Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 15.djvu/141

Rh M A C M A C 125 organized in 1583, and in 1628 Jeronimo de Silveira became first royal governor of Macao. Still the Portuguese remained largely under the control of the Chinese, who had never surrendered their territorial rights and maintained their authority by means of mandarins, these insisting that even European criminals should be placed in their hands. Ferreira do Ainaral, the Portuguese governor, put an end to this state of things in 1849, and left the Chinese officials no more authority in the peninsula than the representatives of other foreign nations ; and, though his antagonists procured his assassination (August 22d), his successors have succeeded in carrying out his policy. The Chinese Govern ment has hitherto refused (notably in 1862) to recognize the terri torial claims of the Portuguese ; but the European powers treat Macao as de facto a colonial possession, and not only the governor, the presid iit of the courts, and other Portuguese officials, but even the Chinese magistrates, are directly appointed by the king of Portugal. For a short time in 1802, and again in 1808, Macao was occupied by the English as a precaution against seizure by the French. See De Beauvoir, Voyage Round the World, 1870 ; Wiselius, &quot; Macausche tocstamlen,&quot; in Tijds. ran het Aardr. Gen., 1877 ; Relatorio e documentos sobre &amp;lt;t abolifdo da emigrafdo de Chinas contra/ados em Macau, Lisbon, 1874; English parliamentary papers on the coolie trade, 1874; Biker, Mem. sobre o estabeleci- meitto de Macau, Lisbon, 1879. MACARONI (from dialectic Italian maccare, &quot; to bruisa or crush &quot;) is a preparation of wheat originally peculiar to Italy, in which country it is an article of food of national importance. The same substance in different fo.rms is also known as vermicelli, pasta or Italian pastes, taglioni, fanti, &c. These substances are prepared from the hard semi- translucent varieties of wheat which are largely culti vated in tlia south of Europe, Algeria, and other warm regions, and which are distinguished by the Italians as f/rano dura or grano da semolino. Hard wheats are much richer in gluten and other nitrogenous compounds than the soft or tender wheats, and their preparations are more easily preserved, to which conditions their suitability for the manufacture of Italian pastes are mainly due. The various preparations are met with in the form of fine thin threads which constitute vermicelli, so called from its thread-worm like appearance, thin sticks and pipes (macaroni), small lozenges, stars, disks, ellipses, &amp;lt;fec. (pastes), and ribbons, tubes, and other fanciful forms. These various forms are prepared in a uniform manner from a granular meal of hard wheat which itself, under the name of semolina or semola, is a commercial article. The semolina is thoroughly mixed and incorporated into a stiff paste or dough with boiling water, and in the hot condition it is placed in a strong metallic cylinder, the end of which is closed with a thick disk pierced with openings which correspond with the diameter or section of the article to be made. Into this cylinder an accurately fitting plunger or piston is introduced, and by very powerful pressure it causes the stiff dough to squeeze out through the openings in the disk in continuous threads, sticks, or pipes, as the case may be. When pipe or tube macaroni is being made, the openings in the disk are widened internally, and mandrels, the gauge of the tubes to be made, are centred in them. In making pastes the cylinder is laid horizontally, the end is closed with a disk pierced with holes having the sectional form of the pastes, and a set of knives revolves close against the external surface of the disk, cutting off the paste in thin sections as it exudes from each opening. Macaroni is dried rapidly by hanging it in long sticks or tubes over wooden rods in stoves or heated apartment through which currents of air are driven. It is only genuine macaroni, rich in gluten, which can be dried in this manner; spurious fabrications made with common flour and coloured to imitate the true material will not bear their own weight. Imitations must therefore be laid out flat and dried slowly, during which they very readily split and break up, while in other cases they become mouldy on the inside of the tubes. True macaroni can be distinguished by observing the flattened mark of the rod over which it has been dried within the bend of the tubes it has a soft yellowish colour, is rough in texture, elastic, and hard, and breaks with a smooth glassy fracture. In boiling it swells up to double its original size without becoming pasty or adhesive, maintaining always its original tubular form without either rupture or collapse. It can be kept any length of time without alteration or deteriora tion, and it is on that account, in many circumstances, a most convenient as well as a highly nutritious and healthful article of food. In its various forms it is principally used as an ingredient in soups, and for the preparation of puddings, with cheese, &c. Many of the good qualities of genuine macaroni may be obtained by enriching the flour of common soft wheat with gluten obtained in the prepara tion of wheaten starch, and proceeding as in the case of semolina. Such imitations, and others of inferior quality, are extensively made both in France and Germany. MACARTNEY, GEORGE MACARTNEY, EARL OF (1737- 180G), was descended from an old Scotch family, the Macartneys of Auchinleck, who had settled in 1649 at Lissanoure, Antrim, Ireland, where he was born May 13, 1737. After graduating at Trinity College, Dublin, in 1759, he became a student of the Inner Temple, London. Appointed envoy-extraordinary to Russia in 1764, he suc ceeded in negotiating an alliance between England and that country. After for some time occupying a seat in the English parliament, he^was in 1769 returned for Armagh in the Irish parliament, in order to discharge the duties of chief secretary for Ireland. On resigning this office he received the honour of knighthood. In 1775 he became governor of Granada, in 1780 governor of Madras, and in 1785 he was appointed governor general of Bengal, but, his health demanding his return to England, he declined to accept office. After being created earl of Macartney in the Irish peerage, he was appointed in 1792 the first envoy of Britain to China* On his return from a confidential mission to Italy he was raised to the English peerage in 1796, and in the end of the same year was appointed governor of the newly acquired territory of the Cape of Good Hope, where he remained till ill health compelled him to resign in November 1798. He died at Chiswick, Surrey, 31st March 1806. An account of Macartney s embassy to China, by Sir George Stauiiton, was published in 1797, and has been frequently re printed. See also Life and Writings of Lord Macartney, by Barrow, 2 vols., London, 1807. MACASSAR, See CELEBES, vol. v. p. 288. MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY, LORD (1800-1859), was born at Rothley Temple, Leicestershire, on the 25th of October 1800. His father, Zachary Macaulay, had been governor of Sierra Leone, and was in 1800 secretary to the chartered company who had founded that colony. Happy in his home, the boy at a very early age gave proof of a determined bent towards literature. Before he was eight years of age he had written a Compendium of Universal History, which gave a tolerably connected view of the leading events from the creation to 1800, and a romance in the style of Scott, in three cantos, called the Battle of Cheviot. At a little later time the child composed a long poem on the history of Olaus Magnus, and a vast pile of blank verse entitled Fingal, a Poem in Tivelve Books. The question between a private and a public school was anxiously debated by his parents, and decided in favour of the former. The choice of school, though dictated by theological considerations, was a fortunate one. Mr Preston of Little Sheli ord enjoyed the confidence of Mr Simeon, but was himself a judicious tutor; and at his table, where master and pupil dined in common, not only the latest Cambridge topics were mooted, but university ambitions and ways of thought were brought liome to the boys.