Saints. This fine Perpendicular building contains, besides many excellent monuments, the richly carved sedilia and the twenty-eight oak seats used by the collegiate priests. Courtenay also founded a college of secular canons, the ruins of which are an interesting specimen of 14th-century architecture. From the reign of John until the Reformation the archbishops had a residence here, at which Stafford and Courtenay died. This Perpendicular building, with its Elizabethan east front, was acquired by the corporation as a memorial of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee in 1887, and houses the school of science and art. The rectory, with the manor, passed into lay hands at the Reformation; and, having been a perpetual curacy for three hundred and twenty years, the living became a vicarage in 1866. The grammar school was founded in 1549, and endowed with the estates of the local Corpus Christi fraternity, then dissolved; the hall in which the gild assembled remains, but the school is established in modern buildings on a new site. There are oil-mills, rope, sacking and twine factories, and cement, lime, and brick works. There is a considerable carrying trade on the Medway. A museum, with public library, was opened in 1858, in an interesting building of the early part of the 16th century. This is the headquarters of the Kent Archaeological Society, founded by the Rev. L. B. Larking in 1858. In 1890 an art gallery was added. The West Kent and General hospital, the county ophthalmic hospital, county gaol and barracks may be mentioned among other institutions. From Saxon times down to 1830 condemned malefactors were executed, and all the great county meetings were held, on Penenden Heath, a common situated about a mile north-east of the town, and enclosed by the corporation as a public recreation ground. The parliamentary borough of Maidstone returns one member. The town is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors.
There is evidence of a Roman settlement at Maidstone. The name Maidstone (Medwegestun, Meddestane, Maydestan), probably meaning Medway Town, is presumably of Saxon origin. At the time of the Domesday Survey it belonged to the archbishop of Canterbury, and from the reign of John the archbishops had a residence there. Its position in the centre of Kent gave it an early importance; the shire-moot was held on Penenden Heath in the 11th century, and Maidstone was an assize town in the reign of Edward I. In 1537 Cranmer exchanged the manor of Maidstone with the king, and it was granted by Edward VI. to Sir Thomas Wyatt. Edward also incorporated the town by the title of the mayor, jurats and commonalty; it had formerly been governed by a portreve and 12 “brethren.” This charter was forfeited through Wyatt’s rebellion; a second charter was granted by Elizabeth in 1559 and confirmed by subsequent sovereigns. A new charter constituting a governing body of a mayor, 12 jurats and 40 common councilmen was given at the petition of the inhabitants by George II. in 1747, and remained the governing charter until 1835. Four fairs were granted by the charter of 1559; these are now held on the 13th of February, the 12th of May, the 20th of June and the 17th of October. A Thursday market was granted by Henry III. to Archbishop Boniface, and a market every second Tuesday in the month by charter of George II. A corn market on Tuesday and a cattle market on Thursday are still held. The manufacture of linen and woollen goods was introduced by Walloons, who settled here in 1567. This was succeeded by paper-making, now the chief industry of the town. The cultivation of hops has been carried on since the 17th century.
Maidstone has been associated with various incidents of general history. Wat Tyler broke into the prison, liberated John Ball the rebel preacher, and committed various depredations. Several of the leading inhabitants joined Jack Cade’s rising. The rising of the Kentish Royalists in 1648 collapsed at Maidstone, where on the 1st of June Fairfax, after five hours’ obstinate fighting, captured the town at midnight.
See Victoria County History, Kent; I. M. Russell, History of Maidstone (1881).
MAIHAR, a native state of Central India, in the Baghelkhand agency. Area, 407 sq. m.; pop. (1901), 63,702; estimated revenue, £4700. The state, which is watered by the Tons river, consists mainly of alluvial soil covering sandstone, and is fertile except in the hilly district of the south. A large area is under forest, the produce of which provides a small export trade. The chief, whose title is raja, claims descent from the Kachwaha Rajput clan. The state suffered severely from famine in 1896–1897. The town of Maihar (pop. 6802) is on the East Indian railway, 97 m. N. of Jubbulpore. Extensive ruins of shrines and other buildings in its neighbourhood indicate a former much greater extent of the place.
MAIL. (1) (Through Fr. maille, from Lat. macula, a spot or hole, the mesh of a net), properly a metal ring or link which,
joined closely with other links, formed the fabric of body and
other armour in the middle ages, till it was superseded by plate-armour.
The word “mail,” properly applied to this form of
chain-armour, is also used of armour generally, whether plate or
chain, and is also transferred to the horny defensive coverings of
animals, such as the tortoise, crab, &c. (see Arms and Armour).
(2) (O. Eng. mál, speech; probably the same as O. Saxon mahal,
assembly; in meaning connected with O. Norse mále, stipulation),
a Scots law term meaning rent, tax. “Mails and duties” are
the rents, whether in kind or money, of an estate. In English
the word only survives in “blackmail” (q.v.). (3) (Through
O. Fr. male, mod. malle, a Teutonic word surviving in Dutch
maal), properly a bag, especially one used in travelling; this
word, which appears in Chaucer, is now applied chiefly to the
despatch and delivery of postal matter. In this sense “mail”
is properly the bag in which such matter is conveyed, and hence
is applied to the contents of the mail, postal matter collectively,
and to the train, carts, or other means used in the despatch
and delivery of the same. In general usage “mail” is confined
to the “foreign” as opposed to the “inland” despatch of
letters, &c., and to which the word “post” is chiefly applied;
in official language, the word refers to the inland despatch. The
word appears also in “mail-coach,” a coach used for conveying
the mails, and in “mail-cart,” a cart similarly employed. This
word is also applied to a light low vehicle propelled or drawn
by hand, suitable for young children. The “mail phaeton”
is a type of phaeton with high seat for two persons and drawn by a pair of horses.
MAILLY, LOUISE JULIE, Comtesse de (1710–1751), mistress of Louis XV. of France, was the daughter of Louis,
marquis de Nesle. She was the eldest of three sisters who
succeeded one another as favourites of the king. In 1726 she married her cousin, Louis Alexandre de Mailly. Although Louis XV. had paid her attentions from 1732, she did not become titular mistress until 1738. She did not use her position either to enrich herself or to interfere in politics. She was supplanted by her sister, the duchess of Châteauroux, and obliged to leave court in 1742.
See E. and J. de Goncourt, La Duchesse de Châteauroux et ses sœurs (1879); Toussaint, Anecdotes curieuses de . . . Louis XV. (2 vols., 1905); J. B. H. R. Capefigue, Mesdemoiselles de Nesle et la jeunesse de Louis XV. (1864).
MAIMANA, a town and khanate of Afghan Turkestan. The town is situated 100 m. S.W. of Balkh, and only some 25 m. from the frontier of Russian Turkestan. It is about two-thirds the size of Herat, square built and surrounded by a ruined wall and moat. The khanate was for long in dispute between Bokhara and Kabul, but in 1868 Abdur Rahman laid siege to the town, and it was compelled to come to terms. Its political status as an Afghan province was definitely fixed by the Russo-Afghan boundary commission of 1885. The inhabitants are chiefly Uzbegs.
MAIMAND, a town in the province of Fars, Persia, a few miles east of Firuzabad and about 70 m. from Shiraz. It has a population of about 5000, almost wholly occupied with the manufacture and sale of rose-water, which is largely exported to many parts of Persia as well as to Arabia, India and Java. The district also produces great quantities of almonds. The
