Born: Sir Henry Yelverton, eminent
English judge, 1566, Islington; Rev. John Williams, 'the apostle of Polynesia,'
1796, Tottenham.
Died: Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond (mother
of King Henry VII), 1509; Pierre de Marca, archbishop of Paris, historian, 1662;
Bishop Zachary Pearce, 1774; Francesco Caraccioli, Neapolitan patriot, shot,
1799; Valentine Green, eminent
mezzotint engraver, 1813, London; Rev. David Williams, originator of the Royal
Literary Fund, 1816; Rev. Edward Smedley, miscellaneous writer, editor of
Encyclopaedia Metropolitana, 1836, Dulwich; Henry Clay, American
statesman, 1852, Washington; Elizabeth Barrett
Browning, poetess, 1861, Florence.
Feast Day: St. Peter the Apostle, 68; St. Hemma,
widow, 1045.
ST. PETER THE APOSTLE
The 29th of June is a festival of the Anglican
Church in honour of St. Peter the Apostle. It is familiarly known that St.
Peter, the son of Jonas, and brother of Andrew, obtained this name (signifying a
rock) from the Saviour, in place of his
original one of Simon, on becoming an apostle. He suffered martyrdom by the
cross at Rome in the year 68, under the tyrannous rule of Nero. On the strange,
obscure history, which exhibits a succession of bishops from Peter, resulting in
the religious principality of Rome, it is
not necessary here to enter. The veneration, however, felt, even in reformed
England, for the alleged founder of the Church of Rome, is shown in the festival
still held in commemoration of his martyrdom, and the great number of churches
which are from time to time dedicated to
him.
St. Peter has in England '830 churches dedicated in his sole
honour, and 30 jointly with St. Paul, and 10 in connecton with some other saint,
making 1070 in all.'�Calendar of the Anglican Church.
It is well known to be customary for the popes on their
elevation to change their Christian name. This custom was introduced in 884 by
Peter di Porca (Sergius the Second), out of a feeling of humility, deeming that
it would be presumptuous to have himself
styled Peter the Second. Following in the same line of sentiment, no pope has
ever retained or assumed the name of Peter.
MARGARET
BEAUFORT, COUNTESS OF RICHMOND
Margaret was the daughter and heiress of John Beaufort, Duke
of Somerset, grandson of John of
Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. Being very beautiful, as well as the
heiress of great possessions, she was at the early
age of fifteen years anxiously sought in marriage by two persons of high rank
and influence. One was a son of the Duke of Suffolk, then Prime Minister; the
other was Edmund, Earl of Richmond, half-brother to the reigning monarch, Henry
the Sixth. Wavering between these two
proposals, Margaret, in her perplexity, requested advice from an elderly
gentlewoman, her confidential friend. The matron recommended her not to consult
her own inclinations, but to take an early opportunity of submitting the
question to St.
Nicholas, the patron saint of undecided maidens. She did so, and the
saint appeared to her in a vision, dressed in great splendour, and advised her
to marry Edmund. Following this advice, she became the mother of Henry Tudor,
who afterwards became King Henry VII. Edmund
died soon after the birth of his son, and Margaret married twice afterwards:
first, Humphrey Stafford, son of the Duke of
Buckingham; and, secondly, Thomas Lord
Stanley, subsequently Earl of Derby. We are not told
if she consulted St. Nicholas in the choice of her second and third husbands.
Margaret founded several colleges, and employed herself in
acts of real charity and pure devotion not common at the period. After a useful
and exemplary life, she died at the age of sixty-eight years; having just lived
to see her grandson Henry VIII.
seated on the throne of England. She is included among the royal authors as a
translator of some religious works from the French, one of which, entitled
The Soul's Perfection, was printed in William Caxton's
house by Wynkyn de Worde. At the end of this work
are the following verses:
'This heavenly book, more precious than gold,
Was late direct, with great humility,
For godly pleasure therein to behold,
Unto the right noble Margaret, as ye sec,
The King's mother of excellent bounty,
Harry the Seventh; that Jesu him preserve,
This mighty Princess hath commanded me
T' imprint this book, her grace for to deserve.'
THE ROYAL
LITERARY FUND AND ITS ORIGIN
On the 18th of May 1790, a society passing under
the name of the Royal Literary Fund was constituted in London. It professes to
have in view the relief of literary men of merit from distress, and the succour
of such of their surviving relatives
as may be in want or difficulty. Persons of rank, dignitaries of the church, and
authors in good circumstances, assemble at the dinner, patronizing a collection
for the fund, which seldom falls short of �800. The society at the close of 1861
possessed a permanent fund of �22,500,
and the money distributed that year among deserving objects amounted to �1350.
There is clearly here an agency for good�not perhaps so ordered as to do the
utmost good which it might be made to do (this has been strongly insisted upon
in some quarters)�still a very good and
serviceable institution, and one which stands in England without any parallel.
This fund has been in operation since a few years before the
close of the eighteenth century. It took its origin from an obscure man of
letters, named David Williams, who was born at a
village near Cardigan, in 1738. The career
of Williams was one not calculated to meet the entire approval of the prelates
who sometimes preside at the aforesaid annual dinner. He was originally a
Unitarian clergyman, at one time settled at Highgate. Afterwards, he set up an
even more liberal form of religious worship in
Margaret Street, Cavendish Square, where Dr. Thomas
Somerville, of Jedburgh, one Sunday heard him discourse without a text on
the evils of gaming, and remarked the ominous indifference of the congregation.
At one time, during a short snatch of conjugal life, he kept
a tolerably successful boarding-school at Chelsea, where, it is related, he had
Benjamin Franklin for a guest, at the time when
the American philosopher was
subjected to the abuse of Wedderburn before the
Privy Council. He wrote books on education, on public worship, on political
principles, a moral liturgy, and much besides, cherishing high aims for the
benefit of his
fellow-creatures, while not only little patronized or encouraged by them, but
regarded by most as a dangerous enthusiast and innovator.
When the French Revolution drew on, Williams was found in
Paris, mingling with the Girondists, and helping them to form constitutions.
When sanguinary violence supervened, he came home, and calmly entered upon his
cherished plans for getting up a fund for
the benefit of poor literary men. The difficulties naturally to be encountered
in this scheme must have been greatly enhanced in the case of an originator whom
all the upper classes of that day must have regarded as himself a social pest�a
man to be classed, as
Canning actually classed him,
with 'creatures villanous and low.' He nevertheless persevered through many
years, during which his own means of subsistence were of the most precarious
kind; and having in time gathered �6000,
succeeded in constituting the society.
To the mere church-and-king Tories of that day, the whole of
this history must have appeared a bewildering anomaly; but the truth is, that
David Williams was a man of the noblest natural impulses, and the mission which
he undertook was precisely in
accordance with them. Had Canning ever met him, he would have found a man of
dignified aspect and elegant manners, instead of the human reptile he had
pictured in his imagination. His whole life, unapprovable as it must have
appeared to many, had been framed with a view to what
was for the good of mankind. The Literary Fund only happens to be the one thing
practically good, and therefore practicable, which Williams had to deal with.
This benevolent person died on the 29th June 1816,
and was buried in St. Anne's Church, Soho.
HENRY CLAY
After Washington, Jefferson, and Jackson, Henry
Clay of Kentucky has been the most popular statesman of America. With an
ordinary education, he made
his way, first to distinction as a barrister, and next to eminence as a
politician, purely by the force of his talents, and particularly that of
oratory. His career as a statesman was unfortunately not quite consistent or
unsullied, and hence he failed to obtain the highest
success. In 1832 he was the candidate of his party for the Presidency, but was
defeated by General Jackson, with only influence enough left to quiet for the
time the national discordances respecting the tariff and slavery, by what were
considered judicious compromises � moderate
duties, and a division of the unpeopled territory by a line, separating the free
and slave states that should be found in the future.
In 1840 he might have been elected to the Presidency; but his
timid party set him aside for General Harrison, who was considered a more
available candidate. Later, he had the mortification of giving place to General
Scott and General Taylor. In 1844 he was
a candidate, but was defeated by Mr. Polk, who was elected by the party in
favour of the annexation of Texas, and of going to war with England rather than
give up the claim to Oregon, or what is now British Columbia, up to the parallel
of 54� 40'. The party motto was, 'Fifty-four
forty, or fight!' but after the election they accepted a compromise and a lower
parallel. Disappointed in his ambition, mortified by the ingratitude of his
party, Mr. Clay retired from the Senate in 1842, but was induced to return in
1849. His last public efforts were in favour
of the slavery compromises of 1850.
Mr. Clay was tall, raw-boned, and homely, but his face
lighted up with expression, his voice was musical, and his manners extremely
fascinating. Few men have had more or warmer personal friends. His oratory
possessed a power over his hearers of which the
reader of his speeches can form no conception. It was a kind of personal
magnetism, going some way to justify those who suspect that there is a mystic
influence in high-class oratory. He was loved with enthusiasm. No man in America
ever had so great a personal influence, while
few men of as high a position have left so little behind them to justify
contemporary judgments to posterity.
MRS. BROWNING
When in the summer of 1861 the sad news reached England that
Mrs. Browning was no more, the newspapers confessed with singular accord that
the world had lost in her the greatest poetess that had appeared in all its
generations.
Elizabeth Barrett, the subject of this supreme eulogy, was
the daughter of a gentleman of fortune, and at his country-seat in
Hereford-shire, among the lovely scenery of the Malvern Hills, she passed her
girlhood. At the age of ten she began to attempt
writing in prose and verse; and at fifteen her powers as a writer were well
known to her friends. She was a diligent student, and was soon able to read
Greek, not as a task, but as a recreation and delight. She began to contribute
to the magazines, and a series of essays on the
Greek poets proved how deeply she had passed into and absorbed their spirit. In
1833 she published an anonymous translation of the Prometheus Bound of
�schylus, which afterwards she superseded by a better version. Her public
fame dates, however, from 1838, when she
collected her best verses from the periodicals, and published them as The
Seraphim and other Poems.
At this time occurred a tragic accident, which for years
threw a black shadow over Miss Barrett's life. A blood-vessel having broke on
her lungs, the physician ordered her to Torquay, where a house was taken for her
by the sea-side, at the foot of the
cliffs. Under the influence of the mild Devonshire breezes she was rapidly
recovering, when, one bright summer morning, her brother and two other young
men, his friends, went out in a small boat for a trip of a few hours. Just as
they crossed the bar, the vessel capsized, and all
on board perished. Even their bodies were never recovered. This sudden and
dreadful calamity almost killed Miss Barrett. During a whole year she lay in the
house incapable of removal, whilst the sound of the waves rang in her ears as
the moans of the dying.
Literature was her only solace. Her physician pleaded with
her to abandon her studies, and, to quiet his importunities, she had a small
edition of Plato bound so as to resemble a novel. When at last removed to
London, it was in an invalid carriage, at the
slow rate of twenty miles a day. In a commodious and darkened room in her
father's house in Wimpole Street she nursed her remnant of life, seeing a few
choice friends, reading the best books in many languages, and writing poetry
according to her inspiration. Miss Mitford tells us
that many a time did she joyfully travel the five-and forty miles between
Reading and London, returning the same evening, without making another call, in
order to spend some hours with Miss Barrett.
Gradually her health improved, and in 1846 the brightness of
her life was restored and perfected in her marriage with Robert Browning. They
went to Italy, first to Pisa, and then settled in Florence. Mrs. Browning's
heart became quickly involved in Italy's
struggles for liberty and unity, and various and fervent were the poetical
expressions of her hopes and alarms for the result. Her love for Italy became a
passion stronger even than natural patriotism. Inexplicably to English readers,
she praised and trusted the Emperor of the
French as Italy's earnest friend and deliverer; and Louis Napoleon will live
long ere he hear more ardent words of faith in his goodness and wisdom than the
English poetess uttered concerning him. Blest in assured fame, in a rising
Italy, in a pleasant Florentine home, in a
husband equal in heart and intellect, and in a son in the prime of boyhood�a
brief illness snapped the thread of her frail life, and she was borne to the
tomb, bewailed scarcely less in Tuscany than in England.
Mrs. Browning wrote much and rapidly, and her poetry partakes
largely of that mystical obscurity which is the fault of so much of the verse
produced in the present age. Indeed, it would be easy to produce many passages
from her writings which might be set
as puzzles for solution by the ingenious. At the same time there is much in her
poetry which, for high imagination, subtlety, and delicacy of thought, force,
music, and happy diction, is certainly unsurpassed by anything that ever woman
wrote. Mrs. Browning has been likened to
Shelley, and the resemblances between them are in many respects very remarkable.
Miss Mitford describes Mrs. Browning in her early womanhood
as 'of a slight, delicate figure, with a shower of dark curls falling on each
side of a most expressive face; large, tender eyes, richly fringed by dark
eyelashes; a smile like a sunbeam; and such
a look of youthfulness, that I had some difficulty in persuading a friend that
she was the translatress of �schylus and the authoress of the Essay Mind.
She was certainly one of the most interesting persons that I had ever seen.'
Allowing for the influences of time and
suffering, Mrs. Browning remained the same until the end.
