Page:Imperialdictiona03eadi Brandeis Vol3a.pdf/481

MON for nearly three years, but at length dissensions arose between their leaders the earls of Leicester and Gloucester, and the former retired to France. Suspicions arose that they intended to subvert entirely the ancient constitution, their administration became unpopular, the pope absolved the king and all his subjects from the oath which they had taken to observe the provisions of Oxford, and in 1262 Henry issued a proclamation declaring that he had resumed the government. In the following year Leicester returned from France and placed himself at the head of the party of the barons, who broke out into open rebellion, and soon compelled the king to offer terms of accommodation. It was ultimately agreed that the differences between the two factions should be referred to the arbitration of Louis IX. of France; and that upright monarch decided that the royal castles, possessions, and prerogatives should be restored, that a universal amnesty should be granted by the king, and that all the privileges and liberties conceded by the charter should be confirmed. The barons, however, refused to submit to this decision, and immediately had recourse to arms. The royalists at first obtained several advantages, but in 1264 Leicester completely defeated the royal army at Lewes, took Henry and his brother prisoners, and compelled the princes Edward and Henry, the king's sons, also to surrender themselves into his hands as hostages and to submit to his terms. The government of the kingdom now fell into the hands of this powerful noble, assisted by the earl of Gloucester and the bishop of Chichester; and in order to secure his authority he summoned, in 1265, a parliament composed of the barons of his own party, of several ecclesiastics, two knights returned by each shire, and of representatives from the boroughs, who now for the first time obtained a place in the national councils. The new parliament, however, was by no means so compliant as Leicester expected; a desire began to be manifested for the re-establishment of the royal authority; dissensions again broke out among the barons, and the earl making a virtue of necessity, released Prince Edward from his confinement, though he still kept a strict watch over him. Meanwhile, Gloucester, who had taken offence at the arbitrary conduct of his colleague, left the court and retired to his estates upon the borders of Wales. Leicester followed him at the head of a strong force, carrying the king and prince along with him in order to give greater authority to his cause. By means of a dexterous stratagem Edward succeeded in making his escape, and was immediately joined by a numerous body of royalists, who flocked to him from all quarters, headed by the earls of Gloucester, Mortimer, and other powerful barons. Leicester was now in a position of imminent peril in a remote part of the country, surrounded by his enemies and cut off from all communication with his friends by the river Severn, the bridges on which had been broken down. His son Simon hastened from London to his assistance with a considerable body of troops, but was surprised and defeated by Prince Edward at Kennilworth. The victorious royalists lost no time in advancing upon Leicester himself, whom they encountered at Evesham. Though completely outnumbered, and his men disheartened by their hopeless condition, the resolute old baron fought with indomitable courage and repeatedly repulsed the attacks of his enemies, but was in the end overpowered and slain along with his eldest son and many knights of his party. Leicester possessed a great capacity both for war and government. His memory was long revered by the people, and miracles were believed to have been wrought at his tomb.—J. T.  MONTGAILLARD, , Abbé, brother of Maurice, was born in 1772 at the little town of Montgaillard. He took no part in his brother's intrigues and treasons, but denounced them with the utmost bitterness, although suspicions have always been entertained that he did not reject his brother's gold. He first entered the army, then the church, then the commissariat, and was employed to administer the finances in Napoleon's German conquests. With his brother he published a history of France from the first convocation of the notables. In 1825 he committed suicide by throwing himself from a window.—P. E. D.  MONTGAILLARD,, a political writer and intriguer, in fact an adventurer of the most unblushing kind, who, in the troubles that followed the French revolution, attained a certain notoriety and importance among the high personages of Europe. He was born at Toulouse in 1761; and it appears that he assumed the name De Montgaillard with no other right than that he lived in a small town of that name. Properly he was M. Roques. In 1791 he was sent by the friends of Louis XVI. on a secret mission to Brussels, and he played his cards so well that he became political agent for all parties, and was intrusted with many important secrets of diplomacy. He left a large number of pamphlets and memoirs on the Revolution, and the earlier times of Napoleon's imperial career; and, in addition, a history of France from the year 1787, which passed through seven editions.—P. E. D.  MONTGOLFIER, and , two brothers, French manufacturers and machinists, were the first inventors and constructors of balloons of whose achievements there is any trustworthy record: the history of the supposed balloon of Gusmao being too vague and obscure to be regarded as of much authority.—(See .) Their father was a papermaker at Vidalon-lez-Annonay, where Joseph was born in 1740, and Etienne on the 7th of January, 1745. Joseph died at Balaruc on the 26th of June, 1810, and Etienne at Serrières on the 2nd of August, 1799. Joseph, being of an impatient and adventurous spirit, fled from school at the age of thirteen, and supported himself for a time as a gatherer of food for silkworms, when he was found and brought back. A few years afterwards he left his home and went to St. Etienne-en-Forez, where he lived by manufacturing useful chemical products and hawking them about the neighbourhood, until he acquired the means of going to Paris, in order to become acquainted with some of the scientific men of the time; but he eventually returned home by the invitation of his father to assist in the management of the paper factory. Disagreements arose between the father and son, owing to the attachment of the former to established processes of manufacture, and the zeal of the latter for improvement: and Joseph in consequence quitted his father's establishment and set up an independent paper factory, in which he had free scope to experiment and improve, and did so at first with loss, but ultimately with success and gain. Meanwhile his brother Etienne, who appears to have been comparatively quiet and docile, had been bred to the profession of an architect, which he practised for a time with great credit, until he in turn was summoned home by his father to take the management of the paper factory at Annonay. He was a scientific and skilful mechanic and chemist, and used his knowledge to great advantage in his business. About 1783 Etienne Montgolfier became acquainted with the discoveries of Priestley as to the properties of "different sorts of air," or gases, as we now call them; and while reading Priestley's memoir it occurred to him that a bag filled with gas lighter than common air would float in the atmosphere. He communicated this idea to Joseph; and the two brothers consulting together and working in concert, invented the plan of giving buoyancy to a balloon by filling it with the rarefied gases which rise from a fire. Their first public experiment was made at Annonay on the 5th of June, 1783, when they sent up a fire-balloon made of paper, one hundred and ten feet in circumference, which in ten minutes rose to the height of one thousand fathoms above the earth. The experiment was repeated at Versailles in presence of the court on the 20th of September, when some animals sent up in a basket hung from the balloon came down again uninjured. The first men who made a similar ascent were Pilâtre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes. Joseph Montgolfier himself made his first ascent in 1784. The two Montgolfiers, in honour of their great invention, were elected corresponding members of the Academy of Sciences; their father received letters of nobility; and a large sum was allotted to them by the government to enable them to continue their experiments, which, however, were suspended by the Revolution. The rarefied gas from fire, which they exclusively used, was afterwards superseded by hydrogen, and by carburetted hydrogen or coal-gas. They continued to carry on the paper manufacture with success, and made various mechanical inventions; of these the most important is the well-known "hydraulic ram," in which the impulse of a large mass of water descending from a small height is made available to raise a small mass of water to a great height. During the consulate Joseph received the cross of the legion of honour; he became a member of the Board of Arts and Manufactures, and in 1807 a member of the Institute. He was one of the founders of the Société d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie Nationale.—W. J. M. R.  MONTGOMERY,, a Scottish poet, who flourished towards the close of the sixteenth century. Nothing certain is known of the date of his birth or of his early years and training. 