Minorca.

on the scale, both notes included. The interval between C and E is called a third; that between E and G is also a third; but these intervals are unequal, the one consisting of four semitones, the other of three; the former is therefore distinguished as a major, the latter as a minor interval. 2. The term is also applied to one of the two modes in which a musical passage may be composed. The scale of the minor mode differs from that of the major mode in the third of its key-note being a minor instead of a major third. See MUSIC, MODE.

MINOR is, in Scotch law, the term describing a person who, if a male, is between the ages of 14 and 21; and if a female, is between 12 and 21. In the preceding period he or she is called a pupil. In England the technical term is an infant (q. v.), which includes all persons, male and female, under the age of 21. In Scotland a minor is for many purposes sui juris, and can marry without anybody's consent, and can also make a will of movable property. For the purposes, however, of managing his real property and making contracts, curators are often necessary. See INFANT, RESTITUTION, MAJORITY.

MINOR BARONS. The word baron, in the earliest period of feudalism, signified one who held lands of a superior by military tenure. The superior might be the sovereign, or he might be an earl or other eminent person, who held of the sovereign. According as he was the one or the other, the baron was, in the earliest sense of the distinction, a greater or lesser baron. At the conquest a large part of the soil of England was parceled by William the Norman among his military retainers, who were bound in return to perform services, to do homage, and to assist in administering justice, and in transacting the other business done in the court of the king. 400 of these tenants-inchief of the crown are enumerated in Domesday (q.v.), including among them "vicecomites" and "comites," who together constituted the body of men called the barons of England. As the sovereign was entitled to demand from the barons military service, homage, and attendance in the courts, so, many of the principal barons, particularly such of them as were earls, had military tenants, from whom they in turn received homage and assistance in administering justice in their baronial courts. These tenants were barons of the barons, or, in the earliest sense, minor barons; but by the usage of England, from the conquest downwards, they were seldom called barons, that term having been generally restricted to the former class, the holders of land direct from the crown, who were next to the king in dignity, formed his army and his legislative assembly, and obtained the great charter from king John. The subinfeudation which produced the minor barons was checked by a statute of Edward I., directing that all persons acquiring lands from a subject should hold, not of that subject, but of his superior. Out of the "commune concilium" of the king, at which all his barons were bound to attend, arose the parliament. It is not till the close of Henry III.'s or beginning of Edward I.'s reign that we find a select number instead of the whole barons attending. The exact period of the change, and the way in which it was made, are still among the obscure points of English history; it has been thought that after the rebellion which was crushed at the battle of Evesham, Henry III. summoned only those barons who were most devoted to his interest. From this period a new distinction between major and minor barons arose, the latter term being no longer applied to the barons of the barons, but to those barons of the crown who were no longer summoned by writ to parliament. The word baron was more and more used in the restricted sense of a baron of parliament, and the right or duty of attendance came in process of time to be founded, not on the tenure, but on the writ.

In Scotland the barons (or lairds) were such persons as held their lands directly of the crown. They were the king's advisers, witnessed his charters, and possessed a civil and criminal jurisdiction. All had to give attendance in the Scottish parliament, which consisted of the earls and barons sitting together. After the reign of James I. some of the more powerful barons appear more exclusively as lords of parliament, those whose incomes were below a certain amount obtaining a dispensation from attendance; yet all possessed a right to attend parliament till 1587, when the barons not specially created lords of parliament were required, in place of personally attending, to send representa tives of their order from each sheriffdom. The term baron, however, still continued in Scotland to be applied to the whole body of tenants in capite, such of them as were lords of parliament being distinctively major, and the others minor barons; but all continuing up to 1747 to possess an extensive civil jurisdiction and a criminal jurisdiction, from which only treason and the four pleas of the crown were excluded. The representative minor barons sat in the same house with the major barons, and their votes continued down to the union to be recorded as those of the " small barrounis." MINOR, ROBERT C. See page 881.

MINORCA, the largest of the Balearic isles (q.v.) after Majorca, from which it is distant 25 m. n.e. It is 31 m. long and 13 m. in greatest breadth, with an area of about 300 sq. miles. Pop. 37,262. Its coast, broken into numerous bays and inlets, is fringed with islets and shoals, and its surface, less mountainous than that of Majorca, is undulating, rising to its highest point in mount Toro, 4,793 feet above sea-level. Its productions are similar to those of the larger island, although it is neither so fertile in soil nor so well watered as Majorca. The chief towns are port Mahon (q.v.), and Ciudadela. The annual exports are worth £110,000; the imports £100,000.