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THE GALLERY OF PORTRAITS: WITH MEMOIRS.

LONDON: CHARLES KNIGHT, 22, LUDGATE-STREET.

LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, Duke-Street, Lambeth.

PORTRAITS AND BIOGRAPHIES CONTAINED IN THIS VOLUME.

Page.

RALEIGH.

Very little is known concerning the youth of Sir Walter Raleigh. He was a younger son, descended of an ancient family, and was born at a farm called Hayes, near the mouth of the river Otter, in Devonshire, in the year 1552. He went to Oriel College, Oxford, at an early age, and gained high praise for the quickness and precocity of his talents. In 1569 he began his military career in the civil wars of France, as a volunteer in the Protestant cause. It is conjectured that he remained in France for more than six years, and returned to England in 1576. Soon after, he repaired to the Netherlands, and served as a volunteer against the Spaniards. In such schools, and under such leaders as Coligni and the Prince of Orange, Raleigh's natural aptitude for political and military science received the best nurture: but he was soon drawn from the war in Holland by a pursuit which had captivated his imagination from an early age--the prosecution of discovery in the New World. In conjunction with his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a man of courage and ability, and a skilful sailor, he made an unsuccessful attempt to establish a colony in North America. Returning home in 1579, he immediately entered the Queen's army in Ireland, and served with good esteem for personal courage and professional skill, until the suppression of the rebellion in that country. He owed his introduction to court, and the personal favour of Elizabeth, as is traditionally reported, to a fortunate and well-improved accident, which is too familiar to need repetition here. It is probable, however, that his name and talents were not unknown, for we find him employed almost immediately in certain matters of diplomacy.

Among the cares and pleasures of a courtier's life, Raleigh preserved his zeal for American discovery. He applied his own resources to the fitting out of another expedition in 1583, under command of Sir Humphrey Gilbert, which proved more unfortunate than the former one: two out of five vessels returned home in consequence of sickness, and two were wrecked, including that in which the admiral sailed; and the only result of the enterprise was the taking possession of Newfoundland in the name of England. Still Raleigh's desire for American adventure was not damped. The Continent northward of the Gulf of Florida was at this time unknown. But Raleigh, upon careful study of the best authorities, had concluded that there was good reason for believing that a considerable tract of land did exist in that quarter; and with the assent of the Queen in council, from whom he obtained letters patent, granting to himself and his heirs, under certain reservations, property in such countries as he should discover, with a right to provide for their protection and administration, he fitted out two ships, which sailed in April, 1584. The first land which they made was an island named Okakoke, running parallel to the coast of North Carolina. They were well received by the natives, and returned to England in the following autumn highly pleased. Nor was less satisfaction felt by Raleigh, or even by the Queen, who conferred on him the honour of knighthood, a title which was then in high esteem, inasmuch as it was bestowed by that wise princess with a most frugal and just discrimination. She also gave him a very lucrative mark of favour, in the shape of a patent for licensing the selling of wine throughout the kingdom; and she directed that the new country, in allusion to herself, should be called Virginia. Raleigh did not think it politic, perhaps was not allowed, to quit the court to take charge in person of his undertaking; and those to whom he intrusted the difficult task of directing the infant colony appear to have been unequal to their office. It is not necessary to pursue the history of an enterprise which proved unsuccessful, and in which Sir Walter personally bore no share. He showed his earnestness by fitting out several expeditions, which must have been a heavy drain upon his fortune. But he is said to have derived immense wealth from prizes captured from the Spaniards; and we may here observe that the lavish magnificence in dress, especially in jewels, for which Raleigh was remarkable, even in the gorgeous court of Elizabeth , may be considered less as an extravagance, than as a safe and portable investment of treasure. A mind less active might have found employment more than enough in the variety of occupations which pressed upon it at home. He possessed a large estate, granted out of forfeited lands, in Ireland; but this was always a source rather of expense than of profit, until, in 1601, he sold it to the Earl of Cork. He was Seneschal of the Duchies of Cornwall and Exeter, and held the wardenship of the Stannaries; and in 1586, as well as formerly in 1584, we find that he possessed a seat in parliament. In 1587, the formidable preparation of the Spanish Armada withdrew the mind of Raleigh, as of all Englishmen, from objects of minor importance, to the defence of their country. He was a member of the council of war directed to prepare a general scheme of defence, and held the office of Lieutenant-General of Cornwall, in addition to the charge of the Isle of Portland: but as on this occasion he possessed no naval command, he was not actively engaged in the destruction of that mighty armament. In 1589 he served as a volunteer in the expedition of Norris and Drake to Portugal, of which some account has been given in the life of the latter. Nor were his labours unrewarded even in that unfortunate enterprise; for he captured several prizes, and received the present of a gold chain from the Queen, in testimony of her approbation of his conduct.

Soon after these events, Raleigh retired to his Irish property, being driven from court, according to some authorities, by the enmity of the Earl of Essex, then a young man just rising into favour. He there renewed a former intimacy with the poet Spenser, who, like himself, had been rewarded with a grant of land out of forfeited estates, and then resided at Kilcolman Castle. Spenser has celebrated the return of his friend in the beautiful pastoral, 'Colin Clout's come home again;' and in that, and various passages of his works, has made honourable mention of the highly poetic spirit which enabled the 'Shepherd of the Ocean,' as he is there denominated, to appreciate the merit of the 'Fairy Queen,' and led him to promote the publication of it by every means in his power. The loss of Raleigh's court-favour, if such there were, could not have been of long duration on this occasion. But he incurred more serious displeasure in consequence of a private marriage contracted with Elizabeth Throgmorton, one of the Queen's maids of honour, a lady of beauty and accomplishments, who proved her worth and fidelity in the long train of misfortunes which beset the latter years of Raleigh's life. In consequence of this intrigue, he was committed to the Tower. One or two amusing anecdotes are related of the devices which he employed to obtain forgiveness, by working on that vanity which was the Queen's chief foible. He succeeded in appeasing his indignant mistress so far as to procure his release; and about the same time, in 1594, she granted to him the valuable manor of Sherborne, in Dorsetshire: but though she requited his services, she still forbade his appearance at court, where he now held the office of Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard. Raleigh was peculiarly fitted to adorn a court by his imposing person, the graceful magnificence of his taste and habits, the elegance of his manners, and the interest of his conversation. These accomplishments were sure passports to the favour of Elizabeth; and he improved to the utmost the constant opportunities of intercourse with her which his post afforded, insomuch that, except the Earls of Leicester and Essex, no one ever seems to have stood higher in her graces. But Elizabeth's jealousy on the subject of her favourites' marriages is well known, and her anger was lasting, in proportion to the value which she set on the incense of Raleigh's flattery. He retired, on his disgrace, to his new estate, in the improvement and embellishment of which he felt great interest. But though deeply alive to the beauties of nature, he had been too long trained to a life of ambition and adventure to rest contented in the tranquil routine of a country life; and during this period of seclusion, he again turned his thoughts to his favourite subject of American adventure, and laid the scheme of his first expedition to Guiana, in search of the celebrated El Dorado, the fabled seat of inexhaustible wealth. Having fitted out, with the assistance of other private persons, a considerable fleet, Raleigh sailed from Plymouth, February 6, 1595. He left his ships in the mouth of the river Orinoco, and sailed 400 miles into the interior in boats. It is to be recorded to his honour, that he treated the Indians with great kindness; which, contrasted with the savage conduct of the Spaniards, raised so friendly a feeling towards him, that for years his return was eagerly expected, and at length was hailed with delight. The hardships of the undertaking, and the natural advantages of the country which he explored, are eloquently described in his own account of the 'Discovery of Guiana.' But the setting in of the rainy season rendered it necessary to return, without having reached the promised land of wealth; and Raleigh reaped no other fruit of his adventure than a certain quantity of geographical knowledge, and a full conviction of the importance of colonizing and taking possession of the newly-discovered region. This continued through life to be his favourite scheme; but neither Elizabeth nor her successor could be induced to view it in the same favourable light.

On reaching England, he found the Queen still unappeased; nor was he suffered to appear at court: and he complains in pathetic terms of the cold return with which his perils and losses were requited. But he was invested with a high command in the expedition of 1596, by which the Spanish fleet was destroyed in the harbour of Cadiz; and to his judgment and temper in overruling the faulty schemes proposed by others the success of that enterprise was chiefly due. Indeed his services were perhaps too important, and too justly appreciated by the public, for his own interests: for the great and general praise bestowed on him on this occasion tended to confirm a jealousy of long standing on the part of the commander-in-chief, the Earl of Essex; and it was probably owing to that favourite's influence, that Raleigh was still forbidden the Queen's presence. Essex, and the Secretary of State, Sir Robert Cecil, regarded each other with mutual distrust and dislike. Cecil and Raleigh were connected by ties of common interest, and, as the latter supposed, of friendship. Still Raleigh found the interest of the minister too weak to serve his purpose, while the interest of the favourite was employed against him; and, as the only method of effecting his own restoration to the Queen's favour, he undertook to work a reconciliation between these two powerful rivals. In this he succeeded, to the great admiration of all spectators; and the fruit of his policy was seen in his re-admission to the execution of his official duties at court, June 1, 1597. In the following August he was appointed Rear Admiral in the expedition called the Island Voyage, of which Essex held the chief command. The slight successes which were obtained were again due to the military talents of Raleigh; the main objects of the voyage were lost through the Earl's inexperience.

The terms on which this licence was granted are remarkable. He was not pardoned, but merely let loose on the engagement of his friends, the Earls of Arundel and Pembroke, that he should return to England. Neither did James contribute to the expense of the undertaking, though it was stipulated that he was to receive a fifth part of the bullion imported. The necessary funds were provided out of the wreck of Raleigh's fortune and by those private adventurers who were willing to risk something in reliance on his experience and judgment. A fleet of fourteen sail was thus provided, and Raleigh, by letters under the privy seal, was appointed commander-in-chief and governor of the intended colony. He relied, it is said, on the full powers granted him by this commission as necessarily including a remission of all past offences, and therefore neglected to sue out a formal pardon, which at this period probably would hardly have been denied him. The results of this disastrous voyage must be shortly given. Raleigh sailed March 28, 1617, and reached the coast of Guiana in November following. Being himself disabled by sickness from proceeding farther, he dispatched a party to the mine under the command of Captain Keymis, an officer who had served in the former voyage to Guiana. But during the interval which had elapsed since Raleigh's first discovery of that country, the Spaniards had extended their settlements into it, and in particular had built a town called Santa Thome, in the immediate neighbourhood of the mine in question. James, with his usual duplicity, while he authorised the expedition, revealed every particular connected with it to the Spanish ambassador. The English, therefore, were expected in the Orinoco, and preparation had been made for repelling them by force. Keymis and his men were unexpectedly attacked by the garrison of Santa Thome, and a sharp contest ensued, in which the English gained the advantage, and burnt the town. In this action Raleigh's eldest son was killed. The Spaniards still occupied the passes to the mine, and after an unsuccessful attempt to dislodge them, Keymis abandoned the enterprize, and returned to the ships. Raleigh's correspondence expresses in affecting terms his grief and indignation at this double misfortune; the loss of a brave and promising son, and the destruction of the hopes which he had founded on this long-cherished adventure. On his return to England, he found himself marked out for a victim to appease the resentment of the Spanish court, to which he had long been an object of fear and hatred. He quietly surrendered himself to Sir Lewis Stukeley, who was sent to Plymouth to arrest him, and commenced the journey to London under his charge. But his mind fluctuated between the desire to confront his enemies, and a sense of the hopelessness of obtaining justice, and he was at last entrapped by the artifices of the emissaries of government who surrounded him into an attempt to escape, in which he was arrested and committed to close custody in the Tower. Here his conversation and correspondence were narrowly watched, in the hopes that a treasonable understanding with the French government, from which he had received the offer of an asylum in France, might be established against him. His conduct abroad had already been closely scrutinized, in the hope of finding some act of piracy, or unauthorized aggression against Spain, for which he might be brought to trial. Both these hopes failing, and his death, in compliment to Spain, being resolved on, it was determined to carry into effect the sentence passed fifteen years before, from which he had never been legally released; and a warrant was accordingly issued to the judges, requiring them to order execution. The case was a novel one, and threw that learned body into some perplexity. They determined, however, that after so long an interval execution could not be granted without allowing the prisoner the opportunity of pleading against it; and Raleigh was therefore brought to the bar of the Court of King's Bench, October 28, 1618. The record of his conviction having been read, he was asked whether he could urge any thing why the sentence should not be carried into effect. He insisted on the nature of his late commission, and on that plea being overruled, submitted with his usual calmness and dignity. The execution, with indecent haste, was ordered to take place on the following morning. In this last stage of life, his greatness of mind shone with even more than its usual lustre. Calm, and fearless without bravado, his behaviour and speech expressed the piety and resignation of a Christian with the habitual coolness of one who has braved death too often to shrink at its approach. The accounts of his deportment on the scaffold effectually refute the charges of irreligion and atheism which some writers have brought against him, unless we make up our minds to believe him an accomplished hypocrite. He spoke at considerable length, and his dying words have been faithfully reported. They contain a denial of all the serious offences laid to his charge, and express his forgiveness of those even who had betrayed him under the mask of friendship. After delivering this address and spending some time in prayer, he laid his head on the block, and breathing a short private prayer, gave the signal to the executioner. Not being immediately obeyed, he partially raised his head, and said, "What dost thou fear? Strike, man!" and underwent the fatal blow without shrinking or alteration of position. He died in his sixty-sixth year.

Raleigh sat in several parliaments, and took an active part in the business of the house. His speeches, preserved in the Journals, are said by Mr. Tytler to be remarkable for an originality and freedom of thought far in advance of the time. His expression was varied and animated, and his powers of conversation remarkable. His person was dignified and handsome, and he excelled in bodily accomplishments and martial exercises. He was very fond of paintings, and of music; and, in literature as in art, he possessed a cultivated and correct taste. He was one of those rare men who seem qualified to excel in all pursuits alike; and his talents were set off by an extraordinary laboriousness, and capacity of application. As a navigator, soldier, statesman, and historian, his name is intimately and honourably linked with one of the most brilliant periods of British history.

The works of Oldys, Birch, Cayley, Mrs. Thompson, and Mr. Tytler, may be consulted concerning this remarkable person. The life of the last-named gentleman, published in the 'Edinburgh Cabinet Library,' is the most recent; and the industry of the author has enabled him to gain a clue to some points which before had been imperfectly understood. A list of Raleigh's numerous works is given in the 'Biographia Britannica.' They will be found collected in eight volumes, in the Oxford edition of 1829. Several of his MSS. are preserved in the British Museum.

JENNER.

Edward, the third son of the Rev. Stephen Jenner, was born May 17, 1749, in the vicarage-house of Berkeley in Gloucestershire, of which parish his father, a man of independent fortune, and of a family long established and esteemed in that neighbourhood, was incumbent. At the death of that parent in 1754, the care of Edward Jenner's education devolved upon his eldest brother, Stephen, who succeeded to the living of Berkeley, and faithfully and affectionately discharged the duties of a father towards him.

He began at a very early age to give tokens of that fondness and aptitude for the study of natural history, which first directed the choice of his profession; and afterwards led him, by steps which may be easily traced, to the discovery of a method of securing the constitution against the small-pox, by a remedy so mild as to be scarcely an inconvenience, yet so effectual as almost to have extinguished that disease in some countries where it has been energetically used.

Having finished his school education and fixed upon a profession, Jenner was apprenticed at the usual age to Mr. Ludlow, a surgeon practising at Sodbury near Bristol; and in 1770, when nearly twenty-one, he came to London, and put himself under the tuition of John Hunter, in whose house he lived for two years, as much in the capacity of a friend as in that of a pupil, with great advantage to his professional studies. The intimacy between these two eminent men was very close and cordial, and subsisted till Hunter's sudden death in 1793. It is attested by many letters from Mr. Hunter, which Jenner carefully preserved; his own were probably destroyed with the rest of Hunter's papers by the late Sir Everard Home. Their correspondence relates chiefly to facts and experiments in natural history.

The success with which Jenner had already pursued his studies, and the respect entertained for his talents by his illustrious instructor at a period when their intercourse was yet in its infancy, may be gathered from his being selected in 1771, on the recommendation of Mr. Hunter, to arrange the collections in natural history which had been made by Sir Joseph Banks in his voyage round the world with Captain Cook, then just completed. Jenner acquitted himself so well of this charge, that he was offered, though little more than twenty-two years of age, the situation of naturalist to the second expedition under the command of Captain Cook, which sailed in 1772. This was a flattering proposal to so young a man, and consonant to Jenner's ruling tastes; nevertheless he declined it. It is fortunate for mankind that he chose the laborious seclusion of a country practice in preference to aiming at distinction and wealth; for in no other sphere could he have found opportunities of pursuing his discovery of vaccination through all the perplexities in which his early researches into that subject involved him. Indeed, it is probable that considerations of this kind, independently of his fondness for a country life, had their weight with him in the choice; for the idea had already taken strong hold of his naturally sanguine feelings and quick apprehension, that he was furnished with a clue which might lead him to a result of the highest importance to mankind.

It may be added here that a few years after this time he declined a very lucrative situation in India, as well as a much more tempting proposal from Mr. Hunter, in 1775, to join him in a project for establishing in London a school of natural history, including medicine, of which Jenner was to undertake the anatomical department.

Having determined to settle in the country, and being amply provided with the requisite knowledge, Jenner established himself as a general practitioner at Berkeley. Here he speedily acquired a profitable and extensive practice; so much so, indeed, that finding his health giving way, he was obliged to limit himself to the practice of medicine alone; for which purpose he purchased, as it was then customary, the degree of doctor at St. Andrew's in 1792.

But he not only attained at an early age to a high degree of professional reputation, but won the affectionate esteem of all with whom he associated. It is related of him that his friends were in the habit of joining in his daily professional rides, often of considerable extent, for the sake of his agreeable and instructive conversation; and that when any of them were ill, he would sometimes make their houses the head-quarters of his practice for the time being, and remain in close attendance upon them till their recovery.

Music, the lighter kinds of literature, both as a reader and occasionally as an author, and the innocent recreations of society, which no one enjoyed more keenly than himself, were the means by which Jenner lightened the burden of his professional labours; but his chief amusement was natural history, including geology, a science then in its infancy, for the study of which his position in the vale of Gloucester afforded ample opportunity, the neighbourhood abounding with fossil remains, and exhibiting a great variety of terrestrial structure. Towards subjects of this nature he was led, not only by his original bias, but by his correspondence with Hunter, Banks, and Parry.

In 1778 he formed a medical society, which held its periodical meetings at Rodborough, for the purpose of communicating professional information and promoting a friendly feeling among the members. In furtherance of these objects, Jenner contributed several important and original papers, the substance of which is now embodied in medical science, without his property in them being generally known. Among these were essays on the nature and causes of Angina Pectoris, on a peculiar disease of the heart occurring in acute rheumatism, and on several of the more severe affections of the eye. He also belonged to another medical society, meeting at Alveston near Bristol, to the members of which, who were men of congenial dispositions with his own, he was personally much attached. Upon one topic, however, they did not agree; for it is said that he was in the habit of enlarging so frequently upon his favourite speculation of the cow-pox, that the subject was at length proscribed, and he was jestingly forbidden to renew it on pain of expulsion. This club was for many years a source of much enjoyment and advantage to him, and we may suppose that he was a very principal contributor to the diversion of the other members; for it ceased to exist in 1789, when other objects began to engross the time that he could spare from his practice. In March of the previous year, at the age of thirty-seven, he married Miss Catharine Kingscote, by whom he had several children. The choice appears to have been a very fortunate one for his domestic happiness.

The cow-pox is a disease of the eruptive kind, which is sometimes extensively prevalent among cattle in large dairy countries where they are herded together in numbers, but often disappears for a long time together. Though commonly mild, it is occasionally so severe as to terminate fatally; and it is believed, on strong grounds, to have been at different times even pestilential among them, and as such, to have been mentioned by various writers on rural economy, ancient and modern, as well as in medical and other histories. It is generally, however, a very mild disorder, appearing on the udder of the cow, at first in the form of vesicles much resembling those of small-pox; and it is sometimes, as in the instance which first attracted the attention of Jenner, communicated to the hands of milkers. In such cases, an eruption of similar vesicles takes place on the hands and arms, not without much swelling and inflammation, and occasionally with fever and disturbance of the health for some days. It has never been known to prove fatal when thus communicated, or to have left any unpleasant effects behind it, except a few indented marks in the situation occupied by the pustules. It is not communicable, like small-pox in the human subject, by the effluvia; but the matter, or lymph as it is called, contained in the vesicles, must be actually inserted under the skin, or applied to a raw or an absorbing surface. But the most important of its peculiarities is the security it affords against the infection of small-pox. This property was well known among the agricultural classes in the grazing districts before the time of Jenner, and it has been stated that individuals among them had turned their knowledge of it to account for the protection of their families, by inoculating them with the vaccine disease. But this circumstance, alleged on very scanty evidence by those who were opposed to Jenner's claims, cannot lessen the merit of his independent discovery, of which each step was communicated in succession to a numerous circle of medical friends, and is recorded in the most authentic form. His reputation is, on the other hand, enhanced by the fact that, although the immunity conferred by the casual disease in milkers had frequently come under the notice of medical men from their failing in such persons to produce the small-pox by inoculation, yet the idea of introducing the disease of an animal into the human frame was so little in consonance with any former practice, that Jenner was the first among his brethren to conjecture that cow-pox, as the milder disease, might advantageously supersede the inoculated small-pox; and that, as the latter is rendered less virulent by inoculation, so the former introduced in the same way might be milder than the casual complaint, and yet retain its protecting power. He had even communicated this conjecture to Hunter, himself no mean innovator in medicine, so early as the year 1770; and Mr. Hunter was for many years in the habit of mentioning it in his public lectures coupled with Jenner's name: but the proposed substitution was so distasteful, or appeared of such questionable propriety, that it obtained no favourable notice till it was forced by the inventor on the public attention, thirty years after it had first attracted his own.

It would be interesting to enter into a detail of the progress of Jenner's discovery and of its introduction into general use, as well as to show its inestimable value to society by a reference to statistical facts. This, however, can only be done here in a very cursory manner.

It may be mentioned as a curious circumstance, that the first lymph transmitted in an active state to British India in 1802 by Dr. De Carro of Vienna, long the only source of vaccination in that country, had been furnished to him by Dr. Sacco of Milan, from genuine vesicles produced by direct inoculation from the horse, without passing through the cow; an intervention which, till about that period, Jenner had continued to think essential to the production of the true disease in man.

In addition to these and other curious results, laboriously collected during a period of twenty-six years, Dr. Jenner at length arrived at a rational conviction of the safety of the experiment he meditated, from observing the invariable harmlessness of the disease when casually taken: he determined therefore to put his long-cherished idea to the trial on the first opportunity.

This offered on the 14th of May, 1796, the anniversary of which is still kept as a festival at Berlin. On that day he inoculated a boy of the name of Phipps in the arm, from a pustule on the hand of a young woman who was infected by her master's cows. The boy went favourably through the disease. On the 1st of July he was inoculated for the small-pox, and, as Jenner had predicted, without effect.

The feelings of the sanguine philanthropist may be conceived. They cannot be better described than they have been by himself in the following terms. "While the vaccine discovery was progressive, the joy I felt at the prospect before me of being the instrument destined to take away from the world one of its greatest calamities, blended with the fond hope of enjoying independence and domestic peace and happiness, was often so excessive, that in pursuing my favourite subject among the meadows, I have sometimes found myself in a reverie. It is pleasant to me to recollect that these reflections always ended in devout acknowledgments to that Being from whom this and all other mercies flow."

During the next two years many other equally successful trials were made; and at length the discovery was published to the world in June, 1798, in a quarto pamphlet of seventy pages, which had been previously subjected to the most rigorous criticism and revision by a few chosen friends who met for that purpose at the house of Thomas Westfaling, Esq., at Rudhall, near Ross. It is entitled 'An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the Variolae Vaccinae; a disease discovered in some of the Western Counties of England, particularly Gloucestershire, and known by the name of the Cow-pox.' The pamphlet is enriched with the detail of sixteen cases of the casual, and seven of the inoculated disease, the latter including the case of one of the author's sons; and with coloured drawings of the appearances in both.

Another position advanced by Jenner in this pamphlet is too remarkable to be passed over. After stating his belief that the cow-pox originates from the horse in the way already mentioned, he proceeds to suggest that the small-pox may have been itself originally morbid matter of the same kind, aggravated into a malignant and contagious form by accidental circumstances. But this opinion, though plausible, is not considered by any means as established.

Favourably as his work was received, the author, who had come to London partly to superintend the publication, was unable to obtain an opportunity of displaying the disease in that city, which had been the chief object of his visit; and returned, much disappointed, to Cheltenham, where he now frequently resided, in the middle of July. He left, however, some vaccine lymph with Mr. Cline, who was the first surgeon in London that ventured to make a trial of it. The complete success of the experiment, which was publicly performed, so strongly interested the profession, that the new practice became quickly popular, in spite of a warm though partial opposition, which was put down in the summer of 1799 by a manifesto expressive of confidence in its efficacy and safety, signed by seventy-three of the most eminent medical men in the metropolis. In the same year some unfortunate occurrences took place in consequence of Dr. Woodville, the physician of the Small-pox Hospital, having incautiously used and distributed matter from persons whom he had inoculated with small-pox a few days after vaccination, before it had taken a sufficient hold. The mongrel lymph thus produced sometimes occasioned one, sometimes the other disease; their effects were confounded; and some deaths which ensued, as well as a general eruption of the skin which took place in many instances, were attributed to the cow-pox. This and other mistakes would probably have much retarded the general adoption of vaccination, but for the promptitude of Jenner to discover and expose the source of the error.

In 1803 the Royal Jennerian Society, for the encouragement of vaccination, was established in London under the superintendence of Dr. Jenner. In 1808 this society was merged by his advice in the National Vaccine Establishment, which still continues to dispense the blessings of the antidote at the public charge.

The growing interest in the public mind in favour of vaccination was of course everywhere extended to its author, who, in spite of several unworthy cabals, and attempts to deprive him of the credit of a discovery peculiarly his own, was received among all ranks with the highest distinction at home, and also gratified with various continental honours. If he had thought fit to settle in London, he might undoubtedly have secured wealth in proportion to his reputation; but he preferred the quiet enjoyment of rural life and domestic happiness. His death took place at Berkeley, from a sudden attack of apoplexy, in February, 1823, in the seventy-fourth year of his age. The latter years of his life were spent between Berkeley and Cheltenham, and in occasional visits to London, in the zealous prosecution of his favourite subjects of research, and successful endeavours to diffuse the blessings of his discovery more widely in his own and other lands.

In England, however, these have not been so extensively felt as in some other countries where the form of government has given facilities for the enforcement of vaccination. The small-pox consequently prevails to a considerable extent in this country, and especially in London. Yet the annual number of deaths from small-pox within the bills of mortality is at present under 700; the largest number in one year since the general practice of vaccination having been 1299, in 1825. A century ago, when the population certainly did not reach half its present amount, the yearly average was 2000, the maximum being in 1796, when the mortality swelled to 3549. That this decrease is wholly due to vaccination cannot be doubted; the advantage, however, is partly indirect, and has arisen from the discontinuance of the practice of inoculating for the small-pox, which afforded security to individuals, but increased the general mortality by keeping alive a constant source of infection. But the most striking examples of the advantage derived from vaccination are to be found on the continent. Thus at Berlin, where the average annual amount of deaths from small-pox was 472 for the twenty years previous to 1802, and 1646 died in 1801, the mortality so speedily diminished after the enforcement of vaccination by law, that in 1821 and 1822 there was only one death in each year. These and similar instances which might be adduced from other countries, seem almost to warrant us in adopting the sanguine expectation of Jenner, that by means of his discovery this disgusting and dreadful malady, from which not four in a hundred of the human race wholly escaped, and which destroyed a tenth part of all that were born, and disfigured where it did not destroy, may yet be swept from the face of the earth.

The best books of reference on the subjects of this memoir are 'Baron's Life of Jenner,' 'Moore's History of the Cow-pox,' Dr. Gregory's admirable articles in the 'Encyclopaedia of Medicine,' and the reports of various parliamentary committees, especially those of 1802 and 1833.

MASKELYNE.

Nevil Maskelyne was born in London, October 6, 1732. He was educated at Westminster, and in time proceeded to Catherine Hall, Cambridge, from whence he migrated to Trinity College. He took the degree of Bachelor of Arts, with honours, in the year 1754. In 1755, he was ordained to a curacy near London. He had previously turned his attention to astronomy, to which he was led by the solar eclipse of 1748; and he now formed an acquaintance with Bradley, an astronomer of unequalled merit, whether in discovery or practical excellence in observation, whom he assisted in calculating his table of refractions. It is no wonder that, under such instruction, Maskelyne should have distinguished himself afterwards as an observer. From this period Delambre dates the commencement of really good observations.

In 1758 Maskelyne was elected Fellow of his college; in 1759 he became Fellow of the Royal Society. In 1761 he went to St. Helena, to observe the transit of Venus, and also to collect such observations as might, if possible, enable him to detect the parallax of the fixed stars. He failed in both objects; in the first from cloudy weather, in the second from faulty instruments, as he supposed, though the quantity in question is so small that its existence has not yet been detected; but he was enabled to correct the principal errors of those instruments in a considerable degree, and also to make very good observations on various other points. In his voyage out and home he applied himself to perfect the method of observing lunar distances, and deducing the longitude from them. In 1764 he sailed to Barbadoes, to make a trial of Harrison's time-keeper; and in 1765 he was appointed Astronomer Royal, on the decease of Mr. Bliss. He was then only thirty-three years of age, and had enjoyed a rapid career of celebrity. He had published enough in the 'British Mariner's Guide,' A.D. 1763, to require honourable mention of his name and methods in every work of navigation.

The first Nautical Almanac was published in 1767, and was continued by Maskelyne to the end of his life. The requisite tables, intended to accompany that work, were first published by him in 1781.

The Schehallien experiment was carried on under many difficulties and privations; and its successful result places its author in the list of those who first opened the road to the determination of a fundamental element of the solar system. But brilliant as it must appear, it is by no means the most useful of Maskelyne's labours. Excepting Bradley, he may almost be called the first who systematically directed his efforts to the attainment of the minutest accuracy in astronomical observation. His celebrated catalogue, A.D. 1790, consisted only of thirty-six of the principal stars, but the places of these, especially in right ascension, were determined with a degree of precision which was then believed to be hardly attainable. The means by which he accomplished his objects, such as taking the nearest tenth of a second instead of the nearest second, or half second, of time in his transit observations, the practice of uniformly observing all the wires of the instrument, instead of one; the introduction of the movable eye-piece, by which the several wires could all be viewed directly, instead of obliquely, and many little things of the kind, are the indications of a man who was familiar above his contemporaries with the sources of error, and who had formed at once a bold estimate of the extent to which they might be avoided, and a correct view of the means of doing it. It is difficult to say what portion of the present improved spirit of observation in these points may be attributed to Maskelyne, but it certainly was not small. Delambre, who knew at least as well as any man of his time what had been done and was doing, and who was never profuse of praise, as his 'History of Astronomy' amply demonstrates, pays him the following compliment in the memoir which he contributed to the 'Biographie Universelle:'--"Maskelyne ?tait en correspondance avec tous les astronomes de l'Europe, qu'il consid?rait comme ses fr?res, et qui, de leur c?t?, le respectaient comme un doyen, dont les travaux leur avaient ?t? ?minemment utiles."

We have spoken, in the life of Harrison, of the controversy about the merits of the time-piece of the latter. As Astronomer Royal, Maskelyne was the official investigator of the rates of those instruments, and both in the case of Harrison, and in that of Mudge, his decisions underwent printed attacks, which he answered. Without entering into the merits of these questions, since all the grave accusations which were brought against him have fallen harmless, we shall only state, that Maskelyne's answers are full of documents, and free from passion; both very favourable symptoms.

Dr. Maskelyne held church preferment from his college, and was besides in possession of an easy fortune. He died Feb. 9, 1811, leaving behind him an unblemished personal reputation, and a character for scientific utility of the first order. He left behind him much evidence of his utility in the labours and character of the assistants whom he formed; all of whom, says Lalande, were useful astronomers. The late Dr. Brinkley, Bishop of Cloyne, who added the reputation of a distinguished mathematician to that of an eminent observer, was for sometime one of his pupils in the practical part of the science.

HOBBES.

When Thomas Hobbes was eighty-four years of age he composed an amusing account of his own fortunes in Latin hexameter and pentameter verses; and in these it is mentioned that his birth was premature, owing to the terror occasioned to his mother by a false report of the approach of the Spanish fleet. To this accident he humorously ascribes his patriotic zeal and the peacefulness of his disposition. We quote from a translation made by a contemporary hand, which in elegance of expression is on a par with the original.

"And hereupon it was, my mother dear Did bring forth twins at once, both me, and Fear. For this my country's foes I e'er did hate, With calm Peace and my Muse associate."

It was at Malmsbury, on the 5th of April, 1588, that this very singular man was thus called into an existence, which was continued, in perpetual activity, for ninety-one years.

One of the earliest efforts of his talents was to translate the Medea of Euripides into Latin iambics. At the age of fourteen, he commenced his more serious labours at Magdalen College, Oxford; and employed five years there in the study of logic and Aristotle's Physics. Immediately afterwards he entered into the family of William Cavendish, Baron Hardwick, subsequently Earl of Devonshire, and became tutor to his eldest son. The companion alike of his sports and his studies, Hobbes presently acquired the affection of his pupil and the confidence of the family; and the two young men set out together to travel in France and Italy.

A free intercourse with the learned men of other countries enlarged the mind of Hobbes, and opened new channels to his investigation. And it appears, in the first instance, that when he beheld the contempt in which the subjects of his academical industry were generally held, he turned from them to the more diligent study of Greek and Latin. Nor was it his object alone to become master of the languages, but also to meditate on the invaluable records of the history and the wisdom of the ancients. He employed his leisure hours in the translation of Thucydides; and he published it in the year 1628, to the end , that the absurdities of the democratical Athenians might become known to his own fellow-citizens. This was the first of his publications; and it may have been that perhaps to which, in later life, he attached the least importance. Yet has it so fallen out, that after a lapse of two long centuries of slowly progressive knowledge and wisdom, his other works are for the most part consigned to the shelves of the profound and curious student, while the "Translation of Thucydides" is familiar to the acquaintance and respect of every scholar.

This his system of physics is amply developed in the first section of his book of the 'Elements of Philosophy;' which failed not to gain him a celebrity more than proportionate to the number of his proselytes. For many admired his ingenuity who did not adopt his conclusions. In conjunction with these pursuits, Hobbes engaged with zeal in the study of mathematics. He flattered himself that he had discovered how to square the circle, and published several treatises in relation to that celebrated problem, which at the time gained for him considerable reputation. In 1647 he was appointed mathematical tutor to the Prince of Wales. He engaged in a long mathematical controversy with Dr. Wallis, of which an amusing account will be found in D'Israeli's 'Quarrels of Authors,' vol. 3. Wallis, however, was an adversary entirely above Hobbes' strength in this department of science.

Political researches in that age necessarily involved theological, or at least ecclesiastical, principles; and Hobbes had not feared to denounce some of the antient usurpations of the clergy, and to pronounce religious concord to be absolutely essential to the civil happiness of a people: and while he broached some principles not well pleasing to the pretensions of the hierarchy of the day, he advanced others which were thought to end, by no violent interpretation, in absolute infidelity. Accordingly, the theologians assailed him from every quarter; and his work, while it divided learned laymen, some of whom thought it a marvel of political genius, others a dangerous and unseemly monster, was condemned by the unanimous indignation of the ecclesiastical body. The churchmen of Rome united in hostility with those of England against doctrines which were dangerous to the common prerogatives of the whole order, if not to the integrity of religion itself. The latter, being more closely attacked, were more violent in their enmity. They denounced the opinions as false and heretical; and the divines of Cambridge went so far as publicly to stigmatize the author as an atheist. Besides this, he did not even escape the charges of being ill disposed to royalty, and a disguised adversary to the party of the king. These calumnies deprived him of the patronage of the Court, and seemed at one time even to have endangered his personal safety; insomuch that, under the Commonwealth, he found it expedient to escape from his enemies at Paris, and take refuge among those, whose enmity he had rather deserved, the republicans of England. He escaped however the fate, so common to men of moderation in violent times, of being persecuted by both parties; and only sustained the animosity of that which he had intended to serve.

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