OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Ewbank, John W.

​EWBANK, JOHN W. (1799?–1847), painter, born at Gateshead, Durham, in or about 1799, was adopted when a child by a wealthy uncle who lived at Wycliffe, on the banks of the Tees, Yorkshire. Being designed for the Roman catholic priesthood, he was sent to Ushaw College, from which he absconded, and in 1813 bound himself apprentice to T. Coulson, an ornamental painter in Newcastle. So strong had become his love for art that on removing with his master to Edinburgh, he was allowed to study under Alexander Nasmyth. His talents soon procured him practice both as a painter and a teacher. The freedom and truth of his sketches from nature were especially admired; and a series of drawings of Edinburgh by him, fifty-one in number, were engraved by W. H. Lizars for Dr. James Browne's ‘Picturesque Views of Edinburgh,’ fol. 1825. His reputation, however, will be found to rest mainly upon his cabinet pictures of banks of rivers, coast scenes, and marine subjects. About 1829 he essayed works of a more ambitious character, and was nominated in 1830 one of the foundation members of the Royal Scottish Academy. He painted ‘The Visit of George IV to Edinburgh,’ ‘The Entry of Alexander the Great into Babylon,’ and ‘Hannibal crossing the Alps,’ all works of much ability, yet by no means equal to his landscapes. A ‘View of Edinburgh from Inchkeith,’ which belongs to this period, exhibits higher qualities of excellence. Ewbank was now at the height of his reputation; in one year his labours, it is said, brought him the handsome sum of 2,500l. But he suddenly gave way to habitual intoxication, his wife and children were reduced to want, and he himself became the tenant of a miserable cellar. During the last twelve years of his life his pictures were frequently painted in the taproom of an alehouse, or in his own wretched abode, ‘where,’ writes one who knew him well, ‘a solitary chair and a pile or two of bricks formed the only articles in the shape of furniture to be seen—the window-sill serving for his easel. They were generally painted on tin, within an hour or two, and sold on the instant, wet and unvarnished, for sixpence or a shilling, which was immediately spent in ministering to his sensual gratifications.’ He died of typhus fever in the infirmary at Edinburgh, 28 Nov. 1847. Few of his pictures have been exhibited in London.
[The Art Union (1848), x. 51; Gent. Mag. new ser. xxix. 668; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists (1878), p. 146.]
G. G.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Ewen, John

​EWEN, JOHN (1741–1821), who is credited with the authorship of the well-known Scotch song, ‘O weel may the boatie row,’ was born in Montrose in 1741 of poor parents, and received only a very slender education. Having saved a few pounds he went in 1762 to Aberdeen, where he opened a small hardware shop. This appears to have prospered, but the chief rise in his fortunes was owing to his marriage in 1766 to Janet Middleton, one of two daughters of a yarn and stocking maker in Aberdeen. Through her, who died shortly after giving birth to a daughter, he became possessed of one half of his father-in-law's property. Ewen died on 21 Oct 1821, leaving, after the payment of various sums to the public charities of Aberdeen, about 14,000l. to found a hospital in Montrose, similar to Gordon's Hospital, Aberdeen, for the maintenance and education of boys. The will was challenged by the daughter's relations, and after conflicting decisions in the Scotch court of session was appealed to the House of Lords, who, on 17 Nov 1830, set aside the settlement on the ground that the deed was void in consequence of its want of precision as to the sum to be accumulated by the trustees before building and as to the number of boys to be educated on the foundation. ‘O weel may the boatie row’ was published anonymously in Johnson's ‘Scots Musical Museum.’ It is thus characterised by Burns: ‘It is a charming display of womanly affection mingling with the concerns and occupations of life. It is nearly equal to “There's nae luck about the house.”’
T. F. H.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Ewing, Juliana Horatia

1904 Errata appended.
​EWING, JULIANA HORATIA (1841–1885), writer for the young, was born in 1841 at Ecclesfield in Yorkshire, a few miles from Sheffield. Her father was Alfred Gatty, D.D., vicar of Ecclesfield. Her mother was Mrs. Margaret Gatty [q. v.] Juliana Gatty started in life as the story-teller of the nursery. She was so much given to mimicry that her mother was constrained to write a story to check the excessive development of that faculty; but to the last she loved play-acting, and acted well. From the first her character was strongly marked by the uprightness, gentleness, and generosity which she loved to dwell on in her stories. Her first story was ‘A Bit of Green,’ published in the ‘Monthly Packet’ in July 1861; and this story, with some others, constituted her first volume, published in 1862 under the title ‘Melchior's Dream, and other Tales.’ From her youth she was very delicate, but although her sufferings were severe in later life, she never lost her cheerfulness. From 1862 to 1868 the Ecclesfield family circle kept up a manuscript magazine, but few of the contributions made to this were printed. ‘Aunt Judy's Magazine,’ started in May 1866, owes its title to the nickname given to Juliana Gatty as the nursery story-teller. Her first contribution to the magazine in which most of her stories appeared was ‘Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances.’ In 1867 she married Major Alexander Ewing, Army Pay Department, and with her husband soon sailed for New Brunswick. In 1869 she sent to ‘Aunt Judy's Magazine’ the story which shows her powers at their best, ‘The Land of Lost Toys,’ followed by many others, some written in delightful irregular verse and afterwards published in small separate volumes. In 1872 she wrote her first soldier-story ‘The Peace Egg,’ to be followed by ‘Lob-lie-by-the-fire’ (1873), the popular ‘Jackanapes,’ and the touching ‘Story of a Short Life.’ On the death of Mrs. Gatty in 1873, Mrs. Ewing helped her sister to edit the magazine, but after two years she gave the work up and confined herself to her own tales. At Aldershot, Bowdon in Cheshire, and York, her occupations and interests were the same. In 1879 she started to join her husband in Malta, but at Paris she became so ill that she had to return to England. Until 1883 she was separated from her husband. In that year she removed to Taunton, which she left for Bath, where she died on 13 May 1885.
Most of Mrs. Ewing's stories appeared in ‘Aunt Judy's Magazine,’ from 1866 to 1885, but she contributed also to a few other periodicals. Her separate works were published in small volumes by Bell & Sons and the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
P. A. H.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.119 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
| Page | Col. | Line | |
| 96 | i | 4 f.e. | Ewing, Juliana H.: for 1861 read 1866 |
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Aleyn, Charles

​ALEYN, CHARLES (d. 1640), a poet, whose works have not been thought of sufficient merit to deserve a place amongst the collected works of English poets, was educated at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and became a master in the school of Thomas Farnaby in St. Giles', Cripplegate. Subsequently he was private tutor to Sir Edward Sherburne, commissary-general and clerk of the ordnance. He died in 1640, and was buried in the ​churchyard of St. Andrew's, Holborn. His works are: 1, ‘The Battailes of Crescey and Poictiers,’ London 1631, 8vo, reprinted in 1633. 2. ‘The Historie of Henrie of that name the Seventh King of England. With that famed Battaile upon Redmore, near Bosworth,’ London, 1638, 8vo. 3. ‘The History of Eurialus and Lucretia,’ London, 1639, 8vo. The last work is a translation from Æneas Sylvius.
[Winstanley's Lives of English Poets; Wood's Athenæ Oxon.]
N. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alexander of Ashby

​ALEXANDER of Ashby (fl. 1220), prior of the Austin priory at Ashby, Northamptonshire, has been variously stated to have been a native of Somersetshire and Staffordshire. He wrote a number of theological tracts, chronicles, and Latin poems. His name, according to Wood, appears in a legal document, dated about 1204, belonging to the priory of St. Frideswide's, Oxford. The chief work ascribed to him is a manuscript in Corpus College library, Cambridge, entitled ‘Alexandri Essebiensis Epitome Historiæ Britanniæ a Christo nato ad annum 1257.’ It is mainly an abridgment of Matthew Paris. Fuller, in his ‘Church History’ (ed. Brewer, i. 157), quotes some lines from his ‘De Fastis seu Sacris Diebus,’ an elegiac poem in imitation of Ovid's ‘Fasti,’ the manuscript of which is in the Bodleian. Other works, the names of which are given by Bale, Pits, and Tanner, are verse lives of St. Agnes, a history of the Bible, and a treatise on the art of preaching.
[Dugdale's Monasticon (1830), vi. 442; Hardy's Descriptive Catalogue, iii. 145, Rolls Ser.; Tanner's Bibliotheca, pp. 29–30.]
S. L. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alfred Anglicus

​ALFRED, surnamed Anglicus and also Philosophus, an English writer, who probably flourished towards the close of the twelfth and beginning of the thirteenth centuries. Considerable obscurity rests over his career and works. Roger Bacon, in his reference to translators of Aristotle, mentions one Alfred, an Englishman (R. B. Op. Ined., by Brewer, 1859, p. 471), and speaks of him as a contemporary. The work in which the reference is made doubtless was not prior to 1270. A translation of the pseudo-Aristotelian work, ‘De Vegetabilibus et de Plantis,’ passes under the name of Alfred de Sarchel or Sereshel, and appears to have been dedicated to Roger of Hereford, who is said to have flourished towards the close of the twelfth century (Bréchillet-Jourdain, Recherches sur les Traductions d'Aristote, 2nd ed., 1843, pp, 105–6). A somewhat remarkable little work, ‘De Motu Cordis,’ also by Alfred de Sarchel, is dedicated by the author to his friend and teacher, Alexander Neckham, who died 1227 (C. S. Barach, Excerpta e libro Alf. Ang. de Motu Cordis, 1878, pp. 1–18.) Other works are ascribed to the same Alfred by Bale, Leland, and Pits (see list in Jourdain and Barach, as above). There is difficulty in reconciling what Bacon says with the other facts regarding Alfred, but it is to be remembered that the precise date of Bacon's reference is not known, and that its minute accuracy is not to be rashly assumed. On the other hand, it is not clear that Roger of Hereford is referred to by the translator and annotator of the ‘De Plantis.’ The most satisfactory evidence as to Alfred seems to be that contained in the dedication to Alexander Neckham, and one would therefore assign to the ‘De Motu Cordis’ the date about 1220. This little work expounds, with much that is fantastic, the doctrine that in the heart is to be found the seat of the soul—a doctrine that is repeated in Neckham's ‘De Naturis Rerum’ (ed. by Brewer in Rolls Series). A summary of its contents is given by Barach in his preface to the ‘Excerpta,’ already referred to.
R. A.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alford, Michael

​ALFORD, MICHAEL (1587–1652), a Jesuit and ecclesiastical historian, whose real name was Griffiths, was born in London in 1587, and entered the noviciate of the Society of Jesus at Louvain in 1607. He studied philosophy in the college of the English Jesuits at Seville, and theology at Louvain. On his promotion to the priesthood he was ordered to Naples to attend the English gentry, merchants, and sailors there. In 1615 he was English penitentiary at St. Peter's, Rome. He was appointed Socius to the Master of Novices at Liége, and in 1621 he became rector of the house of Tertians at Ghent. In 1629, or late in the previous year, he was sent to the English mission. On landing at Dover he was arrested on suspicion of his being Dr. Richard Smith, bishop of Chalcedon, for whose apprehension the government had offered a reward of 200l. He was conveyed by his captors to London, but as his person in no respect corresponded with the description of the bishop, he was restored to liberty, through the mediation of Queen Henrietta Maria, consort of Charles I. The county of Leicester was the chief scene of Father Alford's missionary labours. There is, however, a tradition, apparently well founded, that he resided for some time at Combe, in Herefordshire. In 1636 he was rector of the ‘Residence’ of St. Anne, comprising the county of Leicester. He resided at Holt, where he employed his leisure in composing his learned works. In order to put the finishing stroke to his ‘Annales Ecclesiastici,’ he obtained leave to retire to the College of St. Omer in the spring of 1652, and while there he was attacked by a fever, from which he died on 11 Aug. in the same year. His works are:
1. ‘The Admirable Life of St. Winefride,’ 1635 (a translation), re-edited the same year by Father John Falconer. 2. ‘Britannia Illustrata, sive Lucii, Helenæ, Constantini, Patria et Fides,’ Antwerp, 1641, 4to, an extremely rare work, containing much curious matter connected with English and Irish history. It has an appendix, ‘De tribus hodie controversis, de Paschate Britannorum, de Clericorum Nuptiis, num olim Britannia coluerit Rom. Ecclesiam?’ 3. ‘Fides Regia Britannica sive Annales Ecclesiæ Britannicæ. Ubi potissimum Britannorum Catholica, Romana, et Orthodoxa Fides per quinque prima sæcula: e Regum et Augustorum factis, et aliorum sanctorum rebus è virtute gestis, asseritur,’ 4 large folio vols. Liége, 1663. It is remarkable that the title-page varies in each of these handsome volumes. Bishop Fleetwood has pronounced this collection to be a very valuable treasury of the ecclesiastical history of our nation.
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alexander of Canterbury

​ALEXANDER of Canterbury (fl. 1120?), a monk of Christ Church, Canterbury, is known as the author of a work, ‘Dicta Anselmi archiepiscopi,’ which has been also ascribed to Eadmer. He was employed as a messenger from the Countess Matilda to St. Anselm, and was sent by St. Anselm to Pope Paschal II for his instruction on various points.
[Epistolæ S. Anselmi, lib. iv. ep. 37; Papæ Paschal. 90; Tanner's Bibliothec. p. 29.]
H. R. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alfred of Beverley

​ALFRED of Beverley (fl. 1143), chronicler, was a priest of Beverley, and is described in the preface to his book as ‘treasurer of the church of Beverley’ and ‘Master Alfred, sacrist of the church of Beverley.’ He speaks of himself as contemporary with the removal of the Flemings from the north of England to Ross in Herefordshire in 1112, and writes that he compiled his chronicle ‘when the church was silent, owing to the number of persons excommunicated under the decree of the council of London,’ an apparent reference to the council held at Mid-Lent, 1143. His attention, by his own account, was first drawn to history by the publication (before 1139) of Geoffrey of Monmouth's ‘Historia Britonum,’ and he looked forward to following up the chronicle which bears his name, and which largely depends on Geoffrey's work, with a collection of excerpts from the credible portions of the ‘Historia Britonum,’ but no trace of such a work is extant. Alfred of Beverley's chronicle is entitled ‘Aluredi Beverlacensis Annales sive Historia de gestis Regum Britanniæ libris ix. ad annum 1129.’ It is largely devoted to the fabulous history of Britain, and is mainly borrowed from Bede, Henry of Huntingdon, and Symeon of Durham, when Geoffrey of Monmouth is not laid under contribution. Alfred quotes occasionally from Suetonius, Orosius, and Nennius, and names many Roman authors whom he had consulted in vain for references to Britain. The chronicle is of no real use to the historical student, since it adds no new fact to the information to be found in well-known earlier authorities. The best manuscript of Alfred's ‘Annales’ is that among the Hengwrt MSS. belonging to W. W. E. Wynne, Esq., of Peniarth, Merionethshire, and has not been printed. Hearne printed the ‘Annales’ in 1716 from an inferior Bodleian MS. (Rawl. B. 200).
S. L. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Alfield, Thomas

​ALFIELD or AUFIELD, THOMAS, alias Badger (d. 1585), seminary priest, a native of Gloucestershire, was educated at Eton, and sent thence in 1568 to a fellowship at King's College, Cambridge. He was afterwards reconciled to the catholic church, and went over to the English college at Rheims, where he was ordained priest in 1581. He was sent on the English mission the same year. Soon after his arrival in this country he was apprehended and put to the torture. He so far yielded as to consent to go to the protestant church, whereupon he was set free. Afterwards he sincerely repented his weakness, and resumed his functions as a missioner. He imported into the kingdom some copies of Dr. Allen's ‘True and modest Defence of English Catholics that suffer for their Faith,’ and dispersed them with the help of Thomas Webley, a dyer. They were both arrested, and most cruelly tortured in prison. On 5 July 1585 they were arraigned at the sessions hall in the Old Bailey, and having been ‘found guiltie, condemned, and had judgment, as felons to be hanged, for publishing of books, containing false, seditious, and slaunderous matter, to the defamation of our Soveraygne lady the Queene, these were on the next morrow executed at Tyborne accordingly.’ Their offence being felony, they were only hanged, not butchered alive with the knife of the executioner.
[Cal. of State Papers, Domestic (1581–90), 153, 168, 243, 249; Diaries of the English College, Douay; Knox's Letters and Memorials of Card. Allen; Stowe's Annales (1614), 708; Rambler, N.S. vii. (1857), 420–31; Oliver's Hist. of the Catholic Religion in Cornwall, 103; Harwood's Alumni Eton. 182; Dodd's Church Hist. (1737), ii. 64; Challoner's Missionary Priests (1741), 168; Strype's Annals, iii. (i.), 708; MS. Lansd. 33, art. 58; Notes and Queries, 6th ser. ix. 485.]
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Arne, Michael

​ARNE, MICHAEL (1741?–1786), musician, the son of Dr. Arne, was born either in 1740 or 1741. His father wished to make him; a singer, and his aunt, Mrs. Gibber, brought him on the stage when very young, in the part of the page in Otway's tragedy, 'The Orphan,' but giving evidence of more talent as an instrumentalist than a vocalist he henceforth came before the public principally as a performer on the harpsichord, in which capacity he played at a concert when he was only eleven. His performance of Scarlatti's Lessons and his facility in executing double shakes are noted by his contemporaries. His first published composition was a volume of English songs, 'by Master Arne,' and after producing several similar collections, in 1763 he wrote music for 'The Fairy Tale' and 'Hymen' (performed at Drury Lane). In the following year Michael Arne, in collaboration with Jonathan Battishill, set the opera of 'Almena,' which was produced at Drury Lane 6 Nov. 1764, and was played six times. At this time he was living at 14 Crown Court, Russell Street, Covent Garden. On 20 March 1765 he was elected a member of the Madrigal Society, but in the following year his membership ceased. He was re-elected on 16 Dec. 1767 (Records of Madrigal Soc). On 5 Nov. 1766, he married Miss Elizabeth "Wright, who sang in her husband's next work, 'Cymon,' a spectacular drama, written by Garrick, which was successfully produced at Drury Lane 2 Jan. 1767. He was now living 'at Mr. O'Keeffe's, at the Golden Unicorn, near Hanover Street, Long Acre,' but about this time, according to some accounts during a visit to Dublin, he became engrossed in the pursuit of alchemy, and built a laboratory at Chelsea in order to carry on his attempts to discover the philosopher's stone. Ruined and bankrupt, he was before long forced to return to music. In 1770 he was living 'at Mr. Doron's, facing the Vine, near Vauxhall.' He published several volumes of songs, which were sung at Vauxhall Gardens, Where his first wife supported him by singing until her death (which occurred before 1775), and he also supplied music for several dramas. In 1779 he obtained an engagement at Dublin, but in 1784 he was once more in London, and died at South Lambeth, 14 Jan. 1786, leaving his second wife in a state of great destitution. Burney (in 'Rees's Cyclopædia') says of Michael Arne that 'he was always in debt, and often in prison; he sung his first wife to death, and starved the second, leaving her in absolute beggary.'
[Grove's Dictionary, i. 83; Rees's Cyclopædia, vol. ii., 1819; British Museum Catalogue; Dibdin's Musical Tour, 1788; European Magazine, i vols. vi. and ix.; Garrick's Correspondence in Forster Bequest at South Kensington Museum; Kelly's Reminiscences, 1826.]
W. B. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Arnold, Joseph

​ARNOLD, JOSEPH, M.D. (1782–1818), naturalist, was born 28 Dec. 1782 at Beccles, was apprenticed to a local surgeon named Crowfoot, and graduated M.D. Edin. 1807. In his youth he had directed much attention to botany, and made some communications to the 'Gentleman's Magazine.' He entered the British navy as surgeon in 1808, and, the navy being reduced after the war, in January 1815 we find him in medical charge of the Northampton, bound with female convicts to Botany Bay. Returning by way of Batavia in the Indefatigable, of Boston, the ship was burnt by carelessness on 22 Oct. 1815, destroying many of his journals, and his collection of insects from South America, New Holland, and the Straits of Sunda. After some excursions in Java with Sir Stamford Raffles, of which interesting accounts are preserved in the memoir by Mr. Dawson Turner, he returned home in 1816, but, longing for further opportunities of research in travel, he obtained employment as naturalist with Sir Stamford Raffles when he was appointed governor of Sumatra. He prepared himself for research on an extensive scale by study in London. Arriving at Bencoolen 22 March 1818, his second excursion to Passumah produced the discovery of the remarkable plant without stem or leaves named, after the governor and himself, Rafflesia Arnoldi, which is parasitic upon a species of wild vine, and has a huge flower three feet in diameter, and weighing 15lbs. This was described by Robert Brown in Trans. Linn. Soc. xiii. He made a rich collection of shells and fossils, but was cut off by fever at Padang. Sumatra, on one of the last days of July 1818. Sir T. S. Raffles, in recording his death, says: 'It is impossible I can do justice to his memory by any feeble encomiums I may pass upon his character. He was in every respect what he should have been; devoted to science and the acquisition of knowledge, and aiming only at usefulness.' He was elected F.L.S. 1815, and bequeathed his collection of shells and fossils to the Linnean Society.
G. T. B.