MALLANWÁN, a town in Hardoi district, Oudh, India, situated on the Hardoi and Unas road, in 27° 2' 10" N. lat. and 80° 11' 30" E. long., with a population in 1869 of 11,670. Under native rule the town possessed considerable political importance, and upon the British annexation of Oudh it was selected as the civil headquarters of the district, but was abandoned in favour of Hardoi town on the reoccupation of the province after the mutiny. The town has now but little trade, and a deserted indigo factory occupies the site of the old fort. Saltpetre and brass utensils are manufactured.
MALLEMUCK, from the German rendering of the Dutch Mallemugge (which originally meant small flies or midges that madly whirl round a light), a name given by the early Dutch Arctic voyagers to the Fulmar (vol. ix. p. 817), of which the English form is nowadays most commonly applied by our sailors to the smaller Albatroses, of about the size of a Goose, met with in the Southern Ocean—corrupted into “Molly Mawk,” or otherwise modified. There is some difference of opinion as to the number of species of small Albatroses, and it is unfortunate that the results of the voyage of the “Challenger” do not clear up the doubts that have been expressed. Three species have been described and figured, the Diomedea melanophrys and D. chlororhynchus for a long while, while the third, D. culminata, was discriminated by Gould (Proc. Zool. Society, 1843, p. 107), who has stated that the difference between it and the second is so apparent that he had no difficulty in distinguishing them on the wing. Captain Hutton, on the other hand (Ibis, 1865, p. 283), considers all three to be specifically identical. Others, as appears by the Report on the Birds of the “Challenger” voyage (pp, 148, 149), while regarding D. melanophrys as distinct, would seem to unite D. culminata with D. chlororhynchus. The first of these birds, says Gould, is the commonest species of Albatros inhabiting the Southern Ocean, and its gregarious habits and familiar disposition make it well known to every voyager to or from Australia, for it is equally common in the Atlantic as well as the Pacific. The back, wings, and tail are of a blackish-grey, but all the rest of the plumage is white, except a dusky superciliary streak, whence its name of Black-browed Albatros, as also its scientific epithet, are taken. The ...bill of the adult is of an ochreous-yellow, while that of the young is dark. This species (supposing it to be one) is said to breed on the Falkland Islands and on Tristan da Cunha, but the latter locality seems questionable, for, according to Carmichael (Trans. Linn. Soc., xii. p. 490), D. chlororhynchus is the bird of this group there found; while Professor Moseley (Notesofa Naturalist, p. 130) calls it D. culminata ? Whatever it may be, the excellent observer just named describes it as making a cylindrical nest of grass, sedge, and clay, with a shallow basin atop and an overhanging rim—the whole being about 14 inches in diameter and 10 in height. The bird lays a single white egg, which is held in a sort of pouch formed by the skin of the abdomen, while she is incubating. A few other details are given by him, but his visit was too hurried to enable him to ascertain the more important and interesting points in the economy of this Albatros which were neglected by his predecessor, Carmichael, during his four months’ sojourn in 1816-17. D. culminata is said by Gould to be more plentiful in the Australian seas than elsewhere, numbers coming under his notice between Launceston and Adelaide, and being also frequently observed by him between Sydney and the northern extremity of New Zealand, as well as in the same latitude of the Indian Ocean. He describes its bill as having the greyish-yellow ridge broad and flat, while that of D. chlororhynchus is laterally compressed and the ridge round. All these birds seem to have much the same habits. (a. n.)
