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418 MESSINA MESZAROS cient of which is the cathedral, and has also an arsenal, naval arsenal, archbishop's palace, senate house, custom house, a large hospital, two theatres, a lazaretto, and numerous con- vents and nunneries. Messina is the seat of an archbishop. The harbor, one of the finest in the world, is about 4 m. in circuit, and can accommodate the largest fleet. The imports are colonial produce, cotton and woollen fab- rics, hides and hardware. The total exports for 1870 amounted to $8,636,500, of which lemons and oranges were valued at $2,904,- 225 ; olive oil, $2,306,855 ; essence of orange, lemon, and bergamot, $1,358,070; and raw silk, $476,780. Tartar, limestone, almonds, and filberts are exported in considerable quantities. The total imports in 1870 amounted to $5,853,- 755. In the same year there were entered 1,284 steamers, of 763,022 tons, and 3,259 sail- ing vessels, of 360,214 tons ; and cleared 1,274 steamers, of 745,900 tons, and 2,992 sailing vessels, of 324,421 tons. The principal manu- factures are damasks and satins. Coral, tunny, and other fisheries are extensively carried on. Messina is defended by walls and bastions, a citadel, and many forts, and is considered a fortress of the highest importance, as com- manding the strait of its name, and thus being the principal gate to Sicily from the mainland. A railway extends to Catania, 59J m., and an- other to Palermo is now (1875) in progress. The origin and early history of the ancient city are involved in obscurity. It is believed to have been founded by colonists from Magna Gnecia and Greece between 1000 and 800 B. 0., to have made rapid strides in prosperity, and to have derived its name from a body of emi- grants from Messene in Greece, the original name having been, according to Thucydides, Zancle, after the similar Greek word signify- ing a sickle (the form of the harbor). In 396, when it was celebrated for its flourishing trade, a Carthaginian army landed in Sicily and de- stroyed the city, which was immediately re- built by Dionysius of Syracuse, who expelled the invaders. About 280 it was seized by the mercenaries expelled from Syracuse on the death of Agathocles, who were called Mamer- tini, children of Mamers or Mars, and who sub- sequently applied for assistance to the Romans ; hence arose the first Punic war, in the course of which the city was taken by its allies, and thus became the earliest dependency of Rome beyond the Italian continent. Cicero calls it a very great and very rich city. In the civil war of 49-48 it was the station of a part of the fleet of Ca3sar, and Sextus Pompey after his defeat by the fleet of Octavius under Agrippa (3(5) made his escape from it with only 17 ships. During the middle ages Messina con- tinued to be an important city. To avenge the massacres of Sicily, it was besieged in 1282 by Charles of Anjou, king of Naples, but re- lieved by Pedro of Aragon and Roger de Lo- ria. In 1673 it submitted to Louis XIV., but he was compelled to withdraw his forces by the Dutch and Spanish fleet. In 1743 it was aiflicted by the plague, and the great earth- quake of 1783 destroyed and depopulated al- most the whole city, and it has since been re- built upon a better plan. It suffered severely from an inundation in 1823. A revolutionary outbreak took place there in 1848, but the insurgents were put down by the Neapolitans (Sept. 7). The possession of Messina during the war of that year enabled the king of Na- ples to reconquer the island. Every attempt at a popular movement was punished with the utmost rigor, a strong garrison was continually kept there, and the fortifications of the place were strengthened. In 1860, however, after the victory at Milazzo (July 20), Garibaldi's army entered the town, and an agreement was soon after entered into by which the citadel and three forts were to remain in the hands of the latter, and the town and two forts in the possession of the Sicilians. The citadel was invested by Gen. Cialdini on March 7, and surrendered on March 13, 1861. The recent erection of a lighthouse, a mosque, and an agency for the menageries maritime^ and the repair of the streets, have absorbed every ves- tige of ancient Messana except a colonnade whose stones could not be made available. MESTIZO, a Spanish- American term for the mixed offspring of Europeans and Indians. In Mexico, Pern, and Brazil, mestizos are very numerous. Their color is almost a pure white, with a skin of remarkable transparency. The chief indications of the mixture of Indian blood are a thin beard, small hands and feet, and an obliquity of the eyes. The women of this race are called mestizas, and the offspring of their marriage with whites differ but slightly from pure Europeans. MESZAROS, Lfczar, a Hungarian general, born in Baja, county of Bacs, Feb. 20, 1796, died at Eywood, Herefordshire, England, Nov. 16, 1858. He studied law at Pesth, but in 1813, on the outbreak of the new war against Napo- leon, he entered the Hungarian army in the service of the emperor Francis. He was in Italy as colonel of a hussar regiment in the spring of 1848, when he received the first in- formation of the important changes in Hun- gary, and was soon after offered the ministry of war in the cabinet of Batthyanyi, and started for Pesth. Elected a member of the diet, he defended the moderate measures of the minis- try. He went to the seat of war in the south, but failed in his attempts to storm the Rascian ramparts of Szent-Tamas (September). When Austria avowed the purpose of subjugating Hungary, he took the revolutionary side. In December he was sent to the north to check the advance of Schlick ; but after an indecisive encounter at Sziksz6 (Dec. 28), his motley army suffered a total rout before Kaschau (Jan. 4, 1849). When the difficulties with Gorgey com- pelled Kossuth to appoint a new commander- in-chief, the title was given to Meszaros and the real command' to Dembinski, with whom