[Mennonites], a Protestant sect founded at Zurich with a creed that combines the tenets of the Baptists with those of the Quakers; have an episcopal form of government, and maintain a rigorous church discipline.
[Menschikoff, Alexander Danilovitch], Russian soldier and statesman, born in humble life at Moscow; became servant to Lefort, on whose death he succeeded him as favourite of Peter the Great, whom he accompanied to Holland and England; in the Swedish War (1702-1713) he won renown, and was created field-marshal on the field of Pultowa; he introduced to the Czar Catharine, afterwards czarina, whom he captured at Marienburg, and when Peter died secured the throne for her; during her reign and her successor's he governed Russia, but his ambition led the nobles to banish him to Siberia 1727 (1672-1729).
[Menschikoff, Alexander Sergeievitch], general, great-grandson of the former, served in the wars of 1812-15, in the Turkish campaign of 1828, was ambassador to the Porte in 1853, and largely responsible for the Crimean War, in which he commanded at Alma, Inkermann, and Sebastopol (1789-1869).
[Menteith, Lake of], a small beautiful loch in Perthshire, 13 m. W. of Stirling, with three islets, on one of which stood a priory where, as a child, Mary Stuart spent 1547-48; on another stood the stronghold of the earls.
[Menthol], a crystalline substance obtained from the oil of peppermint, used in nervous affections, such as neuralgia, as a counter-irritant.
[Mentone] (8), town and seaport in France, on the Mediterranean, 1½ m. from the Italian border; was under the princes of Monaco till 1848, when it subjected itself to Sardinia, which afterwards handed it over to France; protected by the Alps, the climate is delightful, and renders it a favourite health resort in winter and spring; it exports olive-oil and fruit.
[Mentor], a friend of Ulysses, and the tutor of his son Telemachus, whose form and voice Athena assumed in order to persuade his pupil to retain and maintain the courage and astuteness of his father.
[Menzel, Adolf], German painter, born at Breslau, professor at Berlin; best known for his historical pictures and drawings; b. 1815.
[Menzel, Wolfgang], German author and critic, born in Silesia; wrote on German history, literature, and poetry, as well as general history, and maintained a vigorous polemic against all who by their writings or their politics sought to subvert the Christian religion or the orthodox policy of the German monarchies (1789-1873).
[Mephistopheles], the impersonation in Goethe's "Faust" of the modern devil, the incarnation of the spirit of universal scepticism and scoffing, who can see not only no beauty in goodness but no deforming in iniquity, alike without reverence for God and fear of his adversary, blind as a mole to all worth and all unworth throughout the universe, yet knowing and boastful of knowledge, by means of which he sees only "the ridiculous, the unsuitable, the bad, but for the solemn, the noble, the worthy is blind as his ancient mother."