780
MERCIEE.
in the School of Artillery, and in the University of Turin, and to his election, in 1839, as a member of the Academy of Sciences in that city. He attained the rank of captain in 1848. Sent by King Charles Albert on a mission into the Italian duchies, he exerted him- self to procure a vote in favour of union with the Subalpine kingdom. He was next elected to the Chamber of Deputies, and attached as chief officer first to the Ministry of War, and next to that of Foreign Affairs. These functions he resigned oil the accession to power of Gioberti, but he resumed them after the defeat at Novara. In the war of Italian independence Count Menabrea, who had been advanced to the rank of major-general, and placed at the heaid of the engineering department of the army, executed several im- portant works, including the in- vestment of Peschiera, and was present at the battles of Palestro and Solferino. On the cession of his native province to France, he determined to retain his Italian nationality. Soon afterwards he was nominated a Senator by King Victor Emanuel. He was also made lieutenant-general, and conducted the military operations at Ancbna, Capua, and Gaeta. In 1861 he became Minister of Marine in the administration of Baron Bicasoli, and in 1866 he was sent to Germany, where, as plenipotentiary of Italy, he signed the Treaty of Prague. In 1867 he was intrusted by the king, whose first aide-de-camp he had been for some time previously, with the formation of a cabinet in which he held the portfolio of Foreign Affairs, besides being President of the Council ; and not- withstanding numerous financial difficulties, and the complications of the Boman question, he remained in ix)wer till Nov., 1869, when a new Cabinet was formed by Signer Lanza. Gen. Menabrea was sent as ambassador to Vienna in Nov., 1870, but was recalled in the following
year. He was appointed Ambas- sador at the Court of St. James's in May, 1876. He was subsequently appointed Ambassador at Paris. Ennobled in 1843, he was created a Count in 1861, and Marquis de Val- Dora in 1875.
MEBCIEB, Chablbs, was born at Clapham, Surrey, June 9, 1834. He is a descendant of Philip Meroier, the distinguished Huguenot portrait painter, and is himself an artist. He has, since 1862, served in the 6th Boyal Lancashire Militia (now forming part of the Manchester Begiment), of which he is the senior Major. He has painted numberless public portraits of distinguished and representative men; amongst others, Thomas Wright, the Prison Philanthropist, for subscribers, who presented the picture with great ceremony to- the City of London ; the King of the Bel^ans, for the Volunteers of Great Britain, from whom his Majesty received the pic- ture in state ; the late Prince Boyal of Belgium by command of the King; Lord Napier of Magdala, and the late Lords Derby and Mayo, for the Junior Carlton Club ; the National Thanksgiving at St. Paul's Cathedral; the late Bight Hon. G^rge Ward Hunt, M.P., First Lord of the Admiralty, which was hung in the House of Commons ; General Sir James Lindsay, and other men of note, for the borough of Wigan; Mr. Massey, M.P., for the boroughs of Salford and Tiver- ton; Mr. James Crossley, F.B.S. (the Lancashire Bibliopolist), for the Manchester Free Library ; Mr. Charles Beade, D.C.L.; the Hon. D. C. Macpherson, Speaker of the Canadian Senate ; this picture was commissioned by the Dominion Government. Major Mercier's most important work is one in which the members of the Disraeli Ministry are represented assembled in Cabi- net Council in Downing Street. Another important work is the Distribution of the Boyal Maun- day Bounty, which contains, in
