MANGABEY, a name (probably of French origin) applied to the West African
monkeys of the genus _Cercocebus_, the more typical representatives of
which are characterized by their bare, flesh-coloured upper eye-lids,
and the uniformly coloured hairs of the fur. (See PRIMATES.)
MANGALIA, a town in the department of Constantza Rumania, situated on
the Black Sea, and at the mouth of a small stream, the Mangalia, 10 m.
N. of the Bulgarian frontier. Pop. (1900), 1459. The inhabitants, among
whom are many Turks and Bulgarians, are mostly fisherfolk. Mangalia is
to be identified with the Thracian Kallatis or Acervetis, a colony of
Miletus which continued to be a flourishing place to the close of the
Roman period. In the 14th century it had 30,000 inhabitants, and a large
trade with Genoa.
MANGALORE, a seaport of British India, administrative headquarters of
the South Kanara district of Madras, and terminus of the west coast line
of the Madras railway. Pop. (1901), 44,108. The harbour is formed by the
backwater of two small rivers. Vessels ride in 24 to 30 ft. of water,
and load from and unload into lighters. The chief exports are coffee,
coco-nut products, timber, rice and spices. Mangalore clears and exports
all the coffee of Coorg, and trades directly with Arabia and the
Persian Gulf. There is a small shipbuilding industry. The town has a
large Roman Catholic population, with a European bishop, several
churches, a convent and a college. It is the headquarters of the Basel
Lutheran mission, which possesses one of the most active printing
presses in southern India, and has also successfully introduced the
industries of weaving and the manufacture of tiles. Two colleges
(Government and St Aloysius) are situated here. Mangalore was gallantly
defended by Colonel John Campbell of the 42nd regiment from May 6, 1783,
to January 30, 1784, with a garrison of 1850 men, of whom 412 were
English, against Tippoo Sultan's whole army.
MANGAN, JAMES CLARENCE (1803-1849), Irish poet, was born in Dublin on
the 1st of May 1803. His baptismal name was James, the "Clarence" being
his own addition. His father, a grocer, who boasted of the terror with
which he inspired his children, had ruined himself by imprudent
speculation and extravagant hospitality. The burden of supporting the
family fell on James, who entered a scrivener's office, at the age of
fifteen, and drudged as a copying clerk for ten years. He was employed
for some time in the library of Trinity College, and in 1833 he found a
place in the Irish Ordnance Survey. He suffered a disappointment in
love, and continued ill health drove him to the use of opium. He was
habitually the victim of hallucinations which at times threatened his
reason. For Charles Maturin, the eccentric author of _Melmoth_, he
cherished a deep admiration, the results of which are evident in his
prose stories. He belonged to the Comet Club, a group of youthful
enthusiasts who carried on war in their paper, the _Comet_, against the
levying of tithes on behalf of the Protestant clergy. Contributions to
the _Dublin Penny Journal_ followed; and to the _Dublin University
Magazine_ he sent translations from the German poets. The mystical
tendency of German poetry had a special appeal for him. He chose poems
that were attuned to his own melancholy temperament, and did much that
was excellent in this field. He also wrote versions of old Irish poems,
though his knowledge of the language, at any rate at the beginning of
his career, was but slight. Some of his best-known Irish poems, however,
_O'Hussey's Ode to the Maguire_, for instance, follow the originals very
closely. Besides these were "translations" from Arabic, Turkish and
Persian. How much of these languages he knew is uncertain, but he had
read widely in Oriental subjects, and some of the poems are exquisite
though the original authors whom he cites are frequently mythical. He
took a mischievous pleasure in mystifying his readers, and in practising
extraordinary metres. For the _Nation_ he wrote from the beginning
(1842) of its career, and much of his best work appeared in it. He
afterwards contributed to the _United Irishman_. On the 20th of June
1849 he died at Meath Hospital, Dublin, of cholera. It was alleged at
the time that starvation was the real cause. This statement was untrue,
but there is no doubt that his wretched poverty made him ill able to
withstand disease.
Mangan holds a high place among Irish poets, but his fame was deferred
by the inequality and mass of his work, much of which lay buried in
inaccessible newspaper files under his many pseudonyms, "Vacuus,"
"Terrae Filius," "Clarence," &c. Of his genius, morbid though it
sometimes is, as in his tragic autobiographical ballad of _The Nameless
One_, there can be no question. He expressed with rare sincerity the
tragedy of Irish hopes and aspirations, and he furnished abundant proof
of his versatility in his excellent nonsense verses, which are in
strange contrast with the general trend of his work.
An autobiography which appeared in the _Irish Monthly_ (1882) does not
reproduce the real facts of his career with any fidelity. For some
time after his death there was no adequate edition of his works, but
_German Anthology_ (1845), and _The Poets and Poetry of Munster_
(1849) had appeared during his lifetime. In 1850 Hercules Ellis
included thirty of his ballads in his _Romances and Ballads of
Ireland_. Other selections appeared subsequently, notably one (1897),
by Miss L. I. Guiney. _The Poems of James Clarence Mangan_ (1903), and
the _Prose Writings_ (1904), were both edited by D. J. O'Donoghue, who
wrote in 1897 a complete account of the _Life and Writings_ of the
poet.
MANGANESE [symbol Mn; atomic weight, 54.93 (O = 16)], a metallic
chemical element. Its dioxide (pyrolusite) has been known from very
early times, and was at first mistaken for a magnetic oxide of iron. In
1740 J. H. Pott showed that it did not contain iron and that it yielded
a definite series of salts, whilst in 1774 C. Scheele proved that it was
the oxide of a distinctive metal. Manganese is found widely distributed
in nature, being generally found to a greater or less extent associated
with the carbonates and silicates of iron, calcium and magnesium, and
also as the minerals braunite, hausmannite, psilomelane, manganite,
manganese spar and hauerite. It has also been recognized in the
atmosphere of the sun (A. Cornu, _Comptes rendus_, 1878, 86, pp. 315,
530), in sea water, and in many mineral waters.
The metal was isolated by J. G. Gahn in 1774, and in 1807 J. F. John
(_Gehlen's Jour. chem. phys._, 1807, 3, p. 452) obtained an impure metal
by reducing the carbonate at a high temperature with charcoal, mixed
with a small quantity of oil. R. Bunsen prepared the metal by
electrolysing manganese chloride in a porous cell surrounded by a carbon
crucible containing hydrochloric acid. Various reduction methods have
been employed for the isolation of the metal. C. Brunner (_Pogg. Ann._,
1857, 101, p. 264) reduced the fluoride by metallic sodium, and E.
Glatzel (_Ber._, 1889, 22, p. 2857) the chloride by magnesium, H.
Moissan (_Ann. Chim. Phys._, 1896 (7) 9, p. 286) reduced the oxide with
carbon in the electric furnace; and H. Goldschmidt has prepared the
metal from the oxide by means of his "thermite" process (see CHROMIUM).
W. H. Green and W. H. Wahl [German patent 70773 (1893)] prepare a 97%
manganese from pyrolusite by heating it with 30% sulphuric acid, the
product being then converted into manganous oxide by heating in a
current of reducing gas at a dull red heat, cooled in a reducing
atmosphere, and finally reduced by heating with granulated aluminium in
a magnesia crucible with lime and fluorspar as a flux. A purer metal is
obtained by reducing manganese amalgam by hydrogen (O. Prelinger,
_Monats._, 1894, 14, p. 353).
Prelinger's manganese has a specific gravity of 7.42, and the variety
obtained by distilling pure manganese amalgam _in vacuo_ is pyrophoric
(A. Guntz, _Bull. Soc._ [3], 7, 275), and burns when heated in a current
of sulphur dioxide. The pure metal readily evolves hydrogen when acted
upon by sulphuric and hydrochloric acids, and is readily attacked by
dilute nitric acid. It precipitates many metals from solutions of their
salts. It is employed commercially in the manufacture of special steels.
(See IRON AND STEEL.)