Part 78

=Motya.= An ancient town in the northwest of Sicily, situated on a small island (now _Isola di Mezzo_), only 6 stadia from the coast. It passed from Sicily into the hands of the Carthaginians; was taken from them by Dionysius of Syracuse about 397 B.C., and was finally captured by the Carthaginian general Himilco, who transplanted all its inhabitants to the town of Lilybæum. From this time it disappears from history.

=Moulinet.= A circular swing of the weapon in sword exercise.

=Moultrie, Fort.= See FORT MOULTRIE.

=Mound.= A bulwark for offense or defense.

=Mound.= 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 ascendency of Christianity over the world. The royal crown of England is surmounted by a mound, which first appeared on the seal of William the Conqueror, though the globe without the cross was used earlier.

=Mount.= The means or opportunity for mounting, especially a horse; and the equipments necessary for a mounted horseman.

=Mount.= To place one’s self on, as a horse or other animal, or anything that one bestrides or sits upon; to bestride. Hence, to put on horseback; to furnish with animals for riding; to furnish with horses. “To mount the Trojan troop.” See DISMOUNT.

=Mount.= To put anything that sustains and fits, for use; as, to mount a gun on a carriage. To prepare for being worn or otherwise used, as a sword-blade by adding the hilt and scabbard. A ship or a fort is said to mount cannon when they are arranged for use in and about it.

=Mount.= A word of command in the cavalry exercise for the men to mount their horses.

=Mount a Breach, To.= To run up in a quick and determined manner to any breach made in a wall, etc. _To mount guard_, to do guard duty in a town, garrison, camp, etc.

=Mount Desert Island.= A mountainous island in the Atlantic, and in Hancock Co., Me.; is 14 miles long and 7 wide. The French settled it in 1608; they were driven out by the English in 1616. The English settled it in 1761.

=Mountain Artillery.= A species of light artillery which is used in the United States and other countries in mountain warfare. See MOUNTAIN BATTERY.

=Mountain Battery.= A battery of mountain pieces. The pieces and carriages are carried separately upon the backs of animals, by means of pack-saddles of special construction. These have, however, of late been almost entirely superseded for this purpose by the aparejo. A portable forge also accompanies each battery, and is carried with a bag of coal upon a pack-saddle.

=Mountain-carriage.= See ORDNANCE, CARRIAGES FOR.

=Mountain-gun.= See MOUNTAIN ARTILLERY.

=Mountain-howitzer.= The howitzer used in the U. S. service is a 12-pounder brass gun of old pattern with cylindrical chamber. The gun weighs 220 pounds and has an extreme length of 37.21 inches. This gun is ignored in the Light Artillery Tactics.

=Mounted Troops.= Cavalry.

=Mounting Guard.= See GUARD MOUNTING.

=Mourne.= That part of a lance or halbert to which the steel or blade is fixed.

=Mouser.= In the British army, a sobriquet which was sometimes used in sport to distinguish the battalion men from the flank companies. It was indeed generally applied to them by the grenadiers and light bobs, meaning that while the latter are detached, the former remain in quarters, like cats to watch the mice, etc.

=Mousquetaires=, or =Musketeers=. A body of horse-soldiers under the old French _régime_, raised by Louis XIII. in 1622. This corps was considered a military school for the French nobility. It was disbanded in 1646, but was restored in 1657. A second company was created in 1660, and formed Cardinal Mazarin’s guard.

=Mouth.= See MUZZLE.

=Mouth.= The outer opening of an embrasure.

=Movement.= A term used to express the changes of position which troops undergo in performing their evolutions.

=Mow.= To cut down with speed; to cut down indiscriminately, or in great numbers or quantity; to sweep away; as, a discharge of grape-shot mows down whole ranks of men.

=Moyan.= A species of early artillery.

=Moyen= (_Fr._). The bastions which are constructed on the angles are called royal bastions. Some engineers have distinguished those bastions by the name of _moyens royaux_, or medium royals, whose flanks contain from 90 to 100 toises.

=Moyenne= (_Fr._). An ancient 4-pounder, 10 feet long, weighing 1300 pounds. In the time of Charles IX. (1572) it was a 2³⁄₄-pounder.

=Moyenne Ville= (_Fr._). A term formerly given by the French to any town in which the garrison was equal to a third of the inhabitants, and which was not deemed sufficiently important to bear the expense of a citadel; more especially so because it was not in the power of the inhabitants to form seditious meetings without the knowledge of the soldiers who were quartered on them.

=Moyens Côtés= (_Fr._). In fortification, are those sides which contain from 80 to 120 toises in extent. They are always fortified with bastions on their angles. The _moyens côtés_ are generally found along the extent of irregular places, and each one of these is individually subdivided into small, mean, and great sides.

=Mozyr.= A town in the southeast of the government of Minsk, in European Russia, situated on the Pripet, a tributary of the Dnieper. It is a town of considerable antiquity, and played a rather important part in the wars between the various Russian princes previous to the Tartar invasion. It was unsuccessfully besieged by the Tartars in 1240.

=Muff and Collar.= See ORDNANCE, CARRIAGES FOR, LIMBER.

=Muffle.= To wrap with something that dulls or renders sound inaudible; to deaden the sound of; as, to muffle a drum.

=Mufti.= The civilian dress of a military officer when off duty; hence, a citizen’s dress, as distinguished from military uniform.

=Muhlagis.= Turkish cavalry composed of expert horsemen, who generally attend the beglierbeys. They are not very numerous.

=Muhlberg.= A town of Prussian Saxony, situated on the Elbe. Here, on April 24, 1547, a battle was fought between Johann-Friedrich, elector of Saxony, and the emperor Charles V., a battle fraught with the most important results to the cause of Protestantism in Germany. The battle was soon decided in favor of the emperor; the elector was taken prisoner, and stripped of his territories. From this time till 1552, the Catholics were triumphant in Germany.

=Muhldorf.= In Bavaria, near which place Frederick, duke of Austria, was defeated and taken prisoner by Louis of Bavaria, September 28, 1322.

=Mulct.= A soldier is said to be mulcted of his pay when put under fine or stoppages for necessaries, or to make good some dilapidations committed by him on the property of the people or the government.

=Mule.= See PACK AND DRAUGHT ANIMALS.

=Mullet.= In heraldry, is a charge in the form of a star, generally with five points, intended to represent a spur-rowel. It is a mark of cadency assigned to the third son.

=Multan=, or =Mooltan=. An ancient and important city of India, in the Punjab, 200 miles southwest from Lahore. Multan is a military station, with a small redoubt in the rear of the cantonment. In 1849 it was taken by the British troops under Gen. Whish, and annexed with its territory to the British possessions.

=Multi-charge Gun.= Many attempts have been made by inventors to utilize the accelerating effect on the projectile of several charges successively fired in a gun. _Lyman’s multi-charge_ gun has a series of pockets along the bore, the charges in which are successively fired as the projectile passes them. _Bessemer_ proposed plan is to use a gun of great length. The charges are placed separately in holes at the breech, to be fired in succession by electricity.

=Multiple Lines.= In fortification, several lines of detached walls for the defense of a position.

=Munchengratz.= A town of Bohemia, on the Iser, 8 miles northeast from Jungbunzlau; it was taken by the Prussians under Prince Frederick Charles, after a severe action, June 28, 1866. The Austrians lost about 300 killed and 1000 prisoners, and the prince gained about 12 miles of country. There is a palace here, in which the emperors of Austria and Russia and the king of Prussia met in 1833.

=Munda.= A Roman colony and an important town in Hispania Bætica, situated on a small river, and celebrated on account of two battles fought in its neighborhood, the victory of Cn. Scipio over the Carthaginians in 216 B.C., and the important victory of Julius Cæsar over the sons of Pompey in 45.

=Munich= (Ger. _München_). The capital of the kingdom of Bavaria, situated on the Iser, 117 miles southeast from Stuttgart. It was taken by Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden in 1632; by the Austrians in 1704, 1741, and 1743; and by the French under Moreau, July 2, 1800.

=Munifice= (Lat. _munifex_), Fr. A Roman soldier who was subjected to every kind of drudgery-work in camp.

=Munimell.= A stronghold, fortification, etc.

=Munition.= Whatever materials are used in war for defense, or for annoying an enemy; ammunition; also, stores and provisions; military stores of all kinds.

=Munkacs.= A market-town of East Hungary, 80 miles northeast from Debreczin. It was taken by the Imperialists in 1687, after a siege of three years.

=Munsees=, or =Minsees=. A tribe of Indians of Algonkin stock, who were closely allied to the Delawares. Many of them became converts to Christianity. A few of them now reside on the reservation of the Stockbridge Indians in Wisconsin, and about 60 are settled in Kansas.

=Münster.= A city of Germany, on the small river Aa, 77 miles northeast from Cologne. It is the capital of a government of the same name in Prussian Westphalia. It was seized by the French in 1806; part of the duchy of Berg, 1809; annexed to France, 1810; ceded to Prussia, 1815. It was the headquarters of the Anabaptists under John Leyden, who defended it against the bishop of Münster, 1534-35. Here was signed the treaty of Westphalia or Münster, October 24, 1648.

=Münsterthal.= Two valleys of Switzerland, one in the canton Grisons, the other in Berne, where, in 1444, the battle of St. Jacob was fought between the French and Swiss, when the latter were nearly annihilated.

=Muotta Valley.= A secluded valley of Switzerland, canton of Schwytz, traversed by the river Muotta, an affluent of Lake Lucerne. Here a sanguinary struggle took place in 1799, between the French under Lecourbe, Mortier, and Masséna, and the Russians under Suwarrow. The latter was hemmed in on all sides, but by a desperate onslaught he cut his way through the French lines, and made a masterly retreat.

=Muradal, Battle of.= See TOLOSA.

=Murage.= Money appropriated to the repair of military works; anciently so called.

=Mural Crown.= In Roman antiquity, a golden crown, or circlet of gold, indented so as to resemble a battlement; bestowed on him who first mounted the wall of a besieged place, and there lodged a standard.

=Murcia.= An old kingdom in the southeast of Spain, now divided into the modern provinces of Murcia and Albacete. It was conquered by the Arabs in 711 (712, 713); after the fall of the caliphate of Cordova, it became an independent Arab kingdom, but six years afterward was subjugated by King Ferdinand II. of Castile.

=Murcia.= A city of Spain, capital of the ancient kingdom and modern province of its own name, 30 miles north-northwest of Carthagena. It was taken by the Moors in 713; wrested from them by Ferdinand of Castile. In 1810 it was taken and sacked by the French.

=Murderer.= A great piece of artillery. Among the ordnance given up to Monk with Edinburgh Castle in 1650 is mentioned “The great iron murderer, Muckle Meg.”

=Murdresses.= In ancient fortification, a sort of battlement with interstices, raised on the tops of towers in order to fire through.

=Muret= (Southern France). Here the Albigenses under the Count of Toulouse were defeated by Simon de Montfort, and their ally, Peter of Aragon, killed, September 12, 1213.

=Murfreesboro’.= A town and capital of Rutherford Co., Tenn., about 30 miles southeast of Nashville. A Federal force which occupied this place in 1862 was surprised and captured by a body of Confederates under Gen. Forrest. Near here, on December 31, 1862, the Army of the Ohio under Gen. Rosecrans encountered the Confederates under Gen. Bragg, and a desperate battle ensued, continuing at intervals and with varying success until January 3, 1863, when the Confederate army retreated, and Gen. Rosecrans occupied Murfreesboro’. The Federal loss was about 8500 killed and wounded, and 3600 missing; the Confederates represented their loss at 10,000, of which 9000 were killed and wounded. This battle is known as the battle of Murfreesboro’, or of Stone River.

=Murviedro.= A fortified town of Spain in the province of Valencia, 17 miles north from Valencia. It was taken by Hannibal 219 B.C.

=Muscule=, or =Testude=. In ancient times, a machine of war; a mantelet; shed; low, long, and sharp-roofed shed, which enabled the besiegers to advance to and sap the wall of the besieged.

=Music.= A general term for the musicians of a regimental band.

=Music, Phrygian.= A martial sort of ancient music, which excited men to rage and battle; by this mode Timotheus stirred up Alexander to arms.

=Musicians.= See BAND, DRUMMER, FIFER, and TRUMPETER.

=Musket=, or =Musquet= (Fr. _mousquet_). The fire-arm for infantry soldiers, which succeeded the clumsy arquebuse, and has itself given way before the rifle (which see). The first muskets were matchlocks; after which came wheel-locks, asnaphans or snaphance muskets, and lastly percussion muskets, which were a vast improvement both for accuracy and lightness on all which had gone before. Compared, however, to the present rifle, the musket was a heavy, ugly, and ineffective weapon.

=Musket Baskets.= These are about a foot or a foot and a half high, 8 or 10 inches diameter at bottom, and a foot at the top, so that being filled with earth there is room to lay a musket between them at the bottom, being set on low breastworks, or parapets, or upon such as are beaten down.

=Musketeer.= A soldier armed with a musket.

=Musketoon.= An obsolete weapon; was a short musket of very wide bore, carrying a ball of 5 ounces, and sometimes bell-mouthed like a blunderbuss. Also one who was armed with such a weapon.

=Musket-proof.= Capable of resisting the effects of musket-balls.

=Musketry.= Muskets in general or collectively. “The rattle of musketry.”

=Musselburgh.= A royal burgh of Scotland, county of Mid-Lothian, at the mouth of the Esk, 6 miles east of Edinburgh. The town is historically important on account of the battle of Pinkie, which was fought in the neighborhood in 1547, when the Scottish army was defeated by the English under the Earl of Somerset.

=Mustang.= The wild horse of the prairies in Mexico, California, etc. It is small, hardy, and easily sustained.

=Muster.= A review of troops under arms, fully equipped, in order to take an account of their numbers, inspect their arms and accoutrements, and examine their condition. In the U. S. service troops are mustered bi-monthly. During the civil war, the mustering in and mustering out of troops (into or out of the U. S. service) were performed by staff-officers, called commissaries of musters.

=Muster-book.= A book in which military forces are registered.

=Muster-file.= A muster-roll.

=Muster-master.= One who takes an account of troops, and of their arms and other military apparatus. This title is not known in the U. S. army. The person who performs these duties is called a _mustering_ officer, or an _inspecting_ officer.

=Muster-roll.= A roll or register of the men in each company, troop, or regiment.

=Muta= (Syria). Here Mohammed and his followers defeated the Christians in his first conflict with them, 629.

=Mutilated.= In a military sense, signifies wounded in such a manner as to lose the use of a limb. A battalion is said to be mutilated when its divisions, etc., stand unequal.

=Mutina.= See MODENA.

=Mutine.= To mutiny; a mutineer. This term is obsolete.

=Mutineer.= One guilty of mutiny; a person in military or naval service, who rises in opposition to the authority of the officers, who openly resists the government of the army or navy, or attempts to destroy due subordination.

=Mutinous.= Disposed to mutiny or resist the authority of laws and regulations, especially in an army, or openly resisting such authority; turbulent; seditious.

=Mutinously.= In a mutinous manner.

=Mutinousness.= The quality or state of being mutinous; seditiousness.

=Mutiny.= Insurrection against constituted authority, particularly military authority; open and violent resistance to the authority of officers; concerted revolt against the rules of discipline; hence, generally, forcible resistance to rightful authority on the part of subordinates. Violent commotion; tumult; uproar; strife.

=Mutiny.= To rise against lawful authority in the military service; to excite, or to be guilty of mutiny, or mutinous conduct; to revolt against one’s superior officer or rightful authority.

=Mutiny Act.= In Great Britain, an annual act of Parliament fixing the strength of the army for the military year, which commences April 1, and ends March 31, and imposing certain penalties for offenses connected with the army. It also authorizes the sovereign to issue Articles of War.

=Muzzle.= See ORDNANCE, NOMENCLATURE.

=Muzzle Velocity.= Velocity at the muzzle. See INITIAL VELOCITY.

=Muzzle-ring.= The metallic ring or circle that surrounds the mouth of a cannon or other piece.

=Muzzle-sight.= A front sight placed on or near the muzzle.

=Mycale= (now _Samsum_). A mountain in the south of Ionia, in Asia Minor, north of the mouth of the Meander. It forms the western extremity of Mount Messogis, and runs far out into the sea, opposite to Samos, forming a sharp promontory, which was called Mycale, or Trogilium (now _Cape St. Maria_). This cape and the southeast promontory of Samos (Posidonium) overlap one another, and the two tongues of land are separated by a strait only about three-fourths of a mile in width, which is renowned in Greek history as the scene of the victory gained over the Persian fleet by Leotychides and Xanthippus, 479 B.C.

=Mycalessus.= An ancient and important city in Bœotia, mentioned by Homer, situated on the road from Aulis to Thebes. In 413 B.C., some Thracian mercenaries in the pay of Athens surprised and sacked the town and butchered the inhabitants. From this blow it never recovered, and was in ruins in the time of Pausanias.

=Mycenæ=, sometimes =Mycene= (now _Karvata_). An ancient town in Argolis, about 6 miles northeast of Argos; it is said to have been founded by Perseus in 2 B.C. After the conquest of Peloponnesus by the Dorians, it ceased to be a place of importance. It still, however, continued an independent town till 468 B.C., when it was attacked by the Argives, whose hatred the Mycenæans are said to have incurred by the part they took in the Persian war in favor of the Greek cause. The massive walls of Mycenæ resisted all the attacks of the Argives; but the inhabitants were at length compelled by famine to abandon their town. They effected their escape and took refuge, some at Cleonæ, some in Achaia, and others in Macedonia.

=Mylæ.= See MILAZZO.

=Myonnesus= (now _Cape Hypsili_). A promontory of Ionia, with a town and a little island of the same name, forming the northern headland of the Gulf of Ephesus. Here the Romans, under the prætor L. Æmilius, gained a great naval victory over Antiochus the Great, 190 B.C.

=Myriarch.= A captain or commander of 10,000 men.

=Myrmidons.= The soldiers who accompanied Achilles in the expedition against Troy. Rough, desperate characters banded under a leader.

=Mysore=, =Maheshasoora=, or =Maisur=. A raj or native principality of Southern India. It was ruled by Hyder Ali, who acquired the sovereignty in 1761, and afterwards by his son Tippoo Sahib, who was slain when Seringapatam (May 4, 1799) was stormed and taken, and the country occupied by the British, who set up, in the same year, an heir of the ancient Hindoo royal family of Mysore to rule in his stead. The state is now subsidiary to the British.

=Mytilene=, =Mitylene=, or =Metelin=. The city of Lesbos. At the beginning of the 7th century B.C., the possession of its colony, Sigeum, at the mouth of the Hellespont, was disputed in war between the Mytileneans and Athenians, and assigned to the latter by the award of Periander, tyrant of Corinth. Mytilene submitted to the Persians after the conquest of Ionia and Æolis, and furnished contingents to the expeditions of Cambyses against Egypt and of Darius against Scythia; it was active in the Ionian revolt; became again subject to Persia, and took part in the expedition of Xerxes against Greece. After the Persian war it formed an alliance with Athens, and remained one of the most important members of the Athenian confederacy. In 428 B.C. it headed a revolt of the greater part of Lesbos, the progress and suppression of which forms one of the most interesting episodes in the history of the Peloponnesian war. Mytilene fell under the power of the Romans after the Mithridatic war.

N.

=Naas.= A town of Ireland, in the county of Kildare, 18 miles southwest from Dublin. Here the insurgent Irish were defeated by a body of the king’s forces, May 24, 1798; the insurgents lost about 300 killed and many wounded.

=Nabatæi=, or =Nabathæ= (in the Old Testament _Nebaioth_). An Arabian people, descended from the eldest son of Ishmaël, had their original abodes in the northwestern part of the Arabian peninsula, east and southeast of the Moabites and Edomites. After the Babylonian conquest of Judæa, the Nabathæans extended west into the Sinaitic peninsula and the territory of the Edomites. They resisted all the attacks of the Greek kings of Syria. Under Augustus the Nabathæans are found, as nominal subjects of the Roman empire, assisting Ælius Gallius in his expedition into Arabia Felix; under Trajan they were conquered by A. Cornelius Palma, and Arabia Petræa became a Roman province, 105-107. The Mohammedan conquest finally overthrew the power of the Nabathæans.

=Nachod.= A town of Bohemia, near where the Prussians, under their crown prince, defeated the Austrians after a severe conflict, June 27, 1866. In this battle, the superiority of the Prussian Uhlans over the Austrian cavalry was demonstrated.

=Nafels.= A small town of Switzerland, in the canton of Glarus, 4 miles north from Glarus. Here in 1388, 1500 men of Glarus, under Matthias am Buhl, overthrew an Austrian force of from 6000 to 8000 men The event is still celebrated yearly.

=Nagarkana.= In the East Indies, the place where all the drums and war-music are kept, is so called.

=Naggur= (_Ind._). The principal drum in Asiatic armies, commonly allowed only to persons of high dignity; the bass drum.