MOTION-MOTLEY. other legs reach the ground, so that there is a minute interval when all four legs are raised above the ground at the same time. The velocity acquired by moving the legs in pairs (as in running), instead of consecutively (as in walking), depends upon the circumstance, that in trotting each leg rests on the ground during a short time and swings during a long time, while in walking the swing occupies a short period, and the rest a comparatively long one. In cantering, the animal, after advancing the two fore-legs one after the other, brings forward the two hind-legs simultaneously; and when this movement is greatly urged, the fore-legs are raised together, as well as the hind-legs, and the pace then becomes the gallop. In leaping, the horse raises the fore-legs from the ground, and propels the body upwards and forwards by the hind-legs alone. This act in the horse is, however, mainly the result of education, and those animals that leap or spring upon their prey (as the members of the cat tribe) crouch before leaping, in order to throw the body forward with the greatest possible force, by first bending all the limbs, and then suddenly extending them. As the hind-legs are, however, the essential agents in leaping, we observe that in those animals whose natural mode of progression is leaping-as frogs, hares, kangaroos, &c. the hind-legs are much longer, and more muscular than the fore-legs. Leaping is a common mode of progression in many short-legged birds (black birds, thrushes, finches, sparrows, &c.), in which the step would be extremely short if performed by moving the legs alternately. There is also a large number of insects, such as grasshoppers, fleas, &c., whose ordinary mode of progression is by leaps; and it is in this class of animals that the leaping power is developed to its greatest extent. The common flea, for example, can leap 200 times its own length. While fleas, locusts, and grasshoppers leap by means of their long and strong hind-legs; other insects, as the Poduride, or springtails, possess a forked tail, which they bend beneath the body, and which, when suddenly extended, propels them to a considerable distance. Climbing, is merely walking on an inclined or vertical surface. It is usually accomplished by means of sharp nails or claws, as in the cat-tribe, the lizards, &c. In many birds, as the woodpeckers, parrots, &c., the toes are arranged in two divisions, so as to grasp branches in the manner of a hand. Bears and sloths use their arms for climbing, while monkeys use their hands, and in some cases their tails. It is only in a very few cases, as in the sloth, that this is the ordinary method of progression. The act of flying in the bird is accomplished by the simultaneous action of the two anterior limbs, the wings, much as leaping is by that of the two posterior limbs. See FLYING; BIRDS. Many attempts have been made to estimate the velocity at which different birds can fly. Whether, as has been stated, the eider-duck can fly 90, and the hawk 150 miles in an hour, is very questionable; but it has been ascertained that carrier-pigeons can accomplish from 38 to 42 miles in that time. The bats are the only mammals which possess a true power of flight. For a description of their organs and mode of flight, we must refer to the article BAT, where will also be found a notice of the false claims of some other mammals, as the so-called flying-squirrel, to the possession of true flight. Similarly, the actions of the flying lizard and of the flying-fish are not true flight. In no to right or left, as well as forwards without turning. The wings of insects, of which there may be either one or two pair, are analogous (as instruments of motion) to the feathered wings of birds, but are regarded as homologous to (or in their essential nature) branchiæ or respiratory organs. For details regarding the mechanism employed in their aërial progression by insects, see INSECTS. The Swimming is the mode of progression employed by most aquatic animals. It mainly differs from flying in this respect, that water being much more dense than air, and the body of the animal being nearly of the same weight as the water it displaces, very little effort is required to keep the animal from sinking, and hence almost the whole of the muscular force can be employed in progression. In fishes, the locomotive organs consist of the fins and tail, the latter being the great propelling organ. The swimming of a fish has been correctly compared to the motion of a boat propelled by a single oar or scull at the stern. In the same manner as a succession of strokes alternately right and left propels the boat straight forwards, so the fish advances by striking alternately right and left with its tail. The caudal fin, in which the tail ends, is vertical in fishes, and is usually considerably forked, when there is great speed. The ventral fins are for the purpose of keeping the fish in its proper position, with the back upwards, as is shewn by a well-known experiment of Borelli, who, after cutting off these fins, restored the living fish to the water, when it rolled from side to side like a drunken man. air-bladder with which many fishes are provided, and which they can distend and contract at pleasure, facilitates their swimming by enabling them to modify their specific gravity. Most terrestrial mammals, excepting man, swim at once the first time they find themselves in deep water. The reason of this is, that their limbs move in water precisely as they do on land, and no new action either as regards direction or order is required, as is the case with man, to enable them to swim. which frequent the water, as seals, otters, and beavers, have webbed feet like ducks and other palmiped birds, the toes being united by membranes, which, when expanded, act as paddles. A large number of invertebrate animals move chiefly by swimming. Thus lobsters move by means of a vertical motion of the tail, and many of the crabs by means of their posterior legs, which are fashioned like oars. Many insects swim with their legs, which are fringed with hairs to give additional surface. The cuttle-fish uses its long arms as oars, and darts through the water with extreme rapidity; while other molluscs erect sail-like organs, by which they are propelled along the surface of the water. SWIMMING, as a gymnastic exercise, is described in a separate article. Those See Notices of the more special modes of progression will be found under a variety of heads. CRUSTACEA, SERPENTS, WORMS. MOTION, in Plants. See IRRITABILITY and SPORE. MOTIVE, or MOTIVO, in a musical composition, means the principal subject on which the movement is constructed, and which, during the movement, is constantly appearing in one or other of the parts, either complete or modified. In elaborate and long compositions there are also secondary motives. MOTLEY, JOHN LOTHROP, LL.D., D.C.L., &c., class of animals is the mechanism of flight so perfect American historian, was born at Dorchester, Massaas in insects. The dragon-fly, for example, can out-chusetts, April 15, 1814. After graduating at Harstrip the swallow; and can do more in the air than vard University, he spent a year at Göttingen, any bird, as it can fly backwards and sidelong, another at Berlin, and travelled in Italy and other MOTRIL-MOULD. parts of Southern Europe. Returning to America, he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1837; but preferring literature, he wrote a historical romance, entitled Morton's Hope (1839), which had little success. In 1840, he received the appointment of secretary of legation to the American Embassy to Russia, but soon resigned, and in 1849, published another unsuccessful novel, entitled Merry Mount, a Romance of the Massachusetts Colony. He attracted attention, however, by some valuable historical essays for American_reviews, among which may be mentioned one on De Tocqueville's Democracy in America, and another on 'Peter the Great;' and having planned a history of Holland, he proceeded to Europe for materials, and after five years' labour, published in 1856 The Rise of the Dutch Republic, which had an immediate and marked success, was translated into French, Dutch, and German, and caused him to be elected to the French Institute and many learned societies in Europe, and to receive the degrees of Doctor of Laws from Harvard, and Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford University. He has since been engaged on a History of the United Netherlands, of which two volumes were published in 1860. MOTRI'L, a town of Spain, in the province of Granada, and 35 miles south of the city of that name, in a richly productive district about 3 miles from the sea. The hills in the vicinity are covered with vines, and the town is tropical in its aspect. Agriculture and fishing are the principal employments of the inhabitants. Pop. 12,850. Common Mould (Mucor mucedo), highly magnified. morbid state. To the naked eye, they often seem like patches or masses of fine cobweb, and are discovered by the microscope to consist of threads more or less distinctly jointed, sometimes branched. Some species of M. occur on many different substances; others seem to be peculiar to substances of particular kinds, as decaying pears, decaying gourds, &c Some of the moulds belong to the suborder of fungi called Physomycetes. See FUNGI One of these is the COMMON M. (Mucor mucedo), so plentifully found on fruit, paste, preserves, &c., in a state of incipient decay, the progress of which it hastens. It consists of cobweb-like masses of threads, from which rise many short stems, each bearing at the top a roundish membranous blackish spore-case.-A nearly allied, and also very common species, is Ascophora mucedo, which forms a bluish M. on bread. From a spreading cobweb-like bed rise long slender branches, terminated by spore-cases, of which the vesicle collapses into the form of a little pileus.-An interesting species of M., remarkable for its luxuriance and beauty of colours -at first white, then yellow, with orange spore cases, then shining green or olive, and with threads often several inches long-grows on fatty subMOTTO, in Heraldry, a word or short sentence stances.-Other species of M. are ranked among which forms an accompaniment to a coat-of-arms, floccose thallus and naked spores. One of these is Hyphomycetes, a suborder of Fungi, having a crest, or household badge. Mottoes were originally the BLUE M. (Aspergillus glaucus), which imparts to attached to the badge when the family had one, or to the crest where there was no badge. In later cheese a flavour so agreeable to epicures, and heraldry, the practice is to place the motto in an perhaps marks it as in a condition most suitable for escrol either over the crest or below the shield. A promoting the digestion of other aliments, of which motto is sometimes a religious or moral sentiment, epicures eat too much. Advantage is often taken as ‘Gardez la foi,' 'Humanitate;' it is not unfre of the fact, that a small portion of cheese affected quently a heroic exclamation or war-cry, Courage with M. will speedily infect sound cheese into which sans peur,' Forward.' In a great many cases it it may be introduced. It is one of the few cases in bears reference to the crest, badge, or some bearing which the propagation of these fungi is ever desired of the escutcheon; thus, Stuart, Earl of Moray, has and sought after by man.-SNow M. (Lanosa nirafor crest a pelican wounding herself, and for motto,lis) is found on grasses, and especially on barley Salus per Christum Redemptorem;' and not a few mottoes are punning allusions to the family nameas Scudamore, Scuto amoris Divini;' Vernon, 'Ver non semper viret;' Fare, fac,' for Fairfax; and Time Deum, cole regem,' for Coleridge. Two Even living animals are liable to be injured by mottoes are sometimes used by the same family-fungi of this kind. Silk-worms are killed in great one above the crest, the other below the shield. numbers by one called MUSCARDINE (q. v.), or ŠILKThe motto, 'Dieu et mon Droit,' which accompanies WORM ROT. Such fungi are sometimes developed the royal arms of Great Britain, is supposed to have on the mucous membrane and in internal cavities of been a war-cry, and was used in England at least vertebrated animals; and on the bodies of inverte as early as the time of Henry VI. Its origin has brated animals, as the common house-fly, which, in been assigned to a saying of Richard I.. 'Not we, the end of autumn, when it becomes languid, often dies from this cause. but God and our right have vanquished France.' Even strongly-scented substances, if moist, are liable to be attacked by M. of one kind or other; nor are strong poisons, either animal or vegetable, a sufficient safeguard. Asco phora mucedo springs up readily in paste full of corrosive sublimate; and the mycelium of moulds is found in strong arsenical solutions. The only sure preventive of M. is dryness. Many of the moulds vegetate in liquids, but do not attain their perfect development, only appearing as filamentous and flocculent mycelia. The Vinegar Plant (q. v.) is an instance of this kind. · MOU'FFLON, or MU'SMON (Ovis or Caprovis Musimon), the wild-sheep of Corsica, Sardinia, Cyprus, Greece, &c. It is about the size of a small fallow-deer, covered with hair and not with wool, except that hair of a somewhat woolly character appears in winter. The upper parts are brownish, the under parts whitish; the hair of the neck is long; the tail is very short. The horns of the male are very large, approaching to those of the Argali. The M. lives chiefly in the higher parts of mountainous regions, and is not easily approached by the hunter. MOULD, or MOULDINESS, the common name of many minute fungi which make their appearance, often in crowded multitudes, on animal and vegetable substances, either in a decaying or in a living but and rye beneath snow, often destroying whole crops. It appears in white patches of a foot or more in diameter, which finally become red as if dusted with red powder. Mildews and Moulds are very nearly allied. The rapidity with which these fungi are produced is marvellous. 'In favourable circumstances, a plant will pass through every stage of growth to perfect maturation of its seeds in less than two days, the threads which sustain the ripe sporangia MOULD-MOULMEIN. being so long, and yet so delicate, as to make it a led to the more elaborate form of mouldings during marvel that they can remain erect.'-(Berkeley). MOULD, the model or pattern from which workmen execute mouldings, ornaments, &c. Also, the shape or bed in which metal and other castings are made. MOULDINGS, the curved and plane surfaces used as ornaments in cornices, panels, arches, &c., and in all enriched apertures in buildings. In classic architecture the mouldings are few in number, and ECHINUS OR CYMA RECTA CYMA SCOTIA TORUS Classic Mouldings. the Decorated period (fig. 4). The mouldings of the perpendicular style are generally flatter and thinner than the preceding, and have large hollows separated by narrow fillets, which produce a meagre effect. Each of these styles has its peculiar ornaments and style of foliage; and when these are used along with the mouldings, there is no difficulty in determining the approximate date of a building. MOULINS, a town of France, capital of the department of Allier, on the right bank of the river Allier, here crossed by a handsome stone bridge of 13 arches, lies 213 miles, by railway, south-east of Paris, and 95 miles north-west of Lyon. M. was formerly the capital of Bourbonnais. It is a clean, well-built town, with pretty promenades. The principal buildings are the cathedral of Notre Dame (for the enlargement of which the sum of one and a half million francs was granted in 1852), the museum, the theatre, the public library containing 20,000 vols., the new town-house, the Palace of Justice, and the college. Of the old castle, built by the Duc de Bourbon in 1530, only a square tower remains, which is used as a prison. M. carries on trade in coal, wood, iron, grain, wine, oil, and cattle. Pop. 15,471. MOULMEI'N, the seat of government of the Tenasserim Provinces (q. v.), situated on the northeast corner of the Bay of Bengal, at the junction of the rivers Salween, Gyne, and Attaran, in 16° 29 N. lat., and 97° 38' E. long. M., one of the healthiest stations in India, is a pretty specimen of an eastern town. It is divided into five districts, each of which is under a goung or native head of police. The streets are, for the most part, shaded with trees, principally of the acacia tribe, and the glossy jack is often seen half covering a native house, its great fruit, as large as a child's head, The principal street, about 3 definitely fixed in their forms. There are eight kinds ripening in the sun. of these regular mouldings, viz., the Cyma, the Ovolo miles in length, runs due north and south, and parallel with the river Salween. The native houses are (or Echinus), the Talon, the Cavetto, the Torus, the Astragal, the Scotia, and the Fillet (q. v.); and each constructed in the usual Burman style of bamboo, of these mouldings has its proper place assigned to and a thatch made of the leaf of the water-palm. it in each order. See COLUMN. In Gothic architec-All are raised on piles, according to the universal ture, and all other styles, the mouldings are not reduced to a system as in the Greek and Roman styles, but may be used in every variety of form at the pleasure of the artist. Certain forms generally prevail at one period in any style. Thus, in Gothic architecture, the date of a building may in many instances be determined by the form of the mouldings. custom of the country. Men walk about with the green paper chattah, or Chinese umbrella, used throughout the provinces; the gharie, or India cab, dashes along, the attendant imp revelling in heat and dust. M. is backed by a fine range of hills, on whose heights flash the gilded spires of innumerable pagodas; and here, too, are built many pretty residences, commanding a fine view of the town, river, and adjacent country, which for picturesque beauty and varied scenery has few equals. M. boasts various churches, chapels, and missionary establishments, several charitable and educational institutions, substantial barracks, a general hospital, public library, &c. Vessels drawing 10 feet of water can come up to M., under charge of pilots from Amherst, and at spring-tide ships of any tonnage may reach the town. The rise and fall of the water is at that time from 20 to 23 feet. The population of M. is on the increase In the census of 1855 -1856 it is given as follows: MOULTING-MOUNTAINS. many fine vessels have lately been constructed in the building-yards of Tavoyzoo and Mopoon. The principal exports from M. are teak-timber and rice; the imports consist of general merchandise, chiefly piece-goods, hardware, provisions, and sundries. The Tenasserim and Martaban Directory; Winter's Six Months in British Burmah (Lond. 1858); Marshall's Four Years in Burmah (Lond. 1860); personal observation. MOULTING is the term applied by naturalists to the periodical exuviation, or throwing off of certain structures, which are for the most part of an epithelial or epidermic character. Thus, in a considerable number of the Articulata, the external covering is thrown off, and replaced many times during life. In some of the minute Entomostracous Crustacea of our pools, a process of moulting, similar to that which occurs in crabs and lobsters, occurs every two or three days, even when the animals seem to have attained their full growth. In the crabs, in which the process has been carefully observed, the exuvium, or cast-off shell, consists not only of the entire external covering, including even the faceted membrane which forms the anterior coat of the compound eyes, but also carries with it the lining membrane of the stomach, and the plates to which the muscles are attached. During growth, this moulting takes place as often as the body becomes too large for the shell; and after the animal has attained its full size, it is found to occur at least once a year, at the reproductive season. During the early growth of insects, spiders, centipedes, &c., a similar moult is frequently repeated at short intervals, but after they have attained their full size, no further moulting takes place. In the Vertebrata we have examples of as complete a moulting, and replacement of new skin, among frogs and serpents as occurs in the Articulata, the whole epidermis being thrown off at least once, and, in some instances, several times yearly. In birds, the feathers are periodically cast off and renewed; in mammals generally, the hair is regularly shed at certain periods of the year; and in the deer tribe the casting off and renewal of the antlers must be regarded as a special example of moulting. In man, the continual exuviation of the outer layers of the epidermis is a process analogous to that which takes place on a more general scale in the lower animals. MOULTRIE, FORT, a fortress on Sullivan's Island, at the mouth of Charleston Harbour, South Carolina, celebrated for the repulse of a British squadron commanded by Sir Peter Parker, January 28, 1776. The fort, at that time, was hastily built of Palmetto logs and sand, with 31 guns and 435 men. The spongy wood of the palmetto was found to resist the cannon balls perfectly. The fort was afterwards rebuilt, and in April 1861, took part in the reduction of Fort Sumter, and the commencement of active hostilities in the civil war of secession. MOUND (Lat. mundus), in Heraldry, a representation of a globe, surmounted with a cross (generally) pattée. As a device, it is said to have been used by the Emperor Justinian, and to have been intended to represent the ascendancy of Christianity over the world. The royal crown of England is surmounted by a mound, which first appears on the seal of William the Conqueror, though the globe Mound. without the cross was used earlier. MOUNT, in Heraldry. When the lower part of the shield is occupied with a representation of ground slightly raised, and covered with grass, this is called a mount in base; e. g., Argent, on a mount in base, a grove of trees ppr.-Walkinshaw of that Ilk, Scotland. Mount. MOUNT VERNON, the seat and tomb of George Washington, first President of the United States of America, on the right bank of the river Potomac, in Virginia, 15 miles below Washington. The residence of Washington, finely situated on the rising bank of the river, and his tomb, with an estate of 200 acres, have been pur chased by a patriotic society of ladies, to be kept as a place of public resort, and a memorial of the Father of his country.' MOUNTAIN ASH. See ROWAN, of the carboniferous series in the south of England MOUNTAIN LIMESTONE, the basement rock and in Wales. It consists of a calcareous rock loaded with marine remains, the greater part of the rock being made up bodily of corals, crinoids, and shells. It has a variable thickness, sometimes reaching as much as 900 feet. In the north of England and in Scotland, the marine limestones are not separated See CARBONIFEROUS SYSTEM. from, but alternate with the coal-bearing strata MOUNTAINS. The number and altitude of the mountains of the globe are so great that they form almost everywhere prominent objects, and operate to a large extent in modifying the climatic conditions of every country in the world. Yet the amount of solid material so raised above the ordinary level of the land is not so much as might be expected. Remembering that elevated plateaus of great extent occur in several regions, and that the general surface of the earth is considerably higher than the sea-level, it has been estimated that were the whole dry land reduced to a uniform level, it would form a plain having an elevation of 1800 feet above the sea. And were these solid materials scattered over the whole surface of the globe, so as to fill up the bed of the ocean, the resulting level would be considerably below the present surface of the sea, inasmuch as the mean height of the dry land most probably does not exceed one-fifteenth of the mean depth of the bed of the ocean. Mountains, and especially mountain-chains, subserve important uses in the economy of nature, especially in connection with the water system of the world. They are at once the great collectors and distributors of water. In the passage of moisture-charged winds across them, the moisture is precipitated as rain or snow. When mountain ranges intersect the course of constant winds by thus abstracting the moisture, they produce a moist country on the windward-side, and a comparatively dry and arid one on the leeward. This is exemplified in the Andes, the precipitous western surface of which has a different aspect from the sloping eastern plains; and so also the greater supply of moisture on the southern sides of the Himalayas brings the snow-line 5000 feet lower than on the northern side. Above a certain height the moisture falls as snow, and a range of snow-clad summits would form a more effectual separation between the plains on either side than would the widest ocean, were it not that transverse valleys are of frequent occurrence, which open up a pass, or way of transit, at a level below the snow-line. But even these would not prevent the range being an impassable MOUNTAINS. barrier, if the temperate regions contained as lofty mountains as the tropics. Mountain-ranges, however, decrease in height from the equator to the poles in relation to the snow-line. at Sierra Leone. Most of the principal secondary ranges have generally a direction more or less at right angles to this great mountain tract. The inquiry into the origin of mountains is one that has received not a little attention. Geologists have shewn that the principal agents in altering the surface of the globe are denudation, which is always abrading and carrying to a lower level the exposed surfaces, and an internal force which is raising or depressing the existing strata, or bringing unstratified rocks to the surface. Whether the changes are the small and almost imperceptible alterations now taking place, or those recorded in the mighty mountains and deep valleys everywhere existing, denudation and internal force are the great producing causes. These give us two great classes of mountains. The numerous attempts that have been made to generalise on the distribution of mountains on the globe have hitherto been almost unsuccessful. In America, the mountains take a general direction more or less parallel to the meridian, and for a distance of 8280 miles, from Patagonia to the Arctic Ocean, form a vast and precipitous range of lofty mountains, which follow the coast-line in South America, and spread somewhat out in North America, presenting everywhere throughout their course a tendency to separate into two or more parallel ridges, and giving to the whole continent the character of a precipitous and lofty western border, gradually lowering into an immense expanse of 1. Mountains produced by denudation. The eastern lowlands. In the Old World, on the other extent to which denudation has altered the surface hand, there is no single well-defined continuous of the globe can scarcely be imagined. All the chain connected with the coast-line. The principal stratified rocks are produced by its action; but ranges are grouped together in a Y-shaped form, these do not measure its full amount, for many the general direction of which is at right angles to of these beds have been deposited and denuded, the New World chain. The centre of the system not once or twice, but repeatedly, before they in the Himalayas is the highest land in the hemi- reached their present state. Masses of rock sphere. From this, one arm radiates in a north- more indurated, or better defended from the wasteast direction, and terminates in the high land at ing currents than those around, serve as indices of Behring Straits: the other two take a westerly the extent of denudation. The most remarkable case course; the one a little to the north, through the of this kind, with which we are acquainted, is that Caucasus, Carpathians, and Alps, to the Pyrenees; of the three insulated mountains in Ross-shire-Suil the other more to the south, through the immense Veinn, Coul Beg, and Coul More (fig. 1)-which are chain of Central African mountains, and terminating about 3000 feet high. The strata of the mountains Fig. 1.-Suil Veinn, Coul Beg, and Coul More.-From Murchison's Siluria: London, J. Murray. are horizontal, like the courses of masonry in a through an opening in the surface. The lava, scoriæ, pyramid, and their deep red colour is in striking and stones ejected at this opening form a conical contrast with the cold bluish hue of the gneiss projection which, at least on the surface, is composed which forms the plain, and on whose upturned of strata sloping away from the crater. Volcanoes edges the mountain-beds rest. It seems very are mostly isolated conical hills, yet they chiefly probable, as Hugh Miller suggests, that when the formation of which these are relics (at one time considered as Old Red Sandstone, but now determined by Sir Roderick Murchison as being older than Silurian), was first raised above the waves, it covered, with an amazing thickness, the whole surface of the Highlands of Scotland, from Ben Lomond to the Maiden Paps of Caithness, but that subsequent denudation swept it all away, except in circumscribed districts, and in detached localities like these pyramidal hills. 2. Mountains produced by internal force.-These are of several kinds. (a.) Mountains of ejection, in which the internal force is confined to a point, so to speak, having the means of exhausting itself occur in a somewhat tortuous linear series, on the mainland and islands which enclose the great Pacific Ocean. Vesuvius and the other European volcanoes are unconnected with this immense volcanic tract. (b.) But the internal force may be diffused under a large tract or zone, which, if it obtain no relief from an opening, will be elevated in the mass. When the upheaval occurs to any extent, the strata are subjected to great tension. If they can bear it, a soft rounded mountain-chain is the result; but generally one or more series of cracks are formed, and into them igneous rocks are pushed, which, rising up into mountainchains, elevate the stratified rocks on their flanks, and perhaps as parallel ridges. Thus, the Andes 595 |