Lord M'reng: Difference between revisions

Jump to navigation Jump to search
No edit summary
 
(10 intermediate revisions by the same user not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
{{Infobox military person
{{Infobox military person
|honorific_prefix = The Honourable Lord M′reng, Dr.
|honorific_prefix = The Honourable Lord M′reng, Dr.
|name            = Trjuk Krjên-magh
|name            = Truk Krin-mak
|honorific_suffix = MP, MPhD, OA
|honorific_suffix = MP, MtD, OA
|image            =  
|image            =  
|image_upright    =  
|image_upright    =  
|alt              =  
|alt              =  
|caption          =  
|caption          =  
|native_name      = 筑柬寞
|native_name      = 內史筑 顭君柬寞
|native_name_lang = [[Shinasthana]]
|native_name_lang = [[Shinasthana]]
|birth_name      =  
|birth_name      =  
|other_name      =  
|other_name      =  
|nickname        =  
|nickname        = Srin (潸)
|birth_date      = {{birth date|1812|12|30}}  
|birth_date      = {{birth date|1812|12|30}}  
|birth_place      =  
|birth_place      =  
Line 24: Line 24:
|serviceyears    = 1855 – 1858, 1863 – 1881
|serviceyears    = 1855 – 1858, 1863 – 1881
|serviceyears_label =  
|serviceyears_label =  
|rank            = MP & Second Class ([[Ranks of the civil service of Themiclesia|rural election]])<br>Colonel-in-Chief (1855 – 1858)<br>Colonel (1863 – 1870)<br>Colonel-General (1870 – 1881)  
|rank            = Colonel-in-Chief (1855 – 1858)<br>Colonel (1863 – 1870)<br>Colonel-general (1870 – 1881)  
|rank_label      =  
|rank_label      =  
|servicenumber    =  
|servicenumber    =  
|unit            =  
|unit            =  
|commands        = Marshal of Mhje′<br>[[Themiclesian Marine Corps|2nd Regiment of Marines]] <br>Captain-general of Marines  
|commands        = [[Themiclesian Marine Corps|2nd Regiment of Marines]] <br>Captain-general of Marines  
|battles          = [[Battle of Liang-la]]
|battles          = [[Battle of Liang-la]]
|battles_label    =  
|battles_label    =  
Line 42: Line 42:
|website          = <!--{{URL|example.com}}-->
|website          = <!--{{URL|example.com}}-->
|module          =  
|module          =  
}}'''The Hon. Lord M′reng, Dr. Trjuk Krjên-magh MP, PhD, OA''' ([[Shinasthana]]: 筑柬寞, Dec. 30, 1812 – May 2, 1881) was a Themiclesian mathematician, legislator, civil servant, and military officer.  He was born the second son of the Lord of Nrak in 1812 in the [[Inner Region]] and was a member of parliament between 1847 and 1854 in Tubh, for the [[Conservative Party (Themiclesia)|Conservative Party]].  After entering the administration, he feuded with the Liberals over budget and was dismissed in 1858.  He became a doctor of mathematics in 1860, working on discrete calculus.   
}}'''The Hon. Dr. Truk Krin-mak, Lord M′reng MP, MtD, OA''' ([[Shinasthana]]: 筑柬寞, {{smallcaps|rf}} Truk Krin-maqs; Dec. 30, 1812 – May 2, 1881) was a Themiclesian mathematician, politician, civil servant, and military officer.  He was born the second son of the Lord of Nrak in 1812 in the [[Inner Region]] and was a member of parliament between 1847 and 1854 in Tubh, for the [[Conservative Party (Themiclesia)|Conservative Party]].  After entering the administration, he feuded with the Liberals over budget and was dismissed in 1858.  He became a doctor of mathematics in 1863 for his work on discrete calculus.   


Through his connections in the [[Themiclesian Navy|Navy]], he became the colonel of the 2nd Regiment of Marines, thereas surrendering to the [[Camia|Camians]] in the [[Battle of Liang-la]].  He was promoted to Captain-General, where he entered another feud with the Admiralty and the future prime minister the [[Lord of Krungh]], and there he remained until his death in 1881.
In the 1860s, he became a colonel in the [[Themiclesian Marine Corps|Marines]], and thereas he surrendered to the [[Camia|Camians]] in the [[Battle of Liang-la]] but ultimately escaped disgraceIn 1867, he joined the Na-qrum Ministry as Captain-general of Marines, resigning that office in 1869 along with the Ministry but retaining his colonelcy.  He left the military in 1874 for the publishing industry.  In 1878, the Lord of M'i appointed him as Master-general of the Ordnance and promoted him as Secretary to the Board of Trade in 1879.  He died in 1880 under a severe case of Pneumonia, that winter having been one of the coldest in the century.


==Academic work==
==Academic work==
Trjuk returned to the University of the Pond in 1860 to continue work on discrete calculus.  He became a doctor of mathematics from that institution in 1862.  He was the second Themiclesian to possess a {{wp|doctorate}} in mathematics; not more than ten individuals would receive this distinction in the 19th century.   
Truk returned to the University of the Pond in 1860 to continue work on discrete calculus.  He became a doctor of mathematics from that institution in 1863.  He was the second Themiclesian to possess a {{wp|doctorate}} in mathematics; not more than ten individuals received this distinction in the 19th century.  In 1865, while on military commission, Truk arranged for broad publication for his monograph ''Insular Calculus'' (mocking his isolation on Liang), which was a success amongst academics in the 1860s and 70s.


In 1865, while on military commission, Trjuk arranged for broad publication for his monograph ''Insular Calculus'' (mocking his isolation on Liang), which was a success amongst academics in the 1860s and 70s.
==Military career==
Having tried and failed to secure a lecturing tour, he appealed in 1865 to the Baron of Na-qrum, prime minister and leader of the Conservative party, for office.  Lord of Krungs, there a leading figure, interfered with the appointment.  Eventually, Krungs told Conservative magnates he planned to "get rid of him" (from the social scene in [[Kien-k'ang]]) by offering him a commission as colonel of the Lower Naval Engineers, a Marines unit stationed on the Isle of Liang.  The island was four days from the Themiclesan coast by steamboat. 
 
M′reng desired an office urgently, but he detested the idea of being on Liang, which the Camians threatened to take by force.  He appeared before other prominent Conservatives and lobbied their support for a seat in the House of Commons.  As the emerging Conservative leader, the [[Lord of M'i]], wanted to reform the party to place more emphasis on integrity and public spirit, he was not offered a different position.  After taking the commission, he lingered in [[Kien-k'ang]], unwilling to travel to the island, for several months.  The Liberals found out about his reluctance to travel to his post and pressured the Government to order him to set sail in January 1866.
 
On his first day on the island, he made a serious blunder by accidentally discharging a pistol, killing one of his subordinates.  The government sent a [[Tribune (Themiclesia)|government attorney]] to investigate the homicide, and Truk was acquitted only with the intercession of the [[Barons of the Admiralty]].  In 1865, he was named Lord M′reng (顭君) for being in public service for 20 years.  ′Eng, a Liberal MP, snidely asked if he knew what a gun was, and he replied, "I am glad to say I have never seen a gun before.  It is obvious our social spheres have been widely different."  Asked what he did during the day, he said he wrote letters and invited himself to meals, because there was nobody to talk to.  The MP also discovered a large pile of letters from the Admiralty in a basket for firewood.


==Military career==
In 1867, the Camians invaded the island in the [[Battle of Liang-la]] and blockaded the Bay of Themiclesia.  M′reng, without orders to resist, surrendered the island to the Camian forces on the island so quickly as to take them by surprise.  While many officers considered his behaviour unbecoming, he was priased by the Conservatives for his sensibility.  Nevertheless, the surrender caused a great dip in the trading value of the Marines' commissions, which garnered him the animosity of most other Marines' officers, whose commissions lost as much as 50% of "float", or the market value of the commission above its face or statutory value.
===Marines===
 
Having tried and failed to secure a tenure in that institution, he again appealed to the Ministry of Administration for a public office, but his prolonged disagreement with the Lord of Krungh, who was by this time a leading figure in the Conservative Party, prevented a rapid appointmentEventually, Krungh told the Executive Committee he planned to "get rid of him" (from the social scene in [[Kien-k'ang]]) by arranging his appointment as colonel of the 2nd Regiment of Marines, which was stationed on the Isle of Liang.   
For his rapid surrender, the Liberals demanded he should lose his commission without compensation, but he was rescued by the Government majority in the upper houseIn Nov. 1867, the incumbent Captain-general of Marines accepted a tenure at the City University, creating a vacancy that Na-qrum (for an unclear reason) filled by calling M′reng to the [[Themiclesian Ministry|Ministry]].  Na-qrum's appointment utterly shocked the Liberal opposition, which could not approve the appointment of an officer "so unbecoming and uncaring" to high office.  M′reng felt so indebted to Na-qrum that he financed his own by-election, but unexpectedly, the electorate, turned out by the local Liberal party, rejected him at the polls. 
 
The Liberal leader, the Lord of Sng′ra′, apologized for the discourtesy of blocking a {{wp|ministerial by-election}} but nevertheless expressed distain for the blatantly-political appointment.  Other Liberal parliamentarians pointed out that, out of the five colonels then in the Marines, only M′reng was a Conservative.  M′reng stood again and was elected without incident in Mik, which was in pocket of the [[Baron of Treks]]As was customary at that time, active military officers called to the Ministry were required to stand in a by-election but did not actually take their seats in the House; this ensured that only the most well-connected and financially secure officers could secure high appointments.


On the one hand, Trjuk wanted an appointment soon, as his seniority would expire soon if he was not in office, but he detested the idea of being on Liang, which the Camians threatened to take by forceTrjuk appeared before the Executive Committee and stated the "colonelcy can be offered to a starving pauper and be still rejected," while making dissenting comments to aristocrats and other party leadersEventually, he was forced to accept the positionAfter the appointment, he lingered in [[Kien-k'ang]], unwilling to travel to the island, for several months.  The government ordered him to set sail in Mar. 1864, after irrepressable Liberal derision and caricature of his refusal to take up his commission.
However, M′reng's tenure was cut short by the general election of Mar. 1869, which saw the Liberal Party restored to power with a tremendous majorityHe resigned the captaincy-general with Na-qrum's ministry.  Coincidentally, his replacement Lord Kram also lost his by-election and had to stand in a safe seat, at great expenseWhile it has been the Liberal Party's overarching goal to establish a professional military leadership, this goal was shelved during Sng′ra′s second premiership as it focused on assisting the economy deal with the influx of agricultural products resulting from the elimination of tariffs.  M'reng remained as his regiment's colonelLord Kram was reportedly on friendly terms with M'reng, but the two could not agree on the need to teach arithmetic skills to ordinary naval servicepeople: Kram believed that M'reng was labouring under a serious misapprehension about the applicability of basic arithmetic to the quotidian duties of the service.


On his first day in office, Trjuk made a serious blunder by playing and accidentally discharging a pistol, killing one of his subordinatesThe government sent a [[Tribune (Themiclesia)|tribune]] (government attorney) to investigate the homicide, and Trjuk was acquitted by the House of Lords' intercessionIn 1865, Trjuk became Lord M′reng (顭君). A Liberal MP visited Trjuk and asked if he even knew what a gun was, and he replied, "I am glad to say I have never seen a gun beforeIt is obvious our social spheres have been widely different."  Asked what he did during the day, he said he invited himself to lunch and dinner every day on the empty island, because there was nobody to talk to. The MP also discovered a large pile of letters from the Admiralty in a basket for firewood.  He later disclosed all he heard and saw to journalists, who hounded the government for his replacement.
In 1874, M'reng sold his colonelcy to Dr. Tsit, a doctor of medicine, practitioner, and writer of great fame, for the healthy sum of $10,000, yet Tsit continued to write letters almost every day to M'reng asking for advice over all part of the colonel's dutiesM'reng thus complained to his friend, Lord Bram, that he was still effectively running the regiment despite not receiving any of its benefitsThis complaint somehow made it to Dr. Tsit, who humourously included $0.20—a day's wage of an enlisted man of the regiment—in every letter he sent to M'rengHe adjusted his remuneration to $0.24 per letter ($0.01 for the return stamp) after Parliament increased the regiment's wages to $0.23 in March 1875: M'reng's annual income was about $40,000 in this period.


After surrendering to the Camians, the Commons Liberals demanded his immediate dismissalThe Conservative majority in the upper house rejected a proposed impeachment.  Krungh then arranged to make him Captain-general of Marines, which was technically a promotion but one that Trjuk did not wantOver the next few years, Trjuk gave up on the thought of obtaining a ministerial office, which became progressively remote as Krungh became the leader of the New Conservative faction that was gaining traction amongst peers.
In 1878, however, M'reng was back in the fold of public service having secured a seat in the electorate of Kyim and appointed as Master-general of the Ordnance by the Conservative premier, [[Lord of M'i]]As the M'i Ministry (for some reason) did not include a separate Captain-general of Marines, M'reng's portfolio extended to the units of the marine corps, ironically placing Dr. Tsit under him.  M'reng famously remarked that he was "now in a position to make the jokes about Dr. Tsit", though he was dismayed to find out that his now-subordinated colonel had moved to Anglia permanently in 1877 and declined to sell the commissionIn June 1878, M'reng was given the additional office of Receiver-in-Chief of the Exchequer of the East Territories (東國內大史).  In October 1878, M'reng was promoted again as the Secretary to the Board of Trade, whereupon the position of Master-general of the Ordnance was given the young Lord Lu-kas.


Trjuk began to table legislation at the House of Commons relating to his portfolio starting in 1871.  Ironically, this made him a more popular person in the party.  By 1875, Trjuk repealed a number of disliked rules in the Marine Corps, and in 1878, he managed to abolish the hated militia fine, which was a fine levied on marines with the excuse that they fail to participate in five days' drilling at their home towns' militias.  Trjuk delivered a memorable speech at the Commons for this reason:
==Board of Trade==
{{quote|[...] I am by profession a mathematician, but it does not require a mathematician's mind to see that every [solar] calendar year is approximately 365 and a quarter days.  For this entire time, marines are employed aboard the Consolidated Fleet and other needy places, not permitted to leave.  It seems impossible, to my mind at any rate, that they could have five days outside of the calendar year to discharge their natural and civic duties at militia musters.  I would beg this house, on that account, to make a statute excusing them from that duty, and they will ever remember your grace...}}


==Personal life==
==Personal life==
===Sexuality===
===Sexuality===
{{main|Sexual orientation and gender identity in the Themiclesian military}}
{{main|Sexual orientation and gender identity in the Themiclesian military}}
Trjuk was an open homosexual throughout his public life.  While he was against lurid language in public, believing it to be disrespectful, he fought with Admiral Trat over homosexual intercourse on ships, which the Admiralty was desirous to prevent in the 1870s.  He said the prohibition of gay sex was "unfounded and Liberal".  However, recent scholarship point out Trjuk was not "a shining beacon of traditional morality in an age when Casaterran homophobia was gaining acceptance in Themiclesia", like some previous authors have accepted.   
Truk was an open homosexual throughout his public life.  While he was against lurid language in public, believing it to be indecent, he fought with Admiral Trat over homosexual intercourse on ships, which the Admiralty was desirous to prevent in the 1870s.  He said the prohibition of sex between naval personnel was "unfounded and Liberal".  However, recent scholarship suggests Truk was not "a shining beacon of traditional morality in an age when Casaterran homophobia was gaining acceptance in Themiclesia", like some previous authors have argued.   


Homosexuality had been pathologized by Casaterran medical scholars, sometimes ascribed with moralistic overtones as degeneracy.  As Themiclesian law prohibited interference with a crew member on duty, sailors enjoyed an enormous advantage avoiding allegations of minor misbehaviour, and a frequent one was sexual abuse of marines.  Under contemporary law, males cannot be victims of rape, which is viewed as a crime against the family; instance of male-on-male rape were prosecuted as misdemeanours.  Thus, the banning of homosexuality was not only motivated by Casaterran moralities and then-accepted medical theories, but also by the Admiralty's desire to protect marines against abuse.  The Admiralty had proposed a total ban on homosexual intercourse in 1870, but Trjuk refused to propose the same for the Marines.   
{{quote|Homosexuality had been pathologized by Casaterran medical scholars, sometimes ascribed with moralistic overtones as degeneracy.  As Themiclesian law prohibited interference with a crew member on duty, sailors enjoyed an enormous advantage avoiding allegations of minor misbehaviour, and a frequent one was sexual abuse of marines.  Under contemporary law, males cannot be victims of rape, which is viewed as a crime against the family; instance of male-on-male rape were prosecuted as misdemeanours.  Thus, the banning of homosexuality was not only motivated by Casaterran moralities and then-accepted medical theories, but also by the Admiralty's desire to protect marines against abuse.  The Admiralty had proposed a total ban on homosexual intercourse in 1870, but Truk refused to propose the same for the Marines.   


Homosexual intercourse in Themiclesia historically implied active and passive roles, which is not necessarily reflected in intercourse, but courting.  The legal immunity of crew members and naval routines meant marines often had no recourse to prevent unwanted advances, especially when sexual assault may have multiple perpetrators or accessories.  After the fact, most chose to stay silent for fear of stigmatization.  Thus, while the law forbade a judge from having sex, or even proposing it, with a litigant, for fear of abuse of power, it did not account for the implicit power of a sailor on a ship at sea.  Instead, Themiclesian law regarded both sailors and marines as commoners, without a difference in power.  This situation has since been corrected, where the ability to coerce is assessed empirically rather than legally.   
Homosexual intercourse in Themiclesia historically implied active and passive roles, which is not necessarily reflected in intercourse, but courting.  The legal immunity of crew members and naval routines meant marines often had no recourse to prevent unwanted advances, especially when sexual assault may have multiple perpetrators or accessories.  After the fact, most chose to stay silent for fear of stigmatization.  Thus, while the law forbade a judge from having sex, or even proposing it, with a litigant, for fear of abuse of power, it did not account for the implicit power of a sailor on a ship at sea.  Instead, Themiclesian law regarded both sailors and marines as commoners, without a difference in power.  This situation has since been corrected, where the ability to coerce is assessed empirically rather than legally.  }}


===Death===
===Death===
Trjuk died in 1881, aged 68, to {{wp|typhoid}} fever.
Truk died in 1881, aged 68, to {{wp|typhoid}} fever.  As a member of the peerage who died during public service, he lay in state at the [[Court Hall (Themiclesia)|Court Hall]] in [[Kien-k'ang]], between May and June 1881.  He was unmarried and childless, so his cousin led the hearse from the capital city back to his estate in Tubh, where he was interred.  The Inner Administrator and the Magistrate of Tubh were both in attendance at his funeral.


==Scandal==
==Scandal==
===Theatre incident===
On Jun. 2, 1873, Trjuk was at the Oriental Opera when two marines came in with a message, waving at him from the balcony.  Trjuk was too embarrassed to acknowledge them, since they were standing in front of the audience.  One ran down the staircase but fell, dying on the spot.  The performance stopped, and lights were brought in.  The public noticed that Trjuk was in the theatre and called on him to do something.  Trjuk opined that nobody else fell to their deaths on that staircase, so it was the marine's own fault for falling and dying.  While Trjuk later petitioned Parliament to pay for his funeral at public expense, he also invoiced the marine's family to replace the expensive imported rug at the theatre and to refund the shocked audience that night.  This came to a considerable amount that his family could ill-afford.  When criticized for his unsympathetic handling of the incident, he said he was merely implementing "Liberal policy".
===Snubbing the Master-general===
===Snubbing the Master-general===
Trjuk personally hated the Master-general of the Ordnance.  On Christmas 1877, he invited the Master-general to "his house" for a dinner party, which he held at his quayside house in the New District.  Not knowing that Trjuk had a quayside house, the Master-general took a present to his house on address, which was empty.  Feeling snubbed, he tossed the present over the garden walls and left.  Next month at the Admiralty's graden party, Trjuk made it known that the Master-general had missed his dinner and provoked the latter's indignant response.  However, the officers around Trjuk all said that the dinner did occur.  Trjuk then asked where exactly the Master-general visited, and to the response a great laughter broke out on the grounds that the Master-general did not know that "fasionable people" had moved the social scene to the New District in 1871.  The Master-general stormed out of the party and sued Trjuk for wasting his money on the present, which he conceded on condition that the Master-general would repeat in open court why he had lost the present.
Truk personally hated the Master-general of the Ordnance.  On Christmas 1868, he invited the Master-general to "his house" for a dinner party, which he held at his quayside house in the New District.  Not knowing that Truk had a quayside house, the Master-general took a present to his house on address, which was empty.  Feeling snubbed, he tossed the present over the garden walls and left.  Next month at the Admiralty's graden party, Truk made it known that the Master-general had missed his dinner and provoked the latter's indignant response.  However, the officers around Truk all said that the dinner did occur.  Truk then asked where exactly the Master-general visited, and to the response a great laughter broke out on the grounds that the Master-general did not know that "fasionable people" had moved the social scene to the New District in 1871.  The Master-general stormed out of the party and sued Truk for wasting his money on the present, which he conceded on condition that the Master-general would repeat in open court why he had lost the present.


==Commemoration==
==Commemoration==
For his achievements in mathematics, he was posthumously inducted into the Order of Authors in 1905.   
For his achievements in mathematics, he was posthumously inducted into the Order of Authors in 1905.   


In 1925, 44 years after his death, the Marine Corps paid for a statue of him at the Naval Academy.  The ''Personal Images Act'', abolished that year, prohibited the depiction of peers and gentlemen without their permission, or that of their next of kin after their deaths.  His elder brother's son forbade his depiction in uniform that the Marine Corps wanted, since Trjuk himself refused to be in Marines' uniforms, which he claimed was "unfashionable"The abolition of the act allowed the Marines to make a statue of him in uniform; however, because his shape was not in living memory, the statue's body is actually modelled by the sculptor's neighbour.
In 1975, 94 years after his death, the Marine Corps paid for a life-sized statue of him at the Naval Academy, part of a set of three also containing Lord Nya (Captain-general 1907 – 10) and Col. Sam-mri Per (Captain-general 1915 – 16)Because nobody alive remembered M′reng's physical shape, there not being reliable figures about his height and weight, the statue's body was modelled from Col. Martin Bik, the Captain-general in 1975, leading to the quip that Bik had paid the Marines' money mostly for three statues of himselfThis argument is strengthened by the fact that Bik's pervious proposal to make life-sized statues of all Captains-general, including himself, was rejected by the [[Ministry of Defence (Themiclesia)|Ministry of Defence]] in 1974 as "idiotic".


As the very first doctor of mathematics from that institution, the Mathematics Department of the [[Army Academy (Themiclesia)|Army Academy]] annually presents a box of chalk at the foot of his statue, which is promptly removed by the Marines.
==Titles and honours==
*His peerage, the Baronetcy of M′reng, was granted in 1865 for prolonged public service, at the recommendation of the [[Lord of Nja-'rjum|Baron of Na-qrum]], [[Prime Minister of Themiclesia|prime minister]] at that time.  It reverted to the Crown upon his death in 1880.
*He was made a supernumerary Captain of the Gentlemen of the Household in 1873.


==Quotes==
==Quotes==

Latest revision as of 03:54, 7 January 2022

The Honourable Lord M′reng, Dr.

Truk Krin-mak

MP, MtD, OA
Native name
內史筑 顭君柬寞
Nickname(s)Srin (潸)
Born(1812-12-30)December 30, 1812
DiedMay 2, 1881(1881-05-02) (aged 68)
Kien-k'ang, Themiclesia
Buried
c. 3 km south of Tubh Railway Station, Tubh County, Inner Region
AllegianceThemiclesia
Service/branchMilitia of Mhje′ and Marines
Years of service1855 – 1858, 1863 – 1881
RankColonel-in-Chief (1855 – 1858)
Colonel (1863 – 1870)
Colonel-general (1870 – 1881)
Commands held2nd Regiment of Marines
Captain-general of Marines
Battles/warsBattle of Liang-la
AwardsOrder of Authors (posthumously, 1901)
Doctor of Mathematics

The Hon. Dr. Truk Krin-mak, Lord M′reng MP, MtD, OA (Shinasthana: 筑柬寞, rf Truk Krin-maqs; Dec. 30, 1812 – May 2, 1881) was a Themiclesian mathematician, politician, civil servant, and military officer. He was born the second son of the Lord of Nrak in 1812 in the Inner Region and was a member of parliament between 1847 and 1854 in Tubh, for the Conservative Party. After entering the administration, he feuded with the Liberals over budget and was dismissed in 1858. He became a doctor of mathematics in 1863 for his work on discrete calculus.

In the 1860s, he became a colonel in the Marines, and thereas he surrendered to the Camians in the Battle of Liang-la but ultimately escaped disgrace. In 1867, he joined the Na-qrum Ministry as Captain-general of Marines, resigning that office in 1869 along with the Ministry but retaining his colonelcy. He left the military in 1874 for the publishing industry. In 1878, the Lord of M'i appointed him as Master-general of the Ordnance and promoted him as Secretary to the Board of Trade in 1879. He died in 1880 under a severe case of Pneumonia, that winter having been one of the coldest in the century.

Academic work

Truk returned to the University of the Pond in 1860 to continue work on discrete calculus. He became a doctor of mathematics from that institution in 1863. He was the second Themiclesian to possess a doctorate in mathematics; not more than ten individuals received this distinction in the 19th century. In 1865, while on military commission, Truk arranged for broad publication for his monograph Insular Calculus (mocking his isolation on Liang), which was a success amongst academics in the 1860s and 70s.

Military career

Having tried and failed to secure a lecturing tour, he appealed in 1865 to the Baron of Na-qrum, prime minister and leader of the Conservative party, for office. Lord of Krungs, there a leading figure, interfered with the appointment. Eventually, Krungs told Conservative magnates he planned to "get rid of him" (from the social scene in Kien-k'ang) by offering him a commission as colonel of the Lower Naval Engineers, a Marines unit stationed on the Isle of Liang. The island was four days from the Themiclesan coast by steamboat.

M′reng desired an office urgently, but he detested the idea of being on Liang, which the Camians threatened to take by force. He appeared before other prominent Conservatives and lobbied their support for a seat in the House of Commons. As the emerging Conservative leader, the Lord of M'i, wanted to reform the party to place more emphasis on integrity and public spirit, he was not offered a different position. After taking the commission, he lingered in Kien-k'ang, unwilling to travel to the island, for several months. The Liberals found out about his reluctance to travel to his post and pressured the Government to order him to set sail in January 1866.

On his first day on the island, he made a serious blunder by accidentally discharging a pistol, killing one of his subordinates. The government sent a government attorney to investigate the homicide, and Truk was acquitted only with the intercession of the Barons of the Admiralty. In 1865, he was named Lord M′reng (顭君) for being in public service for 20 years. ′Eng, a Liberal MP, snidely asked if he knew what a gun was, and he replied, "I am glad to say I have never seen a gun before. It is obvious our social spheres have been widely different." Asked what he did during the day, he said he wrote letters and invited himself to meals, because there was nobody to talk to. The MP also discovered a large pile of letters from the Admiralty in a basket for firewood.

In 1867, the Camians invaded the island in the Battle of Liang-la and blockaded the Bay of Themiclesia. M′reng, without orders to resist, surrendered the island to the Camian forces on the island so quickly as to take them by surprise. While many officers considered his behaviour unbecoming, he was priased by the Conservatives for his sensibility. Nevertheless, the surrender caused a great dip in the trading value of the Marines' commissions, which garnered him the animosity of most other Marines' officers, whose commissions lost as much as 50% of "float", or the market value of the commission above its face or statutory value.

For his rapid surrender, the Liberals demanded he should lose his commission without compensation, but he was rescued by the Government majority in the upper house. In Nov. 1867, the incumbent Captain-general of Marines accepted a tenure at the City University, creating a vacancy that Na-qrum (for an unclear reason) filled by calling M′reng to the Ministry. Na-qrum's appointment utterly shocked the Liberal opposition, which could not approve the appointment of an officer "so unbecoming and uncaring" to high office. M′reng felt so indebted to Na-qrum that he financed his own by-election, but unexpectedly, the electorate, turned out by the local Liberal party, rejected him at the polls.

The Liberal leader, the Lord of Sng′ra′, apologized for the discourtesy of blocking a ministerial by-election but nevertheless expressed distain for the blatantly-political appointment. Other Liberal parliamentarians pointed out that, out of the five colonels then in the Marines, only M′reng was a Conservative. M′reng stood again and was elected without incident in Mik, which was in pocket of the Baron of Treks. As was customary at that time, active military officers called to the Ministry were required to stand in a by-election but did not actually take their seats in the House; this ensured that only the most well-connected and financially secure officers could secure high appointments.

However, M′reng's tenure was cut short by the general election of Mar. 1869, which saw the Liberal Party restored to power with a tremendous majority. He resigned the captaincy-general with Na-qrum's ministry. Coincidentally, his replacement Lord Kram also lost his by-election and had to stand in a safe seat, at great expense. While it has been the Liberal Party's overarching goal to establish a professional military leadership, this goal was shelved during Sng′ra′s second premiership as it focused on assisting the economy deal with the influx of agricultural products resulting from the elimination of tariffs. M'reng remained as his regiment's colonel. Lord Kram was reportedly on friendly terms with M'reng, but the two could not agree on the need to teach arithmetic skills to ordinary naval servicepeople: Kram believed that M'reng was labouring under a serious misapprehension about the applicability of basic arithmetic to the quotidian duties of the service.

In 1874, M'reng sold his colonelcy to Dr. Tsit, a doctor of medicine, practitioner, and writer of great fame, for the healthy sum of $10,000, yet Tsit continued to write letters almost every day to M'reng asking for advice over all part of the colonel's duties. M'reng thus complained to his friend, Lord Bram, that he was still effectively running the regiment despite not receiving any of its benefits. This complaint somehow made it to Dr. Tsit, who humourously included $0.20—a day's wage of an enlisted man of the regiment—in every letter he sent to M'reng. He adjusted his remuneration to $0.24 per letter ($0.01 for the return stamp) after Parliament increased the regiment's wages to $0.23 in March 1875: M'reng's annual income was about $40,000 in this period.

In 1878, however, M'reng was back in the fold of public service having secured a seat in the electorate of Kyim and appointed as Master-general of the Ordnance by the Conservative premier, Lord of M'i. As the M'i Ministry (for some reason) did not include a separate Captain-general of Marines, M'reng's portfolio extended to the units of the marine corps, ironically placing Dr. Tsit under him. M'reng famously remarked that he was "now in a position to make the jokes about Dr. Tsit", though he was dismayed to find out that his now-subordinated colonel had moved to Anglia permanently in 1877 and declined to sell the commission. In June 1878, M'reng was given the additional office of Receiver-in-Chief of the Exchequer of the East Territories (東國內大史). In October 1878, M'reng was promoted again as the Secretary to the Board of Trade, whereupon the position of Master-general of the Ordnance was given the young Lord Lu-kas.

Board of Trade

Personal life

Sexuality

Truk was an open homosexual throughout his public life. While he was against lurid language in public, believing it to be indecent, he fought with Admiral Trat over homosexual intercourse on ships, which the Admiralty was desirous to prevent in the 1870s. He said the prohibition of sex between naval personnel was "unfounded and Liberal". However, recent scholarship suggests Truk was not "a shining beacon of traditional morality in an age when Casaterran homophobia was gaining acceptance in Themiclesia", like some previous authors have argued.

Homosexuality had been pathologized by Casaterran medical scholars, sometimes ascribed with moralistic overtones as degeneracy. As Themiclesian law prohibited interference with a crew member on duty, sailors enjoyed an enormous advantage avoiding allegations of minor misbehaviour, and a frequent one was sexual abuse of marines. Under contemporary law, males cannot be victims of rape, which is viewed as a crime against the family; instance of male-on-male rape were prosecuted as misdemeanours. Thus, the banning of homosexuality was not only motivated by Casaterran moralities and then-accepted medical theories, but also by the Admiralty's desire to protect marines against abuse. The Admiralty had proposed a total ban on homosexual intercourse in 1870, but Truk refused to propose the same for the Marines.

Homosexual intercourse in Themiclesia historically implied active and passive roles, which is not necessarily reflected in intercourse, but courting. The legal immunity of crew members and naval routines meant marines often had no recourse to prevent unwanted advances, especially when sexual assault may have multiple perpetrators or accessories. After the fact, most chose to stay silent for fear of stigmatization. Thus, while the law forbade a judge from having sex, or even proposing it, with a litigant, for fear of abuse of power, it did not account for the implicit power of a sailor on a ship at sea. Instead, Themiclesian law regarded both sailors and marines as commoners, without a difference in power. This situation has since been corrected, where the ability to coerce is assessed empirically rather than legally.

Death

Truk died in 1881, aged 68, to typhoid fever. As a member of the peerage who died during public service, he lay in state at the Court Hall in Kien-k'ang, between May and June 1881. He was unmarried and childless, so his cousin led the hearse from the capital city back to his estate in Tubh, where he was interred. The Inner Administrator and the Magistrate of Tubh were both in attendance at his funeral.

Scandal

Snubbing the Master-general

Truk personally hated the Master-general of the Ordnance. On Christmas 1868, he invited the Master-general to "his house" for a dinner party, which he held at his quayside house in the New District. Not knowing that Truk had a quayside house, the Master-general took a present to his house on address, which was empty. Feeling snubbed, he tossed the present over the garden walls and left. Next month at the Admiralty's graden party, Truk made it known that the Master-general had missed his dinner and provoked the latter's indignant response. However, the officers around Truk all said that the dinner did occur. Truk then asked where exactly the Master-general visited, and to the response a great laughter broke out on the grounds that the Master-general did not know that "fasionable people" had moved the social scene to the New District in 1871. The Master-general stormed out of the party and sued Truk for wasting his money on the present, which he conceded on condition that the Master-general would repeat in open court why he had lost the present.

Commemoration

For his achievements in mathematics, he was posthumously inducted into the Order of Authors in 1905.

In 1975, 94 years after his death, the Marine Corps paid for a life-sized statue of him at the Naval Academy, part of a set of three also containing Lord Nya (Captain-general 1907 – 10) and Col. Sam-mri Per (Captain-general 1915 – 16). Because nobody alive remembered M′reng's physical shape, there not being reliable figures about his height and weight, the statue's body was modelled from Col. Martin Bik, the Captain-general in 1975, leading to the quip that Bik had paid the Marines' money mostly for three statues of himself. This argument is strengthened by the fact that Bik's pervious proposal to make life-sized statues of all Captains-general, including himself, was rejected by the Ministry of Defence in 1974 as "idiotic".

Titles and honours

  • His peerage, the Baronetcy of M′reng, was granted in 1865 for prolonged public service, at the recommendation of the Baron of Na-qrum, prime minister at that time. It reverted to the Crown upon his death in 1880.
  • He was made a supernumerary Captain of the Gentlemen of the Household in 1873.

Quotes

  • "Sir, you stench of verdigris." — to the Liberal prime minister in 1851. Themiclesian coins were bronze, and to "stench of verdigris" was to evoke the image of money, especially ill-gotten.
  • "Mhje′ Prefecture is made more noble by the absence of a great amount of Liberals in its bosom, and its nonsensical expositions about equality in its mouth."

See also