MOBILE MODE. 



sickliness of Mobile, a few years since, to establish 

 the town of Blakely, on^ the eastern and opposite 

 side of the bay, and ten miles distant from Mobile. 

 Besides being healthy, this site has many very impor- 

 tant advantages over Mobile; but the project of estab- 

 lishing it as a substitute for Mobile, entirely failed. 

 Only New Orleans and Charleston are before Mobile 

 in the cotton trade, and Charleston is declining, 

 while Mobile is rapidly increasing. The value of 

 exports of domestic produce from Alabama in 1829, 

 was 1,679,385 dollars ; and nearly the whole of this 

 must have been shipped at Mobile. This city has a 

 regular steam-boat communication with New Orleans 

 through lake Ponchartrain. During most of the year, 

 steam- boats are constantly plying between this place 

 and the towns on the river, and many vessels are 

 loadino- at the wharves for distant ports. 



MOBILE ; a river of Alabama, formed by the 

 union of the Alabama and the Tombeckbee. It 

 takes the name of Mobile where these two rivers 

 unite at fort Minims. It enters Mobile bay by two 

 mouths. The Alabama is the eastern branch, and 

 rises in the Alleghany ridges of Georgia. It receives 

 a number of small streams, and becomes navigable 

 for small sea vessels at fort Claiborne. Similar ves- 

 sels ascend the Tombeckbee to the mouth of the 

 Black Warrior, eighty miles above St Stephens. At 

 moderate stages of water it affords steam-boat navi- 

 gation to Tuscaloosa, 320 miles from Mobile. Both 

 these rivers are very favourable to boat navigation. 

 The lands on their borders are excellent, and pro- 

 duce great quantities of cotton. 



MOBILITY ; a contingent property of bodies, 

 but most essential to their constitution. Every body 

 at rest can be put in motion, and if no impediment 

 intervenes, this change may be effected by the slight- 

 est external impression. Thus the largest cannon 

 ball, suspended freely by a rod or chain from a lofty 

 ceiling, is visibly agitated by the horizontal stroke of 

 a swan shot which has gained some velocity in its 

 descent through the arc of a pendulum. In like 

 manner, a ship of any burden is, in calm weather and 

 smooth water, gradually pulled along even by the 

 exertions of a boy. A certain measure of force, in- 

 deed, is often required to commence or to maintain 

 the motion ; but this consideration is wholly extrin- 

 sic, and depends on the obstacles at first to be over- 

 come, and on the resistance which is afterwards 

 encountered. If the adhesion and intervention of 

 other bodies were absolutely precluded, motion 

 would be generated by the smallest pressure, and 

 would continue with undiminished energy. 



MOCHA, or MOKKA ; a town on the Arabian 

 sea, in the province of Yemen, with a commodious 

 harbour, and about 6000 inhabitants, including seve- 

 ral hundred Jews and about 500 Banians. It is 

 frequented by merchants from the Barbary States, 

 Egypt, Turkey, and India, and by British, French, 

 and North American ships. The coffee which bears 

 the name of the town, is brought -down from the 

 interior of the country by caravans. Gum Arabic, 

 copal, mastich, myrrh, frankincense, indigo, senna, 

 and other articles, are exported. The imports are 

 chiefly Indian commodities. The trade is most active 

 between May and August, in which period about 100 

 ships enter the port. There are several mosques, 

 caravansaries, and European factories here. Lon. 

 43 10' E. ; lat. 13 16' N. 



MOCKING BIRD (turdus polyglottos). This 

 capricious little mimic is of a cinereous colour; paler 

 beneath. It inhabits America from New England to 

 Brazil, but is rare and migratory in the Northern 

 States, whilst it is common and resident in the South- 

 ern. This T)ird, although it cannot vie with most of 

 the American species in brilliancy of plumage, is 



much sought for on account of its wonderful fa- 

 culty of imitating the tone of every inhabitant of 

 the woods, from the twitter of the humming-bird to 

 the scream of the eagle. But its notes are not en- 

 tirely imitative ; its own song is bold, full, and ex- 

 ceedingly varied, during the utterance of which it 

 appears in an ecstasy of delight. In confinement, it 

 loses little of its power or energy. To use the 

 words of Wilson, " He whistles for the dog ; Caesar 

 starts up, wags his tail, and runs to meet his master. 

 He squeaks out like a hurt chicken, and the hen 

 hurries about, with hanging wings and bristled 

 feathers, clucking, to protect her injured brood. 

 The barking of the dog, the mewing of the cat, the 

 creaking or the passing wheelbarrow, follow with 

 great truth and rapidity. He repeats the tune taught 

 him by his master, though of considerable length, 

 fully and faithfully. He runs over the quiverings of 

 the canary, or the clear whistlings of the Virginia 

 nightingale or red-bird, with such superior execution 

 and effect, that the mortified songsters feel their own 

 inferiority, and become altogether silent ; while he 

 seems to triumph in their defeat, by redoubling his 

 exertions." The female lays from four to five eggs, 

 of an ash-blue colour, marked with patches of brown; 

 she incubates fourteen days, and is extremely jealous 

 of her nest, being very apt to desert it if much dis- 

 turbed. During the period when the young are in 

 the nest, neither cat, dog, nor man can approach it 

 without being attacked. When intended for the 

 cage, they are either taken from the nest when they 

 are very young, or at a later period by trap-cages. 



MODALITY. Kant uses this word for that cate- 

 gory (see Kant) which determines the relation of all 

 the ideas of the judgment to our understanding. 

 The logical modality of Kant is, therefore, the man- 

 ner in which the understanding conceives the con- 

 nexion and relation of ideas in a judgment ; whether 

 we leave something undecided, as in problematical 

 judgments, or give the thing as true, as in assertory 

 judgments, or are obliged to consider a certain con- 

 nexion of ideas to be true, as in apodictical judg- 

 ments. For further information, see the article 

 Kant. 



MODE ; a particular system, or constitution of 

 sounds, by which the octave is divided into certain 

 intervals according to the genus. The doctrine of 

 the ancients respecting modes is rendered somewhat 

 obscure, by the difference among their authors as to 

 the definitions, divisions, and names of their modes. 

 Some place the specific variations of tones, or modes, 

 in the manner of division, or order of the concinnous 

 parts ; and others merely in the different tension of 

 the whole ; that is, as the whole series of notes are 

 more acute or grave, or as they stand higher or 

 lower in the great scale of sounds. While the 

 ancient music was confined within the narrow bounds 

 of the tetrachord, the heptachord, and octachord, 

 there were only three modes admitted, whose funda- 

 mentals were one tone distant from each other. The 

 gravest of these was called the Dorian ; the Phry- 

 gian was in the middle, and the acutest was the 

 Lydian. In dividing each of these tones into two 

 intervals, place was given to two other modes, the Ion- 

 ian and the yEolian ; the first of which was inserted 

 between the Dorian and Phrygian, and the second 

 between the Phrygian and Lydian. The system 

 being at length extended both upward and down- 

 ward, new modes were established, taking their 

 denomination from the five first, by joining the pre- 

 position hyper (over or above) for those added at the 

 acute extremity, and the preposition hypo (under) for 

 those below. Thus the Lydian mode was followed 

 by the Hyper-Dorian, the Hyper-Ionian, the Hyper- 

 Phrygian, the Hyper- /Eolian. and the Hyper-Lydian, 



