bell notificationshomepageloginedit profileclubsdmBox

Read Ebook: Encyclopaedia Britannica 11th Edition Anjar to Apollo Volume 2 Slice 2 by Various

More about this book

Font size:

Background color:

Text color:

Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page

Ebook has 408 lines and 190216 words, and 9 pages

Transcriber's notes:

Characters following a carat were printed in superscript.

Side-notes were relocated to function as titles of their respective paragraphs.

Macrons and breves above letters and dots below letters were not inserted.

ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA

A DICTIONARY OF ARTS, SCIENCES, LITERATURE AND GENERAL INFORMATION

ELEVENTH EDITION

VOLUME II, SLICE II

Anjar to Apollo

ARTICLES IN THIS SLICE:

ANJAR, a fortified town of India, and the capital of a district of the same name in the native state of Cutch, in the presidency of Bombay. The country is dry and sandy, and entirely depends on well irrigation for its water supply. The town is situated nearly 10 miles from the Gulf of Cutch. It suffered severely from an earthquake in 1819, which destroyed a large number of houses, and occasioned the loss of several lives. In 1901 the population was 18,014. The town and district of Anjar were both ceded to the British in 1816, but in 1822 they were again transferred to the Cutch government in consideration of an annual money payment. Subsequently it was discovered that this obligation pressed heavily upon the resources of the native state, and in 1832 the pecuniary equivalent for Anjar, both prospectively and inclusive of the arrears which had accrued to that date, was wholly remitted by the British government.

From the outset of the reign of Charles the Bald, the integrity of Anjou was seriously menaced by a two-fold danger: from Brittany and from Normandy. Lambert, a former count of Nantes, after devastating Anjou in concert with Nomino?, duke of Brittany, had by the end of the year 851 succeeded in occupying all the western part as far as the Mayenne. The principality, which he thus carved out for himself, was occupied, on his death, by Erispo?, duke of Brittany; by him it was handed down to his successors, in whose hands it remained till the beginning of the 10th century. All this time the Normans had not ceased ravaging the country; a brave man was needed to defend it, and finally towards 861, Charles the Bald entrusted it to Robert the Strong , but he unfortunately met with his death in 866 in a battle against the Normans at Brissarthe. Hugh the Abbot succeeded him in the countship of Anjou as in most of his other duties, and on his death it passed to Odo , the eldest son of Robert the Strong, who, on his accession to the throne of France , probably handed it over to his brother Robert. In any case, during the last years of the 9th century, in Anjou as elsewhere the power was delegated to a viscount, Fulk the Red , son of a certain Ingelgerius.

All the while that Fulk the Young and Geoffrey the Handsome were carrying on the work of extending the countship of Anjou, they did not neglect to strengthen their authority at home, to which the unruliness of the barons was a menace. As regards Fulk the Young we know only a few isolated facts and dates: about 1109 Dou? and L'?le Bouchard were taken; in 1112 Brissac was besieged, and about the same time Eschivard of Preuilly subdued; in 1114 there was a general war against the barons who were in revolt, and in 1118 a fresh rising, which was put down after the siege of Montbazon: in 1123 the lord of Dou? revolted, and in 1124 Montreuil-Bellay was taken after a siege of nine weeks. Geoffrey the Handsome, with his indefatigable energy, was eminently fitted to suppress the coalitions of his vassals, the most formidable of which was formed in 1129. Among those who revolted were Guy of Laval, Giraud of Montreuil-Bellay, the viscount of Thouars, the lords of Mirebeau, Amboise, Partbenay and Sabl?. Geoffrey succeeded in beating them one after another, razed the keep of Thouars and occupied Mirebeau. Another rising was crushed in 1134 by the destruction of Cand and the taking of L'?le Bouchard. In 1136, while the count was in Normandy, Robert of Sable put himself at the head of the movement, to which Geoffrey responded by destroying Briollay and occupying La Suze, and Robert of Sable himself was forced to beg humbly for pardon through the intercession of the bishop of Angers. In 1139 Geoffrey took Mirebeau, and in 1142 Champtoceaux, but in 1145 a new revolt broke out, this time under the leadership of Elias, the count's own brother, who, again with the assistance of Robert of Sable, laid claim to the countship of Maine. Geoffrey took Elias prisoner, forced Robert of Sable to beat a retreat, and reduced the other barons to reason. In 1147 he destroyed Doue and Blaison. Finally in 1150 he was checked by the revolt of Giraud, lord of Montreuil-Bellay: for a year he besieged the place till it had to surrender: he then took Giraud prisoner and only released him on the mediation of the king of France.

Thus, on the death of Geoffrey the Handsome , his son Henry found himself heir to a great empire, strong and consolidated, to which his marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine further added Aquitaine.

ANKERITE, a member of the mineral group of rhombohedral carbonates. In composition it is closely related to dolomite, but differs from this in having magnesia replaced by varying amounts of ferrous and manganous oxides, the general formula being Ca2. Normal ankerite is Ca2MgFe4. The crystallographic and physical characters resemble those of dolomite and chalybite. The angle between the perfect rhombohedral cleavages is 73? 48', the hardness 3 1/2 to 4, and the specific gravity 2.9 to 3.1; but these will vary slightly with the chemical composition. The colour is white, grey or reddish.

Ankerite occurs with chalybite in deposits of iron-ore. It is one of the minerals of the dolomite-chalybite series, to which the terms brown-spar, pearl-spar and bitter-spar are loosely applied. It was first recognized as a distinct species by W. von Haidinger in 1825, and named by him after M.J. Anker of Styria.

ANKLAM, or ANCLAM, a town of Germany in the Prussian province of Pomerania, on the Peene, 5 m. from its mouth in the Kleines Haff, and 53 m. N.W. of Stettin, by the railway to Stralsund. Pop. 14,602. The fortifications of Anklam were dismantled in 1762 and have not since been restored, although the old walls are still standing; formerly, however, it was a town of considerable military importance, which suffered severely during the Thirty Years' and the Seven Years' Wars; and this fact, together with the repeated ravages of fire and of the plague, has made its history more eventful than is usually the case with towns of the same size. It does not possess any remarkable buildings, although it contains several, private as well as public, that are of a quaint and picturesque style of architecture. The church of St Mary has a modern tower, 335 ft. high. The industries consist of iron-foundries and factories for sugar and soap; and there is a military school. The Peene is navigable up to the town, which has a considerable trade in its own manufactures, as well as in the produce of the surrounding country, while some shipbuilding is carried on in wharves on the river.

ANKLE, or ANCLE , the joint which connects the foot with the leg .

ANNA, BALDASARRE, a painter who flourished during part of the 16th and 17th centuries. He was born at Venice, probably about 1560, and is said to have been of Flemish descent. The date of his death is uncertain, but he seems to have been alive in 1639. For a number of years he studied under Leonardo Corona, and on the death of that painter completed several works left unfinished by him. His own activity seems to have been confined to the production of pieces for several of the churches and a few private houses in Venice, and the old guide-books and descriptions of the city notice a considerable number of paintings by him. Scarcely any of these, however, have survived.

ANNA , an Indian penny, the sixteenth part of a rupee. The term belongs to the Mahommedan monetary system . There is no coin of one anna, but there are half-annas of copper and two-anna pieces of silver. The term anna is frequently used to express a fraction. Thus an Anglo-Indian speaks of two annas of dark blood , a four-anna crop, an eight-anna gallop.

ANNABERG, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Saxony, in the Erzgebirge, 1894 ft. above the sea, 6 m. from the Bohemian frontier, 18 1/2 m. S. by E. from Chemnitz by rail. Pop. 16,811. It has three Evangelical churches, among them that of St Anne, built 1499-1525, a Roman Catholic church, several public monuments, among them those of Luther, of the famous arithmetician Adam Riese, and of Barbara Uttmann. Annaberg, together with the neighbouring suburb, Buchholz, is the chief seat of the braid and lace-making industry in Germany, introduced here by Barbara Uttmann in 1561, and further developed by Belgian refugees, who, driven from their country by the duke of Alva, settled here in 1590. The mining industry, for which the town was formerly also famous and which embraced tin, silver and cobalt, has now ceased. Annaberg has technical schools for lace-making, commerce and agriculture, in addition to high grade public schools for boys and girls.

ANNABERGITE, a mineral consisting of a hydrous nickel arsenate, Ni32 + 8H2O, crystallizing in the monoclinic system and isomorphous with vivianite and erythrite. Crystals are minute and capillary and rarely met with, the mineral occurring usually as soft earthy masses and encrustations. A fine apple-green colour is its characteristic feature. It was long known under the name nickel-ochre; the name annabergite was proposed by H.J. Brooke and W.H. Miller in 1852, from Annaberg in Saxony, one of the localities of the mineral. It occurs with ores of nickel, of which it is a product of alteration. A variety, from Creetown in Kirkcudbrightshire, in which a portion of the nickel is replaced by calcium, has been called dudgeonite, after P. Dudgeon, who found it.

ANNA LEOPOLDOVNA, sometimes called ANNA CARLOVNA , regent of Russia for a few months during the minority of her son Ivan, was the daughter of Catherine, sister of the empress Anne, and Charles Leopold, duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. In 1739 she married Anton Ulrich , son of Ferdinand Albert, duke of Brunswick, and their son Ivan was adopted in 1740 by the empress and proclaimed heir to the Russian throne. A few days after this proclamation the empress died, leaving directions regarding the succession, and appointing her favourite Ernest Biren, duke of Courland, as regent. Biren, however, had made himself an object of detestation to the Russian people, and Anna had little difficulty in overthrowing his power. She then assumed the regency, and took the title of grand-duchess, but she knew little of the character of the people with whom she had to deal, was utterly ignorant of the approved Russian mode of government, and speedily quarrelled with her principal supporters. In December 1741, Elizabeth, daughter of Peter the Great, who, from her habits, was a favourite with the soldiers, excited the guards to revolt, overcame the slight opposition that was offered, and was proclaimed empress. Ivan was thrown into prison, where he soon afterwards perished. Anna and her husband were banished to a small island in the river Dvina, where on the 18th of March 1746 she died in childbed.

FOOTNOTE:

He is not to be confused with L. Cincius, the author of various political and antiquarian treatises , who lived in the Augustan age, to which period Mommsen, considering them a later fabrication, refers the Greek annals of L. Cincius Alimentus.

ANNAM, or ANAM, a country of south-eastern Asia, now forming a French protectorate, part of the peninsula of Indo-China. . It is bounded N. by Tongking, E. and S.E. by the China Sea, S.W. by Cochin-China, and W. by Cambodia and Laos. It comprises a sinuous strip of territory measuring between 750 and 800 m. in length, with an approximate area of 52,000 sq. m. The population is estimated at about 6,124,000.

The country consists chiefly of a range of plateaus and wooded mountains, running north and south and declining on the coast to a narrow band of plain varying between 12 and 50 m. in breadth. The mountains are cut transversely by short narrow valleys, through which run rivers, most of which are dry in summer and torrential in winter. The Song-Ma and the Song-Ca in the north, and the Song-Ba, Don-Nai and Se-Bang-Khan in the south, are alone of any size. The chief harbour is that afforded by the bay of Tourane at the centre of the coast-line. South of this point the coast curves outwards and is broken by peninsulas and indentations; to the north it is concave and bordered in many places by dunes and lagoons.

The Annamese is the worst-built and ugliest of all the Indo-Chinese who belong to the Mongolian race. He is scarcely of middle height and is shorter and less vigorous than his neighbours. His complexion is tawny, darker than that of the Chinese, but clearer than that of the Cambodian; his hair is black, coarse and long; his skin is thick; his forehead low; his skull slightly depressed at the top, but well developed at the sides. His face is flat, with highly protruding cheek-bones, and is lozenge-shaped or eurygnathous to a degree that is nowhere exceeded. His nose is not only the flattest, but also the smallest among the Indo-Chinese; his eyes are rarely oblique; his mouth is large and his lips thick; his teeth are blackened and his gums destroyed by the constant use of the betel-nut, the areca-nut and lime. His neck is short, his shoulders slope greatly, his body is thick-set and wanting in suppleness. Another peculiarity is a separation of the big toe from the rest, greater than is found in any other people, and sufficiently general and well marked to serve as an ethnographic test. The Annamese of Cochin-China are weaker and smaller than those of Tongking, probably as a result of living amid marshy rice-fields. The Annamese of both sexes wear wide trousers, a long, usually black tunic with narrow sleeves and a dark-coloured turban, or in the case of the lower classes, a wide straw hat; they either go bare-foot or wear sandals or Chinese boots. The typical Annamese dwelling is open to the gaze of the passer-by during the day; at night a sort of partition of bamboo is let down. The roof is supported on wooden pillars and walls are provided only at the sides. The house consists principally of one large room opening on the front verandah and containing the altar of the family's ancestors, a table in the centre and couches placed against the wall. The chief elements of the native diet are rice, fish and poultry; vegetables and pork are also eaten. The family is the base of the social system in Annam and is ruled by its head, who is also priest and judge. Polygamy is permitted but rarely practised, and the wife enjoys a position of some freedom.

Though fond of ease the Annamese are more industrious than the neighbouring peoples. Theatrical and musical entertainments are popular among them. They show much outward respect for superiors and parents, but they are insincere and incapable of deep emotion. They cherish great love of their native soil and native village and cannot remain long from home. A proneness to gambling and opium-smoking, and a tinge of vanity and deceitfulness, are their less estimable traits. On the whole they are mild and easy-going and even apathetic, but the facility with which they learn is remarkable. Like their neighbours the Cambodians and the Chinese, the Annamese have a great respect for the dead, and ancestor worship constitutes the national religion. The learned hold the doctrine of Confucius, and Buddhism, alloyed with much popular superstition, has some influence. Like the Chinese the Annamese bury their dead.

Silk spinning and weaving are carried on on antiquated lines, and silkworms are reared in a desultory fashion. Besides rice, the products of the country include tea, tobacco, cotton, cinnamon, precious woods and rubber; coffee, pepper, sugar-canes and jute are cultivated to a minor extent. The exports comprise tea, raw silk and small quantities of cotton, rice and sugar-cane. The imports include rice, iron goods, flour, wine, opium and cotton goods. There are coal-mines at Nong-Son, near Tourane, and gold, silver, lead, iron and other metals occur in the mountains. Trade, which is in the hands of the Chinese, is for the most part carried on by sea, the chief ports being Tourane and Qui-Nhon, which are open to European commerce.

The following table summarizes the local budget of Annam for the years 1899 and 1904:--

In 1904 the sum allocated to the expenses of the court, the royal family and the native administration, the members of which are paid by the crown, was ?85,000, the chief remaining heads of expenditure being the government house and residencies , the native guard and public works .

The chief towns of Annam are Hu? , seat both of the French and native governments, Tourane , Phan-Thiet in the extreme south, Qui-Nhon, and Fai-Fo, a commercial centre to the south of Tourane. A road following the coast from Cochin-China to Tongking, and known as the "Mandarin road," passes through or near the chief towns of the provinces and forms the chief artery of communication in the country apart from the railways .

ANNAN, a royal, municipal and police burgh of Dumfriesshire, Scotland, on the Annan, nearly 2 m. from its mouth, 15 m. from Dumfries by the Glasgow & South-Western railway. It has a station also on the Caledonian railway company's branch line from Kirtlebridge to Brayton , which crosses the Solway Firth at Seafield by a viaduct, 1-1/3 m. long, constructed of iron pillars girded together by poles, driven through the sand and gravel into the underlying bed of sandstone. Annan is a well-built town, red sandstone being the material mainly used. Among its public buildings is the excellent academy of which Thomas Carlyle was a pupil. The river Annan is crossed by a stone bridge of three arches dating from 1824, and by a railway bridge. The Harbour Trust, constituted in 1897, improved the shipping accommodation, and vessels of 300 tons approach close to the town. The principal industries include cotton and rope manufactures, bacon-curing, distilling, tanning, shipbuilding, sandstone quarrying, nursery-gardening and salmon-fishing. Large marine engineering works are in the vicinity. Annan is a burgh of considerable antiquity. Roman remains exist in the neighbourhood, and the Bruces, lords of Annandale, the Baliols, and the Douglases were more or less closely associated with it. During the period of the Border lawlessness the inhabitants suffered repeatedly at the hands of moss-troopers and through the feuds of rival families, in addition to the losses caused by the English and Scots wars. Edward Irving was a native of the town. With Dumfries, Kirkcudbright, Lochmaben and Sanquhar, Annan unites in sending one meniber to parliament. Annan Hill commands a beautiful prospect. Population 5805.

ANNAPOLIS, a city and seaport of Maryland, U.S.A., the capital of the state, the county seat of Anne Arundel county, and the seat of the United States Naval Academy; situated on the Severn river about 2 m. from its entrance into Chesapeake Bay, 26 m. S. by E. from Baltimore and about the same distance E. by N. from Washington. Pop. 7604; 8525, of whom 3002 were negroes; 8609. Annapolis is served by the Washington, Baltimore & Annapolis and the Maryland Electric railways, and by the Baltimore & Annapolis steamship line. On an elevation near the centre of the city stands the state house , with its lofty white dome and pillared portico. Close by are the state treasury building, erected late in the 17th century for the House of Delegates; Saint Anne's Protestant Episcopal church, in later colonial days a state church, a statue of Roger B. Taney , and a statue of Baron Johann de Kalb. There are a number of residences of 18th century architecture, and the names of several of the streets--such as King George's, Prince George's, Hanover, and Duke of Gloucester--recall the colonial days. The United States Naval Academy was founded here in 1845. Annapolis is the seat of Saint John's College, a non-sectarian institution supported in part by the state; it was opened in 1789 as the successor of King William's School, which was founded by an act of the Maryland legislature in 1696 and was opened in 1701. Its principal building, McDowell Hall, was originally intended for a governor's mansion; although ?4000 current money was appropriated for its erection in 1742, it was not completed until after the War of Independence. In 1907 the college became the school of arts and sciences of the university of Maryland.

ANNAPOLIS, a town of Nova Scotia, capital of Annapolis county and up to 1750 of the entire peninsula of Nova Scotia; situated on an arm of the Bay of Fundy, at the mouth of the Annapolis river, 95 m. W. of Halifax; and the terminus of the Windsor & Annapolis railway. Pop. 1019. It is one of the oldest settlements in North America, having been founded in 1604 by the French, who called it Port Royal. It was captured by the British in 1710, and ceded to them by the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, when the name was changed in honour of Queen Anne. It possesses a good harbour, and the beauty of the surrounding country makes it a favourite summer resort. The town is surrounded by apple orchards and in May miles of blossoming trees make a beautiful sight. The fruit, which is excellent in quality, is the principal export of the region.

ANN ARBOR, a city and the county-seat of Washtenaw county, Michigan, U.S.A., on the Huron river, about 38 m. W. of Detroit. Pop. 9431; 14,509, of whom 2329 were foreign-born; 14,817. It is served by the Michigan Central and the Ann Arbor railways, and by an electric line running from Detroit to Jackson and connecting with various other lines. Ann Arbor is best known as the seat of the university of Michigan, opened in 1837. The city has many attractive residences, and the residential districts, especially in the east and south-east parts of the city, command picturesque views of the Huron valley. Ann Arbor is situated in a productive agricultural and fruit-growing region. The river provides good water-power, and among the manufactures are agricultural implements, carriages, furniture , pianos and organs, pottery and flour. In 1824 Ann Arbor was settled, laid out as a town, chosen for the county-seat, and named in honour of Mrs Ann Allen and Mrs Ann Rumsey, the wives of two of the founders. It was incorporated as a village in 1833, and was first chartered as a city in 1851.

FOOTNOTES:

On the 6th of February 1685 James became king of England. In 1687 a project of settling the crown on the princess, to the exclusion of Mary, on the condition of Anne's embracing Roman Catholicism, was rendered futile by her pronounced attachment to the Church of England, and beyond sending her books and papers James appears to have made no attempt to coerce his daughter into a change of faith, and to have treated her with kindness, while the birth of his son on the 20th of June 1688 made the religion of his daughters a matter of less political importance. Anne was not present on the occasion, having gone to Bath, and this gave rise to a belief that the child was spurious; but it is most probable that James's desire to exclude all Protestants from affairs of state was the real cause. "I shall never now be satisfied," Anne wrote to Mary, "whether the child be true or false. It may be it is our brother, but God only knows ... one cannot help having a thousand fears and melancholy thoughts, but whatever changes may happen you shall ever find me firm to my religion and faithfully yours." In later years, however, she had no doubt that the Old Pretender was her brother. During the events immediately preceding the Revolution Anne kept in seclusion. Her ultimate conduct was probably influenced by the Churchills; and though forbidden by James, to pay Mary a projected visit in the spring of 1688, she corresponded with her, and was no doubt aware of William's plans. Her position was now a very critical and painful one. She refused to show any sympathy with the king after William had landed in November, and wrote, with the advice of the Churchills, to the prince, declaring her approval of his action. Churchill abandoned the king on the 24th, Prince George on the 25th, and when James returned to London on the 26th he found that Anne and her lady-in-waiting had during the previous night followed their husbands' examples. Escaping from Whitehall by a back staircase they put themselves under the care of the bishop of London, spent one night in his house, and subsequently arrived on the 1st of December at Nottingham, where the princess first made herself known and appointed a council. Thence she passed through Leicester, Coventry and Warwick, finally entering Oxford, where she met Prince George, in triumph, escorted by a large company. Like Mary, she was reproached for showing no concern at the news of the king's flight, but her justification was that "she never loved to do anything that looked like an affected constraint." She returned to London on the 19th of December, when she was at once visited by William. Subsequently the Declaration of Rights settled the succession of the crown upon her after William and Mary and their children.

On the 8th of March 1702 Anne became, by King William's death, queen of Great Britain, being crowned on the 23rd of April. Her reign was destined to be one of the most brilliant in the annals of England. Splendid military triumphs crushed the hereditary national foe. The Act of Union with Scotland constituted one of the strongest foundations of the future empire. Art and literature found a fresh renascence.

The fall of the Whigs, now no longer necessary on account of the successful issue of the war, to accomplish which Harley had long been preparing and intriguing, followed; and their attempt to prolong hostilities from party motives failed. A friend of Harley, the duke of Shrewsbury, was first appointed to office, and subsequently the great body of the Whigs were displaced by Tories, Harley being made chancellor of the exchequer and Henry St John secretary of state. The queen was rejoiced at being freed from what she called a long captivity, and the new parliament was returned with a Tory majority. On the 17th of January 1711, in spite of Marlborough's efforts to ward off the blow, the duchess was compelled to give up her key of office. The queen was now able once more to indulge in her favourite patronage of the church, and by her influence an act was passed in 1712 for building fifty new churches in London. Later, in 1714, she approved of the Schism Bill. She gave strong support to Harley, now earl of Oxford and lord treasurer, in the intrigues and negotiations for peace. Owing to the alliance between the Tory Lord Nottingham and the Whigs, on the condition of the support by the latter of the bill against occasional conformity passed in December 1711, the defeated Whigs maintained a majority in the Lords, who declared against any peace which left Spain to the Bourbons. To break down this opposition Marlborough was dismissed on the 31st from all his employments, while the House of Lords was "swamped" by Anne's creation of twelve peers, including Mrs Masham's husband. The queen's conduct was generally approved, for the nation was now violently adverse to the Whigs and war party; and the peace of Utrecht was finally signed on the 31st of March 1713, and proclaimed on the 5th of May in London.

As the queen's reign drew to its close, rumours were rife on the great subject of the succession to the throne. Various Jacobite appointments excited suspicion. Both Oxford and Bolingbroke were in communication with the Pretender's party, and on the 27th of July Oxford, who had gradually lost influence and quarrelled with Bolingbroke, resigned, leaving the supreme power in the hands of the latter. Anne herself had a natural feeling for her brother, and had shown great solicitude concerning his treatment when a price had been set on his head at the time of the Scottish expedition in 1708. On the 3rd of March 1714 James wrote to Anne, Oxford and Bolingbroke, urging the necessity of taking steps to secure his succession, and promising, on the condition of his recognition, to make no further attempts against the queen's government; and in April a report was circulated in Holland that Anne had secretly determined to associate James with her in the government. The wish expressed by the Whigs, that a member of the electoral family should be invited to England, had already aroused the queen's indignation in 1708; and now, in 1714, a writ of summons for the electoral prince as duke of Cambridge having been obtained, Anne forbade the Hanoverian envoy, Baron Sch?tz, her presence, and declared all who supported the project her enemies; while to a memorial on the same subject from the electress Sophia and her grandson in May, Anne replied in an angry letter, which is said to have caused the death of the electress on the 5th of June, requesting them not to trouble the peace of her realm or diminish her authority.

These demonstrations, however, were the outcome not of any returning partiality for her own family, but of her intense dislike, in which she resembled Queen Elizabeth, of any "successor," "it being a thing I cannot bear to have any successor here though but for a week"; and in spite of some appearances to the contrary, it is certain that religion and political wisdom kept Anne firm to the Protestant succession. She had maintained a friendly correspondence with the court of Hanover since 1705, and in 1706 had bestowed the Garter on the electoral prince and created him duke of Cambridge; while the Regency Act provided for the declaration of the legal heir to the crown by the council immediately on the queen's death, and a further enactment naturalized the electress and her issue. In 1708, on the occasion of the Scottish expedition, notwithstanding her solicitude for his safety, she had styled James in her speech closing the session of parliament as "a popish pretender bred up in the principles of the most arbitrary government." The duchess of Marlborough stated in 1713 that all the time she had known "that thing" , "she had never heard her speak a favourable word of him." No answer appears to have been sent to James's letter in 1714; on the contrary, a proclamation was issued for his apprehension in case of his arrival in England. On the 27th of April Anne gave a solemn assurance of her fidelity to the Hanoverian succession to Sir William Dawes, archbishop of York; in June she sent Lord Clarendon to Hanover to satisfy the elector.

Anne was a women of small ability, of dull mind, and of that kind of obstinacy which accompanies weakness of character. According to the duchess she had "a certain knack of sticking to what had been dictated to her to a degree often very disagreeable, and without the least sign of understanding or judgment." "I desire you would not have so ill an opinion of me," Anne writes to Oxford, "as to think when I have determined anything in my mind I will alter it." Burnet considered that "she laid down the splendour of a court too much," which was "as it were abandoned." She dined alone after her husband's death, but it was reported by no means abstemiously, the royal family being characterized in the lines:--

"King William thinks all. Queen Mary talks all, Prince George drinks all, And Princess Anne eats all."

She took no interest in the art, the drama or the literature of her day. But she possessed the homely virtues; she was deeply religious, attached to the Church of England and concerned for the efficiency of the ministry. One of the first acts of her reign was a proclamation against vice, and Lord Chesterfield regretted the strict morality of her court. Instances abound of her kindness and consideration for others. Her moderation towards the Jacobites in Scotland, after the Pretender's expedition in 1708, was much praised by Saint Simon. She showed great forbearance and generosity towards the duchess of Marlborough in the face of unexampled provocation, and her character was unduly disparaged by the latter, who with her violent and coarse nature could not understand the queen's self-restraint in sorrow, and describes her as "very hard" and as "not apt to cry." According to her small ability she served the state well, and was zealous and conscientious in the fulfilment of public duties, in which may be included touching for the king's evil, which she revived. Marlborough testifies to her energy in finding money for the war. She surrendered 10,000 pounds a year for public purposes, and in 1706 she presented 30,000 pounds to the officers and soldiers who had lost their horses. Her contemporaries almost unanimously record her excellence and womanly virtues; and by Dean Swift, no mild critic, she is invariably spoken of with respect, and named in his will as of "ever glorious, immortal and truly pious memory, the real nursing-mother of her kingdoms." She deserves her appellation of "Good Queen Anne," and notwithstanding her failings must be included among the chief authors and upholders of the great Revolution settlement. Her person was described by Spanheim, the Prussian ambassador, as handsome though inclining to stoutness, with black hair, blue eyes and good features, and of grave aspect.

FOOTNOTES:

Luttrell ii. 366, 376.

Anne was a grim, sullen woman, frankly sensual, but as well-meaning as ignorance and vindictiveness would allow her to be. But she had much natural good sense, was a true friend and, in her more cheerful moments, an amiable companion. Lady Rondeau's portrait of the empress shows her to the best advantage. She is described as a large woman, towering above all the cavaliers of her court, but very well shaped for her size, easy and graceful in her person, of a majestic bearing, but with an awfulness in her countenance which revolted those who disliked her.

FOOTNOTE:

Vasily Golitsuin's expedition under the regency of Sophia was the first Crimean War .

Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page

 

Back to top