teen years afterwards he returned to his native district, where he lived as a country gentleman and magistrate until 1798. In that year he was appointed an agent for victualling the navy, in consequence of which he removed to Falmouth; and he subsequently lived much in the south of England. It was while acting as a road-trustee in Scotland that he was first led to turn his attention to the condition of roads in general, which, as then constructed, were for the most part very bad, being at once loose, rough, and perishable, expensive, tedious, and dangerous to travel on, and very costly to repair. By many years of careful observation and study, he discovered the method of making broken stone roads, which ever since has been known as "Macadamising." It consists in raising the surface of the ground on the track of the intended road slightly above the adjoining land, forming suitable drains alongside of it, and covering it with a series of thin layers of hard stone broken into angular fragments of a nearly cubical shape, and as nearly as possible of the same size; no piece being of a greater weight than about six ounces. Each layer of broken stone is gradually consolidated by the traffic passing over it; and when that process is complete, the covering of the road becomes a firm and solid platform, nearly impervious to water, and durable in proportion to the hardness of the stone of which it is made. MacAdam first published an account of his method of road-making in a communication addressed to a committee of the house of commons in 1811: he afterwards wrote a treatise on the subject, which ran through several editions, and was translated into various foreign languages. In 1815 he was appointed general surveyor of the roads in the Bristol district; and he thus obtained an opportunity of applying his discovery to practice. His success in the improvement of the roads under his charge was complete from the first, and the use of his method of road-making in consequence gradually spread, until it extended all over the kingdom; and thus was effected the greatest improvement in the means of inland communication subsequent to the introduction of canals and before the great extension of railways. Between 1798 and 1814, it appears that MacAdam had spent two thousand days in studying the condition of roads, travelled thirty thousand miles, and laid out about £5000 of his private means in expenses. These facts having been proved before a committee, the house of commons, in 1823, voted a grant in repayment of his expenses, and a further grant of £2000 in consideration of the great service he had done to the country. Besides that slender reward, he was offered the honour of knighthood; but at his own request this was conferred instead upon one of his sons. Sir James MacAdam, who assisted and succeeded him as a road-engineer. He was twice married, and left several descendants. His private character is spoken of in terms of the highest esteem by those who knew him.—W. J. M. R.
M'ARDALL, James, one of the ablest mezzotinto engravers of his day, was born in Ireland about 1710. He executed a great number of plates, chiefly portraits of eminent men from paintings of distinguished contemporary artists. He also scraped a few plates from historical subjects by Vandyck, Murillo, Rembrandt, and others, which are very fine. Among his best portraits are those of Rachel, countess of Southampton, and Lords John and Bernard Stuart, after Vandyck. Of his historical engravings, "The Infant Moses," and "Time Clipping the Wings of Love," are the finest. He died in 1768.—J. F. W.
MACARTHUR, John, of Camden, New South Wales, to whom, as the introducer of Merino sheep-breeding into Australia, and the founder of the Australian wool trade, the unparalleled progress and prosperity of the Australian colonies is mainly due, was born rear Plymouth in Devonshire in 1766. His father, a native of Argyleshire, had, with several brothers, joined the Pretender in 1745, and was the only one of them that escaped with life from the field of Culloden. Forced to quit Scotland on account of the part he had taken in the cause of the Stewarts, he first sought refuge in the West Indies; but returning to England, he settled at Plymouth. His son John, after receiving the ordinary education afforded by a private country school in those days, entered the army as an ensign at a very early age. Placed on half-pay while yet a subaltern, he went to reside at a farm-house on the borders of Cornwall and Devonshire, where he made himself practically acquainted with agriculture in its various branches. At this time he contemplated retiring from the army and going to the bar; an idea which he, however, abandoned on being offered a company in the regiment (afterwards the 102nd) then forming for service in New South Wales. Shortly before resuming active military duties, Captain Macarthur married the daughter of a country gentleman named Veale, residing near Holsworthy in Devonshire. In January, 1790, the young couple embarked for Sydney, where, after a tedious and perilous voyage, they arrived in June, 1790. On landing they found the young settlement (founded scarcely eighteen months before, January 26, 1788, by Governor Phillip) reduced to a state bordering on famine, from which, however, it was in some degree relieved by the arrival in the following year, 1791, of some vessels from England. Captain Macarthur became possessed of two hundred acres adjoining the township of Parramatta, which he named, after his wife, "Elizabeth Farm." Here was initiated the experiment which has had so great an influence upon the subsequent history of the colony, viz., of converting hair into fine wool, by crossing hair-bearing ewes from the Cape of Good Hope and Bengal, with sheep of English breed. The success of that experiment led Captain Macarthur to make efforts to obtain the Merino or Spanish race of sheep, in which with the aid of Captains Waterhouse and Kent, R.N., he succeeded in 1796. He visited England in 1803, at a time when the cloth manufacturers were seeking some changes in the statute law for regulating the employment of artisans; and it was material to their case to show that fine wool then imported chiefly from Spain in comparatively small quantities (from three to four million pounds annually) was, like cotton, capable of unlimited production. Having inspected Captain Macarthur's samples of wool, and heard his explanatory statement, they induced him to place before the privy council, in detail, the capabilities of Australia for the growth of fine wool. The lords of the council, impressed with the importance of the subject thus brought under their notice, recommended it to the attention of the colonial minister. Lord Camden, by whom it was decided, that in consideration of his devoting himself to the production of Merino wool in New South Wales, Captain Macarthur should, after the sale of his commission, obtain a grant of ten thousand acres, in the Cow pastures, upon which to graze his flocks. Having sold out of the army, Macarthur purchased a ship to return to the colony, which he appropriately named the Argo, and placed a golden fleece upon her prow. In this vessel he returned to New South Wales in 1805, taking with him two ewes and three rams from the Merino flock of his majesty George III. He also carried with him the olive, and many valuable fruits, trees, plants, and other useful objects. Governor King did everything in his power to promote Macarthur's views; but his successor. Governor Bligh, pursued the opposite policy. After the dismissal of the latter and during Colonel Johnstone's provisional administration of the colony, Macarthur acted as secretary to the government. The arrival in the colony of a senior officer enabled Colonel Johnstone to return to England, whither he was accompanied by Mr. Macarthur. After the peace of 1814 Mr. Macarthur determined to visit the continent, in order to make himself practically conversant with the culture of the vine, the olive, and other products which might probably be grown with advantage in New South Wales. He accordingly set out for Paris in March, 1815, and travelling through Burgundy to Lyons, and thence to Geneva, settled for some time at Clarens, in order to profit by the instruction of a practical vine cultivator. In May, 1816, after visiting the vineyards of the south of France, he reached London with the ample collection made during his continental wanderings. A large transport was provided by government for his return to New South Wales, and he arrived safely at Elizabeth Farm in 1817, after an absence of eight years. In 1825, when colonists holding no office under the government were first admitted as members of the legislative council of New South Wales, Mr. Macarthur was appointed to that body as the senior non-official member. The duties thus devolving upon him, with other affairs public and private, were of a nature to afford him ample occupation. In 1831, however, his second son John, just as he had attained a position as an equity barrister in the London courts, which would soon have led to high professional distinction, was suddenly cut off in the prime of life; and after this severe and unexpected bereavement, Macarthur passed his time chiefly in retirement on his Camden estate, where, on the 10th of April, 1834, he died in his sixty-eighth year. The realization of all that Mr. Macarthur had predicted with reference to the export of fine wool from the Australian colonies, took place long before his death. From a statistical report on
