in Spain, he inspired Larra (q.v.) in the play Macías and in the historical novel entitled El doncel de Don Enrique el doliente.
See H. A. Rennert, Macias, o namorado; a Galician trobador (Philadelphia, 1900); Théodore J. de Puymaigre, Les vieux auteurs castillans (1889–1890), i. 54-74; Cancioneiro Gallego-Castelhano (New York and London, 1902), ed. H. R. Lang; Christian F. Bellermann, Die alten Liederbücher der Portugiesen (Berlin, 1840).
MACINTOSH, CHARLES (1766–1843), Scottish chemist
and inventor of waterproof fabrics, was born on the 29th of
December 1766 at Glasgow, where he was first employed as
a clerk. He devoted all his spare time to science, particularly
chemistry, and before he was twenty resigned his clerkship
to take up the manufacture of chemicals. In this he was
highly successful, inventing various new processes. His experiments
with one of the by-products of tar, naphtha, led
to his invention of waterproof fabrics, the essence of his patent
being the cementing of two thicknesses of india-rubber together,
the india-rubber being made soluble by the action of the naphtha.
For his various chemical discoveries he was, in 1823, elected
F.R.S. He died on the 25th of July 1843.
See George Macintosh, Memoir of C. Macintosh (1847).
MACKAY, CHARLES (1814–1889), Scottish writer, was
born at Perth, on the 27th of March 1814, and educated at
the Caledonian Asylum, London, and in Brussels. In 1830,
being then private secretary to a Belgian ironmaster, he began
writing verses and articles for local newspapers. Returning
to London, he devoted himself to literary and journalistic
work, and was attached to the Morning Chronicle (1835–1844).
He published Memoirs of Extraordinary Public Delusions (1841),
and gradually made himself known as an industrious and
prolific journalist. In 1844 he was made editor of the Glasgow
Argus. His literary reputation was made by the publication
in 1846 of a volume of verses. Voices from the Crowd, some of
which were set to music by Henry Russell and became very
popular. In 1848 Mackay returned to London and worked
for the Illustrated London News, of which he became editor
in 1852. In it he published a number of songs, set to music
by Sir Henry Bishop and Henry Russell, and in 1855 they
were collected in a volume; they included the popular “Cheer,
Boys! Cheer!” After his severance from the Illustrated
London News, in 1859, Mackay started two unsuccessful periodicals,
and acted as special correspondent for The Times in
America during the Civil War. He edited A Thousand and
One Gems of English Poetry (1867). Mackay died in London
on the 24th of December 1889. Marie Corelli (q.v.) was his
adopted daughter. His son, Eric Mackay (1851–1899), was
known as a writer of verse, particularly by his Love Letters of
a Violinist (1886).
MACKAY, HUGH (c. 1640–1692), Scottish general, was
the son of Hugh Mackay of Scourie, Sutherlandshire, and was
born there about 1640. He entered Douglas’s (Dumbarton’s)
regiment of the English army (now the Royal Scots) in 1660,
accompanied it to France when it was lent by Charles II. to
Louis XIV., and though succeeding, through the death of his
two elder brothers, to his father’s estates, continued to serve
abroad. In 1669 he was in the Venetian service at Candia,
and in 1672 he was back with his old regiment, Dumbarton’s,
in the French army, taking part under Turenne in the invasion
of Holland. In 1673 he married Clara de Bie of Bommel
in Gelderland. Through her influence he became, as Burnet
says, “the most pious man that I ever knew in a military
way,” and, convinced that he was fighting in an unjust cause,
resigned his commission to take a captaincy in a Scottish
regiment in the Dutch service. He had risen to the rank of
major-general in 1685, when the Scots brigade was called to
England to assist in the suppression of the Monmouth rebellion.
Returning to Holland, Mackay was one of those officers who
elected to stay with their men when James II., having again
demanded the services of the Scots brigade, and having been met
with a refusal, was permitted to invite the officers individually
into his service. As major-general commanding the brigade,
and also as a privy councillor of Scotland, Mackay was an
important and influential person, and James chose to attribute
the decision of most of the officers to Mackay’s instigation.
Soon after this event the Prince of Orange started on his
expedition to England, Mackay’s division leading the invading
corps, and in January 1688–89 Mackay was appointed major-general
commanding in chief in Scotland. In this capacity
he was called upon to deal with the formidable insurrection
headed by Graham of Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee. In
the battle of Killiecrankie Mackay was severely defeated, but
Dundee was killed, and the English commander, displaying
unexpected energy, subdued the Highlands in one summer.
In 1690 he founded Fort William at Inverlochy, in 1691 he
distinguished himself in the brilliant victory of Aughrim,
and in 1692, with the rank of lieutenant-general, he commanded
the British division of the allied army in Flanders. At the
great battle of Steinkirk Mackay’s division bore the brunt of
the day unsupported and the general himself was killed.
Mackay was the inventor of the ring bayonet which soon came into general use, the idea of this being suggested to him by the failure of the plug-bayonet to stop the rush of the Highlanders at Killiecrankie. Many of his despatches and papers were published by the Bannatyne Club in 1883.
See Life by John Mackay of Rockville (1836); and J. W. Fortescue, History of the British Army, vol. i.
MACKAY, JOHN WILLIAM (1831–1902), American capitalist,
was born in Dublin, Ireland, on the 28th of November
1831. His parents brought him in 1840 to New York City,
where he worked in a ship-yard. In 1851 he went to California
and worked in placer gold-mines in Sierra county. In 1852
he went to Virginia City, Nevada, and there, after losing all
he had made in California, he formed with James G. Fair,
James C. Flood and William S. O’Brien the firm which in 1873
discovered the great Bonanza vein, more than 1200 ft. deep,
in the Comstock lode (yielding in March of that year as much
as $632 per ton, and in 1877 nearly $19,000,000 altogether);
and this firm established the Bank of Nevada in San Francisco.
In 1884, with James Gordon Bennett, Mackay formed
the Commercial Cable Company—largely to fight Jay
Gould and the Western Union Telegraph Company—laid
two transatlantic cables, and forced the toll-rate for transatlantic
messages down to twenty-five cents a word. In
connexion with the Commercial Cable Company he formed
the Postal Telegraph Company. Mackay died on the 20th
of July 1902 in London. He gave generously, especially to
the charities of the Roman Catholic Church, and endowed
the Roman Catholic orphan asylum in Virginia City, Nevada.
In June 1908 a school of mines was presented to the University
of Nevada, as a memorial to him, by his widow and his son,
Clarence H. Mackay.
MACKAY, a seaport of Carlisle county, Queensland, Australia,
on the Pioneer river, 625 m. direct N.N.W. Pop. (1901), 4091.
The harbour is not good. Sugar, tobacco and coffee thrive
in the district. There are several important sugar mills, one
of which, the largest in Queensland, is capable of an annual
output of 8000 tons. Rum is distilled, and there are a brewery
and a factory for tinning butter for export. Workable coal
is found in the district. This is the port of the Mt Orange
and Mt Gotthart copper mines, and the Mt Britten and Eungella
gold-fields. It is a calling-station for the Queensland
royal mail steamers. The town is named after Captain John
Mackay, who discovered the harbour in 1860.
McKEESPORT, a city of Allegheny county, Pennsylvania,
U.S.A., at the confluence of the Monongahela and Youghiogheny
rivers (both of which are navigable), 14 m. S.E. of Pittsburg.
Pop. (1890), 20,741; (1900), 34,227, of whom 9349 were foreign-born
and 748 were negroes; (1910 census) 42,694. It is served
by the Baltimore & Ohio, the Pittsburg & Lake Erie and the
Pennsylvania railways. The city has a Carnegie library, a
general hospital, and two business schools. Bituminous coal
and natural gas abound in the vicinity, and iron, steel, and tin
and terne plate are extensively manufactured in the city, the
tin-plate plant being one of the most important in the United
