followed the occupation of a weaver until 1794, but having meanwhile devoted himself to study he removed to Broadmead, Bristol, to take charge of a small school. In 1799 he was sent by the Baptist Missionary Society to join their mission at Serampur. Here, in addition to his more special duties, he studied Bengali and Sanskrit, and afterwards Chinese. He translated the Bible into various dialects, and, aided by his son, established newspapers and founded Serampur College. He received the degree of D.D. from Brown University, U.S.A., in 1810. He died at Serampur on the 5th of December 1837. His son, John Clark Marshman (1704-1877), was official Bengali translator; he published aGuide to the Civil Lawwhich, before the work of Macaulay, was the civil code of India, and wrote aHistory of India(1842).
Marshman translated into Chinese the book of Genesis, the Gospels, and the Epistles of Paul to the Romans and the Corinthians; in 1811 he publishedThe Works of Confucius, containing the Original Text, with a Translation, and in 1814 hisClavis Sinica. He was also the author ofElements of Chinese Grammar, with Preliminary Dissertation on the Characters and Colloquial Mediums of the Chinese, and was associated with W. Carey in the preparation of a Sanskrit grammar and of a Bengali-English dictionary.See J. C. Marshman,Life and Times of Carey, Marshman and Ward(2 vols., 1859).
Marshman translated into Chinese the book of Genesis, the Gospels, and the Epistles of Paul to the Romans and the Corinthians; in 1811 he publishedThe Works of Confucius, containing the Original Text, with a Translation, and in 1814 hisClavis Sinica. He was also the author ofElements of Chinese Grammar, with Preliminary Dissertation on the Characters and Colloquial Mediums of the Chinese, and was associated with W. Carey in the preparation of a Sanskrit grammar and of a Bengali-English dictionary.
See J. C. Marshman,Life and Times of Carey, Marshman and Ward(2 vols., 1859).
MARSI,an ancient people of Italy, whose chief centre was Marruvium, on the eastern shore of Lake Fucinus. They are first mentioned as members of a confederacy with the Vestini, Paeligni and Marrucini (Liv. viii. 29, cf. viii. 6, and Polyb. ii. 24, 12). They joined the Samnites in 308B.C.(Liv. ix. 41), and on their submission became allies of Rome in 304B.C.(Liv. ix. 45). After a short-lived revolt two years later, for which they were punished by loss of territory (Liv. x. 3), they were readmitted to the Roman alliance and remained faithful down to the social war, their contingent (e.g.Liv. xliv. 46) being always regarded as the flower of the Italian forces (e.g.Hor.Od.ii. 20, 18). In this war, which, owing to the prominence of the Marsian rebels is often known as the Marsic War, they fought bravely against odds under their leader Q. Pompaedius Silo, and, though they were frequently defeated, the result of the war was the enfranchisement of the allies (seeRome:History, “The Republic”). The Marsi were a hardy mountain people, famed for their simple habits and indomitable courage. It was said that the Romans had never triumphed over them or without them (Appian). They were also renowned for their magicians, who had strange remedies for various diseases.
The Latin colony of Alba Fucens near the north-west corner of the lake was founded in the adjoining Aequian territory in 303, so that from the beginning of the 3rd century the Marsians were in touch with a Latin-speaking community, to say nothing of the Latin colony of Carsioli (298B.C.) farther west. The earliest pure Latin inscriptions of the district seem to beC.I.L.ix. 3827 and 3848 from the neighbourhood of Supinum; its character generally is of the Gracchan period, though it might be somewhat earlier.
Mommsen (Unteritalische Dialekten, p. 345) pointed out that in the social war all the coins of Pompaedius Silo have the Latin legend “Italia,” while the other leaders in all but one case used Oscan.
The chief record of the dialect or patois we owe to the goddess Angitia, whose chief temple and grove stood at the south-west corner of Lake Fucinus, near the inlet to theemissariusof Claudius (restored by Prince Torlonia), and the modern village of Luco. She (or they, for the name is in the plural in the Latin inscription next cited) was widely worshipped in the central highlands (Sulmo,C.I.L.ix. 3074, Furfo Vestinorum, ibid. 3515) as a goddess of healing, especially skilled to cure serpent bites by charms and the herbs of the Marsian woods. Her worshippers naturally practised the same arts—as their descendants do (see A. de Nino’s charming collection ofUsi e costumi abruzzesi), their country being in Rome counted the home of witchcraft; see Hor.Sal.1, 9, 29,Epod.17, 28, &c.
The earliest local inscriptions date from about 300 to 150B.C.and include the interesting and difficult bronze of Lake Fucinus, which seems to record a votive offering to Angitia, ifA(n)ctia, as is probable, was the local form of her name. Their language differs very slightly from Roman Latin of that date; for apparently contracted forms likeFougnoinstead ofFucinomay really only be a matter of spelling. In final syllables the diphthongsai,ei,oi, all appear asē. On the other hand, the older form of the name of the tribe (dat. plur.Martses= Lat.Martiis) shows its derivation and exhibits the assibilation of-tio-into-tso-proper to many Oscan dialects (seeOsca Lingua) but strange to classical Latin.
See R. S. Conway,The Italic Dialects, pp. 290 seq. (from which some portions of this article are taken by permission of the syndics of the Camb. Univ. Press); on the Fucino-Bronze, ib. p. 294.
See R. S. Conway,The Italic Dialects, pp. 290 seq. (from which some portions of this article are taken by permission of the syndics of the Camb. Univ. Press); on the Fucino-Bronze, ib. p. 294.
(R. S. C.)
MARSIGLI[LatinizedMarsilius],LUIGI FERDINANDO,Count (1658-1730), Italian soldier and scientific writer, was born at Bologna on the 10th of July 1658. After a course of scientific studies in his native city he travelled through Turkey collecting data on the military organization of that empire, as well as on its natural history. On his return he entered the service of the emperor Leopold (1682) and fought with distinction against the Turks, by whom he was wounded and captured in anaction on the river Raab, and sold to a pasha whom he accompanied to the siege of Vienna. His release was purchased in 1684, and he afterwards took part in the war of the Spanish succession. In 1703 he was appointed second in command under Count Arco in the defence of Alt-Breisach. The fortress surrendered to the duke of Burgundy, and both Arco and Marsigli were court martialled; the former was condemned to death and the latter cashiered, although acquitted of blame by public opinion. Having thus been forced to give up soldiering, he devoted the rest of his life to scientific investigations, in the pursuit of which he made many journeys through Europe, spending a considerable time at Marseilles to study the nature of the sea. In 1712 he presented his collections to his native city, where they formed the nucleus of the Bologna Institute of Science and Art. He died at Bologna on the 1st of November 1730. Marsigli was a fellow of the London Royal Society and a member of the Paris Academy of Science.
Bibliography.—A list of his works, over twenty in number, is given in Niceron’sMemoirs; hisBreve ristretto del saggio fisico intorno alla storia del marewas published at Venice in 1711, and again at Amsterdam (in French) in 1725; theStato militare dell’ impero ottomanowas published at Amsterdam and the Hague in Italian and French (1732), theOsservazioni intorno al Bosforo Tracioin Rome (1681) and theDanubius pannonico-mysicus, a large work in six volumes containing much valuable historic and scientific information on the Danubian countries, at the Hague (1725). See Fontenelle, “Éloge” in theMém. de l’acad. des sciences(Paris, 1730); Quincy,Mémoires sur la vie de M. le comte Marsigli(Zürich, 1741), and Fantuzzi’s biography of Marsigli (Bologna, 1770).
Bibliography.—A list of his works, over twenty in number, is given in Niceron’sMemoirs; hisBreve ristretto del saggio fisico intorno alla storia del marewas published at Venice in 1711, and again at Amsterdam (in French) in 1725; theStato militare dell’ impero ottomanowas published at Amsterdam and the Hague in Italian and French (1732), theOsservazioni intorno al Bosforo Tracioin Rome (1681) and theDanubius pannonico-mysicus, a large work in six volumes containing much valuable historic and scientific information on the Danubian countries, at the Hague (1725). See Fontenelle, “Éloge” in theMém. de l’acad. des sciences(Paris, 1730); Quincy,Mémoires sur la vie de M. le comte Marsigli(Zürich, 1741), and Fantuzzi’s biography of Marsigli (Bologna, 1770).
MARSILIUS OF PADUA[Marsiglio Mainardino] (1270-1342), Italian medieval scholar, was born at Padua, and at first studied medicine in his own country. After practising various professions, among others that of a soldier, he went to Paris about 1311. The reputation which he had gained in the physical sciences soon caused him to be raised to the position of rector of the university (for the first term of the year 1313). While still practising medicine he entered into relations with another master of Paris, the philosopher John of Jandun, who collaborated with him in the composition of the famousDefensor pacis(1324), one of the most extraordinary political and religious works which appeared during the 14th century. A violent struggle had just broken out between pope John XXII. and Louis of Bavaria, king of the Romans, and the latter, on being excommunicated and called upon to give up the empire, only replied to the pope’s threats with fresh provocations. Marsilius of Padua and John of Jandun, though they had both reason to be grateful for the benefits of John XXII., chose this moment to demonstrate, by plausible arguments, the supremacy of the Empire, its independence of the Holy See, and the emptiness of the prerogatives “usurped” by the sovereign pontiffs—a demonstration naturally calculated to give them a claim on the gratitude of the German sovereign.
TheDefensor pacis, as its name implies, is a work intended to restore peace, as the most indispensable benefit of human society. The author of the law is the people,i.e.the whole body, or at least the most important part (valentior) of the citizens; the people should themselves elect, or at least appoint, the head of the government, who, lest he should be tempted to put himself above the scope of the laws, should have at his disposal only a limited armed force. This chief is responsible to the people for his breaches of the law, and in serious cases they can condemn him to death. The real cause of the trouble which prevails among men is the papacy, a “fictitious” power, the development of which is the result of a series of usurpations. Marsilius denies, not only to the pope, but to the bishops and clergy, any coercive jurisdiction or any right to pronounce on their own authority excommunications and interdicts, or in any way to impose the observation of the divine law. He is not opposed to penalties against heretics, but he would have them pronounced only by civil tribunals. Desiring to see the clergy practise a holy poverty, he proposes the suppression of tithes and the seizure by the secular power of the greater part of the property of the church. The clergy, thus deprived of its wealth, privileges and jurisdiction, is further to be deprived of independence, for the civil power is to have the right of appointing to benefices, &c. The supreme authority in the church is to be the council, but a council summoned by the emperor. The pope, no longer possessing any more power than other bishops (though Marsilius recognizes that the supremacy of the Church of Rome goes back to the earliest times of Christianity), is to content himself with a pre-eminence mainly of an honorary kind, without claiming to interpret the Holy Scriptures, define dogmas or distribute benefices; moreover, he is to be elected by the Christian people, or by the delegates of the people,i.e.the princes, or by the council, and these are also to have the power to punish, suspend or depose him. Such is this famous work, full of obscurities, redundancies and contradictions, in which the thread of the argument is sometimes lost in a labyrinth of reasonings and citations, both sacred and profane, but which nevertheless expresses, both in religion and politics, such audacious and novel ideas that it has been possible to trace in it, as it were, a rough sketch of the doctrines developed during the periods of the Reformation and of the French Revolution. The theory was purely democratic, but was all ready to be transformed, by means of a series of fictions and implications, into an imperialist doctrine; and in like manner it contained a visionary plan of reformation which ended, not in the separation of the church from the state, but in the subjection of the church to the state. To overthrow the ecclesiastical hierarchy, to deprive the clergy of all their privileges, to reduce the pope to the rank of a kind of president of a Christian republic, which governs itself, or rather submits to the government of Caesar—such is the dream formed in 1324 by two masters of the university of Paris.
When in 1326 Louis of Bavaria saw the arrival in Nuremberg of the two authors of the book dedicated to him, startled by the boldness of their political and religious theories, he was at first inclined to treat them as heretics. He soon changed his mind, however, and, admitting them to the circle of his intimates, loaded them with favours. Having become one of the chief inspirers of the imperial policy, Marsilius accompanied Louis of Bavaria to Italy, where he preached or circulated written attacks against the pope, especially at Milan, and where he came within the sight of the realization of his wildest utopias. To see a king of the Romans crowned emperor at Rome, not by the pope, but by those who claimed to be the delegates of the people (Jan. 17, 1328), to see John XXII. deposed by the head of the Empire (April 18), and a mendicant friar, Pietro de Corbara, raised by an imperial decree to the throne of St Peter (as Nicholas V.) after a sham of a popular election (May 12), all this was merely the application of principles laid down in theDefensor pacis. The two authors of this book played a most active part in the Roman Revolution. Marsilius, appointed imperial vicar, abused his power to persecute the clergy who had remained faithful to John XXII. In recompense for his services, he seems to have been appointed archbishop of Milan, while his collaborator, John of Jandun, obtained from Louis of Bavaria the bishopric of Ferrara.
Marsilius of Padua also composed a treatiseDe translatione imperii romani, which is merely a rearrangement of a work of Landolfo Colonna,De jurisdictione imperatoris in causa matrimoniali, intended to prove the exclusive jurisdiction of the emperor in matrimonial affairs, or rather, to justify the intervention of Louis of Bavaria, who, in the interests of his policy, had just annulled the marriage of the son of the king of Bohemia and the countess of Tirol. But, above all, in an unpublished work preserved at Oxford, theDefensor minor, Marsilius completed and elaborated in a curious manner certain points in the doctrine laid down in theDefensor pacis. In it he deals with ecclesiastical jurisdiction, penances, indulgences, crusades and pilgrimages, vows, excommunication, the pope and the council, marriage and divorce. Here his democratic theory still more clearly leads up to a proclamation of the imperial omnipotence.
Marsilius of Padua does not seem to have lived long after 1342. But the scandal provoked by hisDefensor pacis, condemned by the court of Avignon in 1326, lasted much longer. Benedict XII. and Clement VI. censured it in turn; Louis of Bavariadisowned it. Translated into French, then into Italian (14th century) and into English (16th century), it was known by Wycliffe and Luther, and was not without an influence on the Reform movement.