MADRIER

, in Artillery, is a thick plank, armed with plates of iron, and having a cavity sufficient to receive the mouth of a petard, with which it is applied against a gate, or any thing else intended to be broken down.

This term is also applied to certain flat beams, fixed to the bottom of a moat, to support a wall.

There are also Madriers lined with tin, and covered with earth; serving as defences against artificial fires, in lodgments, &c, where there is need of being covered overhead.

MÆSTLIN (Michael), in Latin Mæstlinus, a noted astronomer of Germany, was born in the duchy of Wittemberg; but spent his youth in Italy, where he made a speech in favour of Copernicus's system, which brought Galileo over from Aristotle and Ptolomy, to whom he was before wholly devoted. He afterwards returned to Germany, and became professor of mathematicsat Tubingen; where, among his other scholars, he taught the celebrated Kepler, who has commended several of his ingenious inventions, in his Astronomia Optica.

Mæstlin published many mathematical and astronomical works; and died in 1590.—Though Tycho Brahe did not assent to Mæstlin's opinion, yet he allowed him to be an extraordinary person, and deeply skilled in the science of astronomy.