In 1557 the Portuguese were permitted to erect factories on the peninsula, and in 1573 the Chinese built across the isthmus the wall which still cuts off the barbarian from the rest of the island. Jesuit missionaries established themselves on the spot; and in 1580 Gregory XIII. constituted a bishopric of Macao. A senate was organized in 1583, and in 1628 Jeronimo de Silveira became first royal governor of Macao. Still the Portuguese remained largely under the control of the Chinese, who had never surrendered their territorial rights and maintained their authority by means of mandarins—these insisting that even European criminals should be placed in their hands. Ferreira do Amaral, the Portuguese governor, put an end to this state of things in 1849, and left the Chinese officials no more authority in the peninsula than the representatives of other foreign nations; and, though his antagonists procured his assassination (Aug. 22), his successors succeeded in carrying out his policy.
Although Macao is de facto a colonial possession of Portugal, the Chinese government persistently refused to recognize the claim of the Portuguese to territorial rights, alleging that they were merely lessees or tenants at will, and until 1849 the Portuguese paid to the Chinese an annual rent of £71 per annum. This diplomatic difficulty prevented the conclusion of a commercial treaty between China and Portugal for a long time, but an arrangement for a treaty was come to in 1887 on the following basis: (1) China confirmed perpetual occupation and government of Macao and its dependencies by Portugal; (2) Portugal engaged never to alienate Macao and its dependencies without the consent of China; (3) Portugal engaged to co-operate in opium revenue work at Macao in the same way as Great Britain at Hong-Kong. The formal treaty was signed in the same year, and arrangements were made whereby the Chinese imperial customs were able to collect duties on vessels trading with Macao in the same way as they had already arranged for their collection at the British colony of Hong-Kong. For a short time in 1802, and again in 1808, Macao was occupied by the English as a precaution against seizure by the French.
MACAQUE, a name of French origin denoting the monkeys of the mainly Asiatic genus Macacus, of which one species, the Barbary ape, inhabits North Africa and the rock of Gibraltar. Displaying great variability in the length of the tail, which is reduced to a mere tubercle in the Barbary ape, alone representing the subgenus Inuus, macaques are heavily-built monkeys, with longer muzzles than their compatriots the langurs (see [Primates]), and large naked callosities on the buttocks. They range all over India and Ceylon, thence northward to Tibet, and eastwards to China, Japan, Formosa, Borneo, Sumatra and Java; while by some naturalists the black ape of Celebes (Cynopithecus niger) is included in the same genus. Mention of some of the more important species, typifying distinct sub-generic groups, is made in the article [Primates]. Like most other monkeys, macaques go about in large troops, each headed by an old male. They feed on seeds, fruits, insects, lizards, &c.; and while some of the species are largely terrestrial, the Barbary ape is wholly so. Docile and easily tamed when young, old males of many of the species become exceedingly morose and savage in captivity.
(R. L.*)
MACARONI (from dialectic Ital. maccare, to bruise or crush), a preparation of a glutinous wheat originally peculiar to Italy, where it is an article of food of national importance. The same substance in different forms is also known as vermicelli, pasta or Italian pastes, spaghetti, taglioni, fanti, &c. These substances are prepared from the hard, semi-translucent varieties of wheat which are largely cultivated in the south of Europe, Algeria and other warm regions, and distinguished by the Italians as grano duro or grano da semolino. These wheats are much richer in gluten and other nitrogenous compounds than the soft or tender wheats of more northern regions, and their preparations are more easily preserved. The various preparations are met with as fine thin threads (vermicelli), thin sticks and pipes (spaghetti, macaroni), small lozenges, stars, disks, ellipses, &c. (pastes). These various forms are prepared in a uniform manner from a granular product of hard wheat, which, under the name of semolina or middlings, is a commercial article. The semolina is thoroughly mixed with boiling water and incorporated in a kneading machine, such as is used in bakeries, into a stiff paste or dough. It is then further kneaded by passing frequently between rollers or under edge runners, till a homogeneous mass has been produced which is placed in a strong steam-jacketed cylinder, the lower end of which is closed with a thick disk pierced with openings corresponding with the diameter or section of the article to be made. Into this cylinder an accurately fitting plunger or piston is introduced and subjected to very great pressure, which causes the stiff dough to squeeze out through the openings in the disk in continuous threads, sticks or pipes, as the case may be. Vermicelli is cut off in short bundles and laid on trays to dry, while macaroni is dried by hanging it in longer lengths over wooden rods in stoves or heated apartments through which currents of air are driven. It is only genuine macaroni, rich in gluten, which can be dried in this manner; spurious fabrications will not bear their own weight, and must, therefore, be laid out flat to be dried. In making pastes the cylinder is closed with a disk pierced with holes having the sectional form of the pastes, and a set of knives revolving close against the external surface of the disk cut off the paste in thin sections as it exudes from each opening. True macaroni can be distinguished by observing the flattened mark of the rod over which it has been dried within the bend of the tubes; it has a soft yellowish colour, is rough in texture, elastic and hard, and breaks with a smooth glassy fracture. In boiling it swells up to double its original size without becoming pasty or adhesive. It can be kept any length of time without alteration or deterioration; and it is on that account, in many circumstances, a most convenient as well as a highly nutritious and healthful article of food.
MACARONICS, a species of burlesque poetry, in which words from a modern vernacular, with Latin endings, are introduced into Latin verse, so as to produce a ridiculous effect. Sometimes Greek is used instead of Latin. Tisi degli Odassi issued a Carmen macaronicum de Patavinis in 1490. The real founder of the practice, however, was Teofilo Folengo (1491-1544), whose mock-heroic Liber Macaronices appeared in 1517. Folengo (q.v.) was a Benedictine monk, who escaped from his monastery and wandered through Italy, living a dissolute life, and supporting himself by his absurd verses, which he described as an attempt to produce in literature something like macaroni, a gross, rude and rustic mixture of flour, cheese and butter. He wrote under the pseudonym of Merlinus Coccaius, and his poem is an elaborate burlesque epic, in twenty-five books, or macaronea; it is an extraordinary medley of chivalrous feats, ridiculous and squalid adventures, and satirical allegory. Its effect upon the mind of Rabelais was so extraordinary that no examination of Pantagruel can be complete without a reference to it (cf. Gargantua, i. 19). It was immediately imitated in Italy by a number of minor poets; and in France a writer whose real name was Antoine de la Sablé, but who called himself Antonius de Arena (d. 1544), published at Avignon in 1573 a Meygra entrepriza, which was a burlesque account of Charles V.’s disastrous campaign in Provence. Folengo in Italy and Arena in France are considered as the macaronic classics. In the 17th century, Joannes Caecilius Frey (1580-1631) published a Recitus veritabilis, on a skirmish between the vine-growers of Rueil and the bowmen of Paris. Great popularity was achieved later still by an anonymous macaronic, entitled Funestissimus trepassus Micheli Morini, who died by falling off the branch of an elm-tree:—