Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XI.djvu/422

 410 MERLIN MERODE markings; in both sexes the bill is palo blue at the base, and bluish black toward the end. From its courage and docility it was formerly trained to pursue larks and the smaller game birds. It is found all over Europe and western Asia; it very much resembles the American pigeon hawk (H. columbarius, Boie). MERLIN, the name of two legendary British seers and sorcerers, who lived in the 5th and 6th centuries A. D. I. Merlin Ambrosias, a na- tive of Wales, is represented to have been the son of a demon by a Cambrian princess. When a mere youth he recommended himself to the notice of King Vortigern by the display of supernatural powers ; and he subsequently became the counsellor of that monarch, and of his successors' Ambrosius, Uterpendragon, and Arthur. This is the Merlin to whom allusion is made by Spenser in his " Faerie Queen," and by other old poets. He is also the subject of the metrical romance entitled "Merlin," of which Mr. Ellis has given an analysis in his "Early English Romances;" and he is promi- nent in Bulwer-Lytton's " King Arthur," and in Tennyson's " Idyls of the King," especially in " Vivien." A book of prophecies attributed to him was printed in French in 1498, in Eng- lish in 1529, and in Latin in 1554. The prin- cipal account of him is given by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Britonum. "The Life of Merlin Ambrosius," by T. Hey wood, appeared in London in 1641. The early Eng- lish text society has reprinted the first part of the prose romance of Merlin from the unique manuscript in the Cambridge university library, edited by H. B. Wheatley (1875). II. Merlin Caledonins Sylvestris, or the Wild, a native of Strath- clyde, in S. W. Scotland, was contemporary with St. Kentigern, bishop of Glasgow, in the latter part of the 6th century. According to Fordun, having slain his nephew, he fled to the woods, and there led the life of a savage till his death. A band of peasants pursuing him, he sprang from a rock into the Tweed, in order to escape them, and was impaled on a stake that chanced to be in the bed of the river. A metrical life of him, incorrectly ascribed to Geoffrey of Monmouth, was printed for the Roxburghe club (London, 1830). The works attributed to him were published at Edinburgh in 1615 ; but as the rhapsodies and prophecies of the Cambrian and Caledonian Merlins are confounded, being sometimes ascribed to one and sometimes to the other, it is almost im- possible to distinguish between them. MERMAN AND MERMAID, fabulous beings dwelling in the sea, having the head and body of a man or woman, and the tail of a fish. Pliny, ^Elian, and Pausanias give particular ac- counts of their being seen by sailors and oth- ers, especially in the seas around the island of Taprobane (Ceylon). Julius Caesar Scaliger, in his commentary on Aristotle (De Anima- libw), maintains their existence. Rondelet (1554) gave a picture of a singular merman seen in Poland, which was clothed by nature with the garb of a bishop. The most formida- ble animal of this kind is the devil-merman, monstrum marinum dcemonifbrme, captured on the shore of Illyria, seen alive at .Antwerp, and described by Aldrovandus. The merrows of Irish legend are mermaids. Capt. Whitbourne minutely describes a mermaid seen by him in 1610 in the harbor of St. John's, Newfound- land. Monsters of similar appearance have since been occasionally described. MERODACH, or Bel Merodaeh, the second of the minor Babylonian gods, nearly correspond- ing with the classic Jupiter, and astronomically identified with the planet Jupiter. The name Merodaeh was at first a mere epithet of the god Bel or Belus, and by degrees superseded the proper name. Its signification or origin is unknown. The golden image in the great temple at Babylon was worshipped as Bel rath- er than Merodaeh, but other images probably represented him as Merodaeh, and the temple itself, described by Herodotus as the temple of Belus, is the temple of Merodaeh in the in- scriptions. Tn what the distinction between the names consists, however, is not known. Bel Merodaeh is represented as the son of Ao and Davke, and the husband of Zirbanit. He is the ancient one of the gods, and the judge, and has the gates (probably with the seats of justice near them) under his special charge. He was the tutelar god of Babylon from an early period, and the Babylonian kings were often named after him, as Merodach-baladan and Evil-merodach, such use of the name occurring as early as 1650 B. C. His wor- ship was adopted in Assyria at a later time, probably because of the consolidation of the two monarchies about the time of Pul, who claimed to have first put Merodaeh at the head of the Assyrian pantheon. Merodaeh was most honored under the later Babylonian kings, and praises and prayers addressed to him occupy the inscriptions of Nebuchadnezzar. At first he shared with several other deities the wor- ship of the people, but later concentrated in himself the greater part of the homage for- merly given to many gods, and was regarded as the source of all power and blessings. MERODE, Francois Xavier Marie Frederic Ghis- lain de, a Roman Catholic archbishop, born in Brussels in March, 1820, died in Rome, July 24, 1874. His family claims descent from Raymond Berenger V., count of Barcelona and king of Aragon (died 1162); and one of his cousins was mother to Queen Maria, wife of Amadeus, late king of Spain. His mother was a niece of Lafayette; and his father, Count Felix de Merode, took a leading part in the Belgian revolution of 1830, was a mem- ber of the provisional government, and, after refusing to be the candidate of the Catholic party for the throne, was mainly instrumental in securing the election of Leopold of Saxe- Coburg. Xavier entered the Belgian army in 1841, and served with distinction as a volun- teer in Algeria under Marshal Bugeaud. He