Montgomeryshire is occupied chiefly by Lower Silurian rocks. The boundary between it and Merioneth is formed by the Bala beds. In the centre and east, near Llanfair and Montgomery, Wenlock shales prevail. In the neighbourhood of Welshpool the Silurian rocks have been frequently dislocated by volcanic masses, one of the most remarkable of which is Comdon Hill, rising to a height of 1700 feet. In some places the sedimentary rocks have been penetrated by trap mingled with shale or schist. Along the lines of dislocation there are frequent deposits of metallic lodes, carried there by the heated water rising from below. The lead mines of Montgomeryshire are of considerable importance, and at present the metal is wrought at seven different places. In 1881 the amount of lead ore obtained in the various mines was 3432 tons, yielding 2693 tons of lead and 25,432 oz. of silver, the total value being £36,495. There were also obtained 1414 tons of zinc ore, yielding 610 tons of zinc, of a total value of £3231.

Agriculture.— The climate is mild and genial, and the soil in the valleys remarkably fertile, especially along the banks of the Severn. A considerable portion on the borders of Merioneth is, however, occupied chiefly by heath and moss. The number of holdings has been rather decreasing of late years, the decrease being chiefly in those below 50 acres in extent, which in 1880 (the latest year regarding which there is information) numbered 3572, while there were 1650 between 50 and 300 acres, and 45 above 300 acres, of which 2 were above 1000. According to the agricultural returns of 1882, the total area of arable land was 256,084 acres, or nearly one-half of the whole. Of this 53,538 were under corn crops, 163,441 were permanent pasture, 23,882 rotation grasses, and only 11,107 green crops; 457 acres were under orchards, 2 under market gardens, 37 under nursery grounds, and 22,744 under woods. Of the corn crops, wheat occupied 18,665 acres, and oats 23,937 acres. Cattle, which are chiefly Herefords and cross-breeds, though there are some Devons and a few of the old Montgomeryshire breed, numbered 62,033 in 1882, of which 21,912 were cows and heifers in milk or in calf. Horses in 1882 numbered 13,985, of which 7060 were used solely for agricultural purposes. The county was long famous for its hardy breed of small horses called merlins, which are still to be met with. Many good hunters and cart-horses are now bred. The number of sheep in 1882 was 305,641. On some of the heath lands in the centre and west of the county a diminutive breed of sheep called duns is pastured, but those kept in the better cultivated regions are principally Shropshire Downs. According to the latest return, the land was divided among 3241 proprietors, possessing 387,342 acres, with a gross annual rental of £378,512. Of these, 1314, or 40 per cent., possessed less than one acre, 32 possessed between 1000 and 2000 acres, and 25 between 2000 and 5000; the following possessed upwards of 5000 acres, viz.—Earl Powis, 33,545; Sir W. W. Wynn, 32,963; Lord Sudeley, 17,158; J. Naylor, 9275; and marquis of Londonderry, 7400.

Manufactures.— In all the towns the manufacture of woollen cloth, especially Welsh flannel, is carried on, and although the industry was lately on the decline it is now reviving.

Administration and Population.— Montgomeryshire comprises nine hundreds, and the municipal boroughs of Llanidloes (3421) and Welshpool (7107). Llanfyllin, Llanidloes, Machynlleth, Montgomery, Newtown, and Welshpool form the Montgomery district of boroughs, with a total population in 1881 of 19,925, and return one member to parliament. One member is also returned for the county. Montgomeryshire is partly in the dioceses of Bangor, Hereford, and St Asaph, and contains sixty-eight civil parishes, townships, or places, as well as parts of other parishes in adj oining counties. From 65,700 in 1831 the population had increased in 1851 to 67,335, and in 1871 to 67,623, but in 1881 it had diminished to 65,718, of whom 33,004 were males and 32,714 females.

History.— At the time of the Roman invasion, Montgomery was possessed by a tribe of the Cymri called Ordovices. Traces of several of the old British camps still remain, the principal being those at Dolarddyn, on Breidden Hill, and at Caereinion. There are also a large number of cairns and barrows. The county was traversed by the great Roman road, the Via Dcυana, which was joined by a number of others; but the remains of Roman camps or stations are unimportant. After being vacated by the Romans, little is known of the history of Montgomery, until Wales was subdivided into three districts at the death of Rhodri the Great. Montgomery was then included under Powys, and formed the chief portion of Powys Gwenwynwyn, sometimes called Upper Powys. Powys or Powιs Castle, the seat of the rulers of Upper Powys, was founded in 1108. Baldwyn, from which the county takes its Welsh name, was lieutenant of the marches; and, for the purpose of holding the district in check, a castle was built about the end of the 11th century, which, after being captured by the natives, was retaken by Roger de Montgomery. He gave his name to the castle, and to the surrounding district of ancient Powys, which was made a county by Henry VIII. in 1533. ·

Montgomery, the county town, is situated on the declivity of a well-wooded hill near the eastern bank of the Severn, 21 j miles south by west of Shrewsbury, and 187∣ by rail north-west by north of London. It is a clean and well-built town, but somewhat scattered and irregular. The principal buildings are the parish church of Saint Nicholas (an old cruciform structure) and the town-hall. The borough has returned members to parliament since the time of Henry VIII., but by the Reform Act of 1832 it was constituted one of the Montgomery district of boroughs, which together return one member. The population of the borough (area, 3323 acres) was 1194 in 1881.

There are only a few crumbling remains of the old fortress of Montgomery, originally founded in the time of William the Conqueror to overawe the Welsh, and held by Roger de Montgomery, from whom the town takes its name. The castle was greatly enlarged in the time of Henry III., when it was the scene of frequent contests between that monarch and Llewelyn the Great. In the 14th century it was held by the Mortimers, from whom it passed to the house of York. By the crown it was granted in the 15th century to the Herberts of Cherbury, but during the Civil War it was surrendered by Lord Herbert of Cherbury to the Parliamentary forces, by whom it was dismantled.

MONTGOMERY, a district in the lieutenant-governorship of the Punjab, lying between 29° 58' and 31° 33' N. lat., and between 72° 29' and 74° 10' E. long., is bounded on the N.E. by Lahore, on the S.E. by the river Sutlej, on the S.W. by Mûltân, and on the N.W. by Jhang. The area is 5573 square miles. Montgomery district, formerly known as Gugaira, occupies a wide extent of the Bâri Doâb, or wedge of land between the Sutlej and the Râvi, besides stretching across the latter river into the adjoining Rechna Doâb. In the former tract a fringe of cultivated lowland skirts the bank of either river, but the whole interior upland consists of a desert plateau partially overgrown with brushwood and coarse grass, and in places with impenetrable jungle. On the farther side of the Râvi, again, the country at once assumes the same desert aspect.

The census of 1868 returned the population at 359,437 (males 200,016, females 159,421), viz., Hindus, 69,805; Mohammedans, 277,291; Sikhs, 12,286; and “others,” 55. The Jâts, or pastoral tribe, form the most distinctive class in the district. They bear the name of “Great Râvi,” in contradistinction to the purely agricultural classes, who are contemptuously styled 4 ‘ Little Râvi.” They possess a fine physique, with handsome features, claim a Rajput ancestry, and despise all who handle the plough. In former days they exercised practical sovereignty over the agricultural tribes. Only two towns in the district contain over 5000 inhabitants, viz., Pak Pattan (6086) and Kamalia (5695). The town of Montgomery, the headquarters station, had a population of only 2416 in 1868.

Out of a total assessed area of 3,569,746 acres, only 538,240 arc returned as under cultivation. In 1872-73 the rdbi (or spring harvest) acreage was as follows:—wheat (the chief crop), 162,989 acres; barley, 30,134; gram, 21,416; mustard, 2077; and tobacco, 1303 acres. In the same year the kharif{or autumn harvest) acreage was:— -jodr, 20,509 acres; rice, 18,727; cotton, 16,916; til, 12,457; kangni, 9493; and sugar-cane, 498 acres. Irrigation is practised from rivers, canals, and wells; the total area irrigated by public works is 66,495 acres, and by private works, 158,709. The desert uplands afford after the rains a scanty pasturage for the scattered herds of the Great Râvi Jâts, and yield an impure carbonate of soda (sajji) from the alkaline plants with which they abound. The commercial staples include wheat, rice, gram, millets, cotton, wool, ghi, hides, and sajji. Large numbers of camels are bred for exportation. The imports comprise sugar, salt, oil, English piece goods, metals, indigo, and fruits. The manufactures consist of country cloth, coarse striped silk, and lacquered wood-work. The Lahore and Mûltân railway intersects the district, which is also traversed in every direction by good unmetalled highways. The revenue of the district in 1871-72 amounted to £47,954, of which £42,355 was derived from the land-tax. Education in 1871-72 was afforded by 59 aided and unaided schools, with a total of 1417 pupils. The average annual rainfall for the seven years ending 1872-73 was 9'6 inches.

From time immemorial the Rechna Doâb has formed the home of a wild race of pastoral Jâts, who have constantly maintained a sturdy independence against the successive rulers of northern India. The historians of Alexander’s invasion mention a tribe called the Cathaeans, who probably had their capital at Sangala in the Jhang district, and the Malli with their metropolis at Mûltân, as in possession of this part of the country. The sites of Kot Kamalia and Harappa in Montgomery contain large mounds of antique bricks and other ruins, while many other remains of ancient cities or villages lie scattered along the river bank, or dot the now barren stretches of the central waste, clearly marking the former existence of a considerable population. The pastoral tribes of this barren expanse do not appear to have paid more than a nominal allegiance to the Moslem rulers, and even in later days, when Ranjit Sinh extended the Sikh supremacy as far as Mùltân, the country yielded little or no revenue, and the population for the most part remained in a chronic state of rebellion. British influence was first exercised in the district in 1847, when an officer was deputed to effect a summary settlement of the land revenue. Direct British rule was effected on the annexation of the Punjab in 1849. The only incident since then was a general rising of the wild clans during the mutiny of 1857, several actions being fought before the clans were defeated and dispersed and order restored.

MONTGOMERY, a city of the United States, the capital of Alabama, is built on a high bluff on the left bank of the Alabama river, 158 miles north-east of Mobile, with which it is connected by rail (180 miles) and by a steamboat service (330 miles). The State-house, rebuilt in 1851 at a cost of $75,000, occupies a commanding site on Capitol Hill. There are a city-hall, a court-house, and two theatres, a large flour-mill, a cotton-factory, two oil-mills, a fertilizer-factory, and several foundries and machine shops. The population was 16,713 in 1880; and, in consequence of the marked increase in commercial and industrial activity since that date, it is now (1883) estimated at 19,000. Founded in 1817, and named after General Richard Montgomery (1736-75), the town of Montgomery became in 1847 the seat of the State Government instead of Tuscaloosa. From February 1861 to May 1862 it was the capital of the Southern Confederation. In 1865 it was seized by the Federal forces under General Wilson.

MONTGOMERY, Alexander, whose life fell between 1550 and 1610, was the last of the series of Scottish poets who flourished in the 16th century under the patronage of the Jameses. With the union of the crowns, and the transference of James VI. from Edinburgh to London, court favour was withdrawn from Lowland Scotch; it practically ceased to be a literary language, and no poetry of mark was written in the dialect, if we except that of Allan Ramsay’s school, till it reappeared in literature as the instrument of the Ayrshire peasant. By a curious coincidence, Montgomery seems to have been, like Burns, a native of Ayrshire. A commendatory sonnet from his pen, extravagantly flattering, as was the custom of the time, was printed with King James’s Essays of a Prentice in 1584; he received a pension from the crown a few years later, fell into disgrace apparently for a time, was reinstated in favour, and accompanied his patron to England. As might be expected from the poet of a court where the king himself was a keen critic, Montgomery’s miscellaneous poems show a careful attention to form; he tried many metrical experiments, and managed many complicated staves with skill. The sonnet form, at that time a leading fashion in English verse, was also cultivated at the Scottish court, and Montgomery’s sonnets possess considerable merit. His most successful poem, published in 1597, and frequently reprinted in Scotland, was the allegory of The Cherry and the Sloe. The poet, smitten by Cupid, conceives a longing for some cherries, beautiful fruit, but growing high up on a steep and dangerous bank, above a roaring waterfall. Shall he climb and win? Hope and courage and will urge him to try; dread and danger and despair counsel him to be content with the humbler fruit of the sloe, which grows within easy reach. Experience, reason, wit, and skill debate the question. In the end he resolves to venture for the cherry, with the active help of these last-named powers. The conflicting counsels of the poet’s advisers are very pithily expressed in proverbs for and against the adventurous enterprise, and the description of the situation is strong and vivid. Montgomery was no unworthy successor to Henryson and

Dunbar in executive finish, but the want of originality in his poems shows that the old impulse was nearly exhausted. There are traces of Italian influence in his sonnets and love songs, but it was much less powerful with him than with his English contemporaries.

MONTGOMERY, James (1771-1854), poet and journalist, was justly described by Lord Byron, in a footnote to English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, as “a man of considerable genius,” though it was going far beyond the mark to speak of his Wanderer of Switzerland (his first notable poem, published in 1806) as being worth a thousand “Lyrical Ballads.” Montgomery was born 4th November 1771, at Irvine in Ayrshire, Scotland. Part of his boyhood was spent in Ireland, but he received his education in Yorkshire, at the Moravian school of Fulneck, named after the original home of the Moravians, to which sect his father belonged. He drifted at an early age into journalism, and edited the Sheffield Iris for more than thirty years. When he began his career the position of a Dissenting journalist was a difficult one, and he twice suffered imprisonment (in 1795 and 1796) on charges that now seem absurdly forced and unfair. His Wanderer was mercilessly ridiculed by the Edinburgh Review, but in spite of this Montgomery published many poems, which had a wide popularity :— The West Indies, 1810; The World Before the Flood, 1812; Greenland, 1819; Songs of Zion, 1822; The Pelican Island, 1827. On account of the religious character of his poetry, he is sometimes confounded with Robert Montgomery, very much to the injustice of his reputation. The inspiring force of James Montgomery’s poetry was the humanitarian sentiment which has been such a power in the political changes of this century, and the pulse of this sentiment is nowhere felt beating more strongly than in his verse. His poetry has thus an historical interest altogether apart from its intrinsic value as poetry. But this value is far from contemptible or commonplace. Strictly speaking, Montgomery was more of a rhetorician than a poet, but his imagination was bold, ardent, and fertile, and more than one of his greater contemporaries owed occasional debts to his vigorous invention and even to his casual felicities of diction, while some passages from his poems keep a place in the literature that is universally read and quoted. At the close of his career as a journalist, when all parties agreed in paying him respect, he claimed for his poetry that it was at least not imitative, and the claim was just as regarded conception and choice of subjects; but as regards diction and imagery the influence of Campbell is very apparent in his earlier poems, and the influence of Shelley is supreme in the Pelican Island, his last and best work as a poet. His Lectures on Poetry and General Literature, published in 1833, show considerable breadth of sympathy and power of expression. Memoirs of him were published in seven volumes in 1856-8. They furnish valuable materials for the history of English provincial politics in the 19 th century. He died at Sheffield 30th April 1854.

MONTGOMERY, Robert (1807-1855), author of The Omnipresence of the Deity (1828), Satan (1830), and The Messiah (1832), was the Montgomery ridiculed and denounced in Macaulay’s famous essay. As a poet, he deserved every word of Macaulay’s severe censure; the marks of intellectual feebleness — tautologous epithets, absurdly mixed metaphors, and inapt lines introduced for the sake of rhyme—are visible in every page of his versification. It should be mentioned that Macaulay’s “trouncing” did not diminish the sale of his so-called poems; one of the works expressly ridiculed reached its 28th edition in 1858. His real name is said to have been Gomery.