the fifth month in the year, reckoning from our first, or January; and the third, counting the year to begin with March, as the Romans anciently did. It was called Maius by Romulus, in respect to the senators and nobles of his city, who were named magiores; as the following month was called Junius, in honour of the youth of Rome, in honorem juniorum, who served him in the war; though some will have it to have been thus called from Maia, the mother of Mercury, to whom they offered sacrifice on the first day of it; and Papius derives it from Madius, eo quod tunc terra madeat. In this month the sun enters Gemini, and the plants of the earth in general begin to flower. The month of May has ever been esteemed favourable to love; and yet the ancients, as well as many of the moderns, look on it as an unhappy month for marriage. The original reason may perhaps be referred to the feast of the Lemures, which was held in it. Ovid alludes to this in the fifth of his Fasti, when he says,

Nec vidua te dixit eadem, nec virginis opta Tempora; quae nupsit, non diuturna fuit; Hac quoque de causa, si te proverbia tangant, Menfe malum Maio nubere vulgus att.

May-dew. See Dew.

May-duke, a species of cherry. See Prunus, Botany Index.

May, Isle of, a small island at the mouth of the firth of Forth, in Scotland, about a mile and a half in circumference, and seven miles from the coast of Fife, almost opposite to the rock called the Bass. It formerly belonged to the priory of Pittenweem; and was dedicated to St Adrian, supposed to have been martyred in this place by the Danes; and hither, in times of Popish superstition, barren women used to come and worship at his shrine, in hopes of being cured of their sterility. Here is a tower and lighthouse built by Mr Cunningham of Barns, to whom King Charles I. granted the island in fee, with power to exact twopence per ton from every ship that passes, for the maintenance of a lighthouse. In the middle of it there is a fresh-water spring, and a small lake. The soil produces pasturage for 100 sheep and 20 black cattle. On the west side the steep rocks render it inaccessible; but to the east there are four landing places and good riding. It was here that the French squadron, having the chevalier de St George on board, anchored in the year 1708, when the vigilance of Sir George Byng obliged him to relinquish his design, and bear away for Dunkirk. The shores all round round the island abound with fish, and the cliffs with water fowl.

May, Thomas, an eminent English poet and historian in the 17th century, was born of an ancient but decayed family in Sussex, educated at Cambridge, and afterwards removed to London, where he contracted a friendship with several eminent persons, and particularly with Endymion Porter, Esq. one of the gentlemen of the bedchamber to King Charles I. While he resided at court, he wrote the five plays now extant under his name. In 1622, he published a translation of Virgil's Georgics, with annotations; and in 1635 a poem on King Edward III. and a translation of Lucan's Pharsalia; which poem he continued down to the death of Julius Caesar, both in Latin and English verse. Upon the breaking out of the civil wars he adhered to the parliament; and in 1647, he published, "The history of the parliament of England, which began November the third, MDCXL. With a short and accurate view of some precedent years." In 1649, he published, Historia Parliamenti Anglici Breviarium, in three parts; which he afterwards translated into English. He wrote the History of Henry II. in English verse. He died in 1642. He went well to rest over night, after a cheerful bottle as usual, and died in his sleep before morning: upon which his death was imputed to his tying his nightcap too close under his fat cheeks and chin, which caused his suffocation; but the facetious Andrew Marvel has written a poem of 100 lines, to make him a martyr of Bacchus, and die by the force of good wine. He was interred near Camden in Westminster Abbey; which caused Dr Fuller to say, that "if he were a blasted and partial writer, yet he lieth buried near a good and true historian indeed." Soon after the restoration, his body, with those of several others, was dug up, and buried in a pit in St Margaret's churchyard; and his monument, which was erected by the appointment of parliament, was taken down and thrown aside.

Mayer, Tobias, one of the greatest astronomers and mechanics the 18th century produced, was born at Maspach, in the duchy of Wurtemberg 1723. He taught himself mathematics, and at the age of fourteen designed machines and instruments with the greatest dexterity and justness. These pursuits did not hinder him from cultivating the belles lettres. He acquired the Latin tongue, and wrote it with elegance. In 1750, the university of Gottingen chose him for their mathematical professor; and every year of his short life was thenceforward marked with some considerable discoveries in geometry and astronomy. He published several works in this way, which are all reckoned excellent; and some are inserted in the second volume of the "Memoirs of the university of Gottingen." His labours seem to have exhausted him; for he died worn out in 1762.

Mayerne, Sir Theodore de, baron of Aubone, was the son of Lewis de Mayerne, the celebrated author of the General History of Spain, and of the Monarchie arylo-democratique, dedicated to the states-general. He was born in 1573, and had for his godfather Theodore Beza. He studied physic at Montpelier, and was made physician in ordinary to Henry IV. who promised to do great things for him, provided he would change his religion. James I. of England invited him over, and made him first physician to himself and his queen, in which office he served the whole royal family to the time of his death in 1655. His works were printed at London in 1700, and make a large folio, divided into two books; the first containing his Consilia, Epistolae, et Observationes; the second his Pharmacopoeia variaeque medicamentorum formule.

Mayhem. See Maim.

Mayne, Jasper, an eminent English poet and divine in the 17th century, who was bred at Oxford, and entered into holy orders. While his majesty resided at Oxford, he was one of the divines appointed to preach before him. He published in 1647 a piece entitled OXOMAXIA, or The people's war examined according to the principles of reason and scripture, by Jasper Mayne. In 1648 he was deprived of his studentship at Christ church, and two livings he had; but was restored with the king, who made him his chaplain and archdeacon of Chichester; all which he held till he died. Dr Mayne was held in very high esteem both for his natural parts and his acquired accomplishments. He was an orthodox preacher, and a man of severe virtue and exemplary behaviour; yet of a ready and facetious wit, and a very singular turn of humour. From some stories that are related of him, he seems to have borne some degree of resemblance in his manner to the celebrated Dr Swift; but if he did not possess those very brilliant parts that distinguished the Dean, he probably was less subject to that capricious and those unaccountable whimsies which at times so greatly eclipsed the abilities of the latter. Yet there is one anecdote related of him, which, although it reflects no great honour on his memory, as it seems to carry some degree of cruelty with it, yet is it a strong mark of his resemblance to the Dean, and a proof that his propensity for drollery and joke did not quit him even in his latest moments. The story is this: The Doctor had an old servant, who had lived with him some years, to whom he had bequeathed an old trunk, in which he told him he would find something that would make him drink after his death. The servant, full of expectation that his master, under this familiar expression, had left him somewhat that would be a reward for the assiduity of his past services, as soon as decency would permit, flew to the trunk; when, behold, to his great disappointment, the boasted legacy proved to be a red herring. The doctor, however, bequeathed many legacies by will to pious uses; particularly 50 pounds towards the rebuilding of St Paul's cathedral, and 200 pounds to be distributed to the poor of the parishes of Callington and Pyrton, near Wattington, of both which places he had been vicar. In his younger years he had an attachment to poetry; and wrote two plays, the latter of which may be seen in the tenth volume of Dodley's Collection, viz. 1. Amorous war, a tragicomedy. 2. The city-match, a comedy. He published a poem upon the naval victory by the duke of York over the Dutch, printed in 1665. He also translated into English from the Greek part of Lucian's Dialogues.

Maynooth,