OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cotton, William (d.1621)

​COTTON, WILLIAM (d. 1621), bishop of Exeter, was the eldest son of John Cotton, a citizen of London, but descended from an ancient family of Staffordshire, by Pery, daughter of Mr. Cheyne. Though he was born in London, ‘his infancy,’ says Fuller, ‘was much conversant about Finchley in Middlesex.’ He went to Queens' College, Cambridge, in 1572, and became M.A. in 1575. Almost as soon as he had taken orders in the English church, its honours were showered upon him. The prebendal stall of Sneating in St. Paul's Cathedral was held by him from 1577 to 1598, and the archdeaconry of Lewes from 1578 to 1598. On 12 Nov. in the latter year he was consecrated bishop of Exeter, and in 1600 he obtained a dispensation to hold with this see the rich rectory of Silverton. He also held the office of precentor of the cathedral, with a canonry annexed, from 1599 to 1606, when he resigned this piece of preferment to his son, but quickly consoled himself (1 April 1608) with a prebendal stall in his cathedral. Cotton was notorious for the preferments which he bestowed upon his family, and for the fierceness of his opposition to any doctrines or practices savouring of puritanism. A clergyman called Snape (according to Fuller) came from Jersey and sowed the seeds of nonconformity in the diocese of Exeter, but the bishop plucked them up soon. In his old age he was apoplectic, and for some days before his death was deprived of speech; all that he could say was ‘Amen, amen, often reiterated,’ which made ‘some scandalous tongues’ exclaim that he lived like a bishop, but died like a clerk. He died of stone at Silverton, where he usually resided, on Sunday, 26 Aug. 1621, and on 31 Aug. was buried on the south side of the choir, a monument to his memory, ‘containing his portraicture, at large in his robes, cut in alabaster, curiously carved and painted,’ with a long set of Latin verses, being placed in a different part of the cathedral. His widow, Mary, daughter of Thomas Hulme, of the county of Chester, and relict of William Cutler, citizen of London, was buried near the bishop in Exeter Cathedral on 29 Dec. 1629. A full genealogical table of the children and descendants of the bishop is in Maclean's ‘Trigg Minor,’ i. 642–53.
[Oliver's Bishops of Exeter, pp. 143–4, 272; Fuller's Worthies, London (Nichols's ed. 1811), ii. 66; Fuller's Church History (Brewer's ed.), bk. x. v. 501; Prince's Worthies (ed. 1701), pp. 222–3; Le Neve's Fasti (Hardy), i. 263, 379–380, 412, 422; Addit. MS. Brit. Museum 5865 f. 202.]
W. P. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cotton, St. Vincent

​COTTON, Sir ST. VINCENT (1801–1863), gambler and driver of the Brighton coach, eldest son of Admiral Sir Charles Cotton, baronet [q. v.], was born at Madingley Hall on 6 Oct. 1801, and succeeded his father as the sixth baronet in 1812. He was educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, but it is not on record that he took any degree. He obtained a lieutenancy in the 10th light dragoons on 13 Dec. 1827, and served with his regiment in Portugal. During his residence abroad he kept up a correspondence with the driver of the ‘Cambridge Times’ coach, in which he did not give a very favourable opinion of the Portuguese. After his return to England he retired from the army on 19 Nov. 1830. He very soon distinguished himself in the hunting, shooting, racing, cricketing, and pugilistic world. He hunted at Melton and was umpire for Captain Ross in the Clinker and Radical match. From 1830 to 1835 he was a constant player in the Marylebone matches, and the love of cricket clung to him to the last. He was familiarly known either as Vinny Cotton or as Sir Vincent Twist. He lived among a roystering set who were great patrons of the prize-ring, and with Lord Waterford, Lord Waldegrave, and others he was a constant visitor to Jem Burn's parlour, whence they made midnight sallies on area bells, door-scrapers, knockers, &c. His favourite maxim with respect to the procedure to be adopted in a row was, ‘Pitch into the big rosy men, but if you see a little lemon-faced nine-stone man, have nothing to do with him.’ He was also, with his friends, frequently to be found at Tom Spring's levées in Castle Street, Holborn. His insatiable passion for hazard was, however, his ruin, and Crockford is reported to have said of Cotton that he never knew his equal in fondness for play or a more dangerous player. Having entirely dissipated the Madingley property, he was obliged to look out for some means of obtaining a living, and taking advantage of his skill as a coachman, and aware of the profits to be made on the Brighton road by a well-appointed coach, he bought the goodwill of the ‘Age’ from Jack Willaw, and for years drove it from Brighton to London and back. Coach-travelling had never been brought to such a pitch of perfection as it then reached under Cotton's auspices. The passengers were convinced that no team could get away from him, while his anecdotes and jokes caused the time to pass most pleasantly, and many a half-sovereign was the reward he received from his customers. The ‘Age,’ however, could not ultimately compete with the railway, and he had reluctantly to give up his coach. Nearly a quarter of a century before he died he was described as prematurely wrinkled and toothless, and for the last few years of his life he was so completely paralysed that he had to be carried to his carriage and strapped to the seat. He died at his residence, 5 Hyde Park Terrace, Kensington Road, London, on 25 Jan. 1863.
[Morning Post, 28 Jan. and 4 Feb. 1863; Sporting Mag. February 1863, p. 87; Gent. Mag. March 1863, pp. 393, 402; Lillywhite's Cricket Scores, ii. 140 (1862).]
G. C. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Couch, Richard Quiller

​COUCH, RICHARD QUILLER (1816–1863), naturalist, eldest son of Jonathan Couch [q. v.], was born at Polperro on 14 March 1816. After receiving a medical education under his father and at Guy's Hospital, London, where he gained several honours and prizes and obtained the ordinary medical qualifications, he returned to Polperro to assist his father, and employed his leisure in careful zoological study. In 1845 he settled in Penzance as a medical practitioner, and in a few years became recognised as an able zoological observer. Within a few weeks of his arrival at Penzance he was elected one of the secretaries ​and curators of the Penzance Natural History and Antiquarian Society, and he was for many years its president. His interesting annual addresses and many other papers on zoology by him are published in the ‘Transactions’ of that society, vols. i. and ii. He contributed the third part (on the zoophytes) to the ‘Cornish Fauna,’ written by his father; and an account of the natural history of West Cornwall to J. S. Courtney's ‘Guide to Penzance,’ 1845. Other interesting papers on zoophytes, crustacea, and fishes were contributed by him to the ‘Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall,’ the ‘Reports of the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society,’ the ‘Zoologist,’ ‘Annals of Natural History,’ &c., all of which are recorded in Boase and Courtney's ‘Bibliotheca Cornubiensis,’ i. 92–4, iii. 1138. Among these may be mentioned observations on the zoophytes of Cornwall, on the development of the frog, on the metamorphosis of the decapod crustaceans, and the natural history of the mackerel in the ‘Polytechnic Reports’ for 1842 and 1844; and on the nest of the fifteen-spined stickleback in the ‘Penzance Natural History Transactions,’ ii. 79–83. He contributed to Ralfs's ‘British Desmidieæ,’ 1848, and to Thomas Bell's ‘British Stalk-eyed Crustacea,’ 1853. Couch was also interested in Cornish geology, and did useful work in developing the difficult subject of Cornish fossil remains. From 1848 onwards he was curator of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, and contributed to its ‘Transactions’ several valuable papers, as well as annual reports. The diseases of the Cornish miners were a subject of his careful investigation, and his papers on the mortality of miners in the ‘Polytechnic Reports’ (1857–60) are, as far as they go, of permanent value; they were translated into French.
Couch died, in the full vigour of his powers, on 8 May 1863, aged 47, leaving a widow and four children.
[Obit. notices, Cornish Telegraph, 13 May 1863; Western Morning News, 12 May 1863 (by G. Bettany); Gent. Mag. 3rd ser. xv. (1863) 106–8; Hist. of Polperro, 1871, pp. 25–7; Boase and Courtney's Bibl. Cornub. i 92–4, iii. 1138.]
G. T. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cotton, Roger

​COTTON, ROGER (fl. 1596), poet, was the fifth son of Ralph Cotton, esq., of Alkington, in the parish of Whitchurch, Shropshire, by Jane, daughter and heiress of John Smith, alias Tarbock, of Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire. He had five brothers, most of whom were patrons of literature; and Allen, the youngest, became lord mayor of London and received the honour of knighthood. Roger was born at Whitchurch and probably educated in the newly founded free school there. He settled in London and carried on the business of a draper in Canning Street, having been admitted a member of the Drapers' Company. His mind became deeply imbued with the religious sentiment in consequence of his friendship with the celebrated Hugh Broughton [q. v.] He proved to be ‘a true scholar of such a master, and so constantly plied the Scriptures, according to the admonitions he had received from him, that he read over the Bible twelve times in one year’ (Lightfoot, Life of Broughton). The Cotton family esteemed Broughton so highly that when he was abroad they sent him frequently large tokens of their love—occasionally 100l. at a time. The date of Roger Cotton's death is not recorded, but by his will he bequeathed 50s. to be annually paid by the Drapers' Company for the use of the poor of Whitchurch. He married Katherine [Jenkes] of Drayton, Shropshire, and left two sons, Samuel and Alexander.
He was author of the following rare works: ​1. ‘A Direction to the waters of lyfe. Come and beholde, how Christ shineth before the Law, in the Law, and in the Prophetes: and withall the iudgements of God upon all Nations for the neglect of his holy worde, wherein they myght haue seene the same,’ London, 1590, 1592, 4to. This prose discourse is dedicated to Hugh Broughton. A third edition appeared with the title: ‘A Direct Way, whereby the plainest man may be guided to the Waters of Life,’ London, 1610, 8vo. 2. ‘An Armor of Proofe, brought from the Tower of Dauid, to fight against Spannyardes, and all enimies of the trueth,’ London, 1596, 4to, dedicated to Gilbert Talbot, earl of Shrewsbury. A poetical tract, in six-line stanzas. 3. ‘A Spirituall Song: conteining an Historicall Discourse from the infancie of the world, untill this present time: Setting downe the treacherous practises of the wicked, against the children of God: Describing also the markes and overthrow of Antichrist, with a thankesgiuing to God for the preseruation of her Maiestie, and of His Church. Drawen out of the holy Scriptures,’ London, 1596, 4to, dedicated to Sir Francis Drake. In five-line stanzas.
Some of Ireland's forged manuscript remarks, purporting to be by Shakespeare, were made in copies of Cotton's two poetical works.
[Corser's Collectanea, ii. 484–97; Bibl. Anglo-Poetica, pp. 54, 55; Ritson's Bibl. Poet. p. 174; Brydges's Restituta, iii. 138–44; Addit. MS. 24487, f. 107; Addit. Charter, 5979; Lowndes's Bibl. Brit. (Bohn), p. 535.]
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Durand, David

​DURAND, DAVID (1680–1763), French protestant minister and author, was born in 1680 at Sommières in the south of France, and studied for the ministry at Basle. Thence he went to Holland, and accompanied a corps of French refugees to Spain, where he was taken prisoner at the battle of Almanza 1707. He would have been burnt alive by some peasants but for the intervention of the Duke of Berwick. From Spain he was sent into France, and succeeded in escaping to Switzerland, ultimately finding his way back to Holland, where he became one of the pastors at Rotterdam, and gained the friendship of Bayle. He finally left Holland for London in 1711, and was successively pastor of the French churches in Martin's Lane and the Savoy. He became a member of the Royal Society in 1728, and died on 16 Jan. 1763.
Durand was a voluminous author and translator. Among his works, all in French, are a history of the sixteenth century (1725–9), a continuation of Rapin's ‘History of England’ (1734), a history of painting in antiquity (1725), and ‘Histoire naturelle de l'or et de l'argent, extraite de Pline le Naturaliste,’ London, 1729, which contains a lumbering imitation of ‘Paradise Lost’ in French verse.
F. T. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Duport, John

​DUPORT, JOHN (d. 1617), biblical scholar, descended from an ancient family at Caen in Normandy, which came into Leicestershire in the reign of Henry IV, was the eldest son of Thomas Duport of Sheepshed in that county, by his wife, Cornelia Norton of Kent (pedigree in Nichols, Leicestershire, vol. iii. pt. ii. p. 1023). Admitted of Jesus College, Cambridge, he had become M.A. and fellow there by 1580, in which year he was one of the university proctors and rector of Harleton, Cambridgeshire. He was afterwards instituted to the rectory of Medbourne, and that of Husband's Bosworth in his native county of Leicester. On 24 Dec. 1583 he was presented by Aylmer, bishop of London, to the sinecure rectory of Fulham, Middlesex; succeeded Henry Harvey, LL.D., 29 April 1585, in the precentorship of St. Paul's, London, and in 1590, being then D.D., became master of Jesus College. He was four times elected vice-chancellor of the university, in 1593, 1594, 1601, and 1609, in which last year he succeeded to the seventh prebendal stall in the church of Ely (Bentham, Ely, 2nd edit., p. 261). Duport, who died about or soon after Christmas, 1617, was one of the translators of the Bible (1611), and is recorded among the benefactors of his college as having bequeathed to it the perpetual advowson of the church of Harleton. His will, bearing date 21 Oct. 1617, was proved in P. C. C. 19 Feb. 1617–18 (registered 14, Meade). He married Rachel, daughter of Richard Cox, bishop of Ely, by whom he had John, baptised 26 April 1596, died young; Richard, baptised 4 Sept. 1597, a graduate of Cambridge; Thomas, whom his father desired to be bound apprentice to some business in London: James [q. v.]; Eudocia, baptised 10 Nov. 1592, married Samuel Hill, D.D., and was buried at Medbourne 25 Dec. 1614; Cornelia (Mrs. Jane); Rachel, baptised 22 Oct. 1598; and Luce, baptised 13 Sept. 1604, died unmarried 6 Feb. 1665, aged 61 (epitaph in Lansd. MS. 986, f. 230 b; Le Neve, Monumenta Anglicana). Mrs. Duport was buried at Medbourne on 19 July 1618.
G. G.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Duppa, Richard

​DUPPA, RICHARD (1770–1831), artist and author, son of William Duppa of Culmington, Shropshire, studied art in Rome in youth, and showed himself a skilful draughtsman. He matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford, 9 Nov. 1807, aged 37; became a student of the Middle Temple, 7 Feb. 1810; graduated LL.B. at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, in 1814; wrote largely on botanical, artistic, and political topics; was elected F.S.A.; and died in Lincoln's Inn, 11 July 1831. A relative of the same name died at Cheney Longville, Shropshire, on the previous 25 Feb. while high sheriff of Radnorshire (Gent. Mag. 1831, i. 284). An elder brother, John Wood Duppa (1762–1840), was rector of Puddlestone, Herefordshire.
Duppa's chief works were:
* 'A Journal of … the subversion of the Ecclesiastical Government in 1798,' London, 1799, 3rd ed. 1807.
* 'A Selection of twelve heads from the Last Judgment of Michael Angelo,' 1801, imp. folio.
* 'Heads from the Fresco Pictures of Raffaele in the Vatican,' 1803, fol.
* 'Memoirs [1742–57] of a Literary and Political Character,' i.e. Richard Glover (1712–1785) [q.v.], whom Duppa seeks to identify with Junius, London, 1803.
* The Life and Literary Works of Michael Angelo Buonarotti, with his Poetry and Letters,' London, 1806, with fifty etched plates; 2nd ed. 1807, 3rd ed. 1816 (reissued in Bohn's 'European Library,' 1846, and in Bohn's 'Illustrated Library,' 1869).
* 'Elements of [Linnæan] Botany,' 1809.
* 'Illustrations of the Lotus of Antiquity,' London, 1813, 4to; reissued in folio, 1816, in an edition of twenty-five copies (cf. Pritzel, Thes. Lit. Bot. 2nd ed. p. 95).
* 'Classes and Orders of Botany,' illustrated 1816.
* 'Dr. Johnson's Diary of a Journey into North Wales in 1774,' first printed and elaborately edited by Duppa in 1816 with Mrs. Piozzi's help (incorporated in Croker's (Boswell).
* 'Life of Raffaele,' 1816.
* 'Outlines of Michael Angelo's Works, with Plans of St. Peter's, Rome,' 1816.
* 'Miscellaneous Observations on the Continent,' 1825; reissued in 1828 as 'Travels in Italy, Sicily, and the Lipari Islands.'
* 'Maxims and Reflections,' 1830. Duppa also issued pamphlets on literary copyright (1813), on Junius (1814), and on the price of corn (1815), besides many classical school-books. His library was sold 3-7 Sept. 1831.
[Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Gent. Mag. 1831, ii. 567; Redgrave's Dict.; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Durant, John

​DURANT or DURANCE, JOHN (fl. 1660), puritan divine, was, according to Edwards's ‘Gangræna,’ apprenticed to a washing-ball maker of Lombard Street in 1641, but this seems scarcely consistent with Edwards's own story of Durant having before 1646 expressed his regret that he had spent much time in reading the Fathers. He was an independent preacher at Sandwich in 1644. A year or two later he removed to Canterbury, where he preached at first in a church and in a private room, and afterwards in the cathedral. The royalist Edwards denounces him with characteristic violence. His published works bear out Calamy's description of him as ‘an excellent practical preacher.’ They also show him to have been a man of some learning, acquainted with both Greek and Hebrew as well as Latin. After the Restoration he was ejected from Canterbury Cathedral, but of his further history nothing is known. His works are: 1. ‘Comfort and Counsell for Dejected Soules. Being the heads and sum of divers Sermons preached to a particular congregation,’ 1651, 4th ed. 1658, where the author is described as pastor of ‘a church of Christ’ in Canterbury, i.e. the cathedral. 2. ‘Sips of Sweetnesse, or Consolation for weak Beleevers,’ 1651. 3. ‘The Salvation of Saints by the appearances of Christ (1) Now in Heaven (2) Hereafter from Heaven,’ 1653. 4. ‘A Discovery of Glorious Love, or the Love of Christ to Beleevers; being the sum of VI Sermons on Ephes. iii. 19,’ preached at Sandwich eleven years before (1655). 5. ‘The Spiritual Seaman, or a Manual for Mariners, being a short tract comprehending the principal heads of Christian religion, handled in allusion to the Seaman's Compass and Observations,’ 1655; reissued, with alterations, as ‘The Christian's ​Compass,’ 1658. 6. ‘Altum Silentium, or Silence the Duty of Saints under every sad Providence; a Sermon preached after the death of a Daughter by her Father,’ 1659 (September). 7. ‘A Cluster of Grapes taken out of the Basket of the Woman of Canaan; being the Summe of certain Sermons,’ 1660. All these works were published as by John Durant, and the name is thus spelt in Calamy; but Edwards writes of Durance, and the ‘Canterbury Cathedral Register’ (Harleian Soc.) contains the birth of Elizabeth Durance, 1656, and of Renovata Durance, 14 Nov. 1659, both daughters of John and Mary.
E. C-n.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dupuis, Thomas Sanders

​DUPUIS, THOMAS SANDERS (1733–1796), musician, was the third son of John Dupuis, a member of a Huguenot family who is said to have held some appointment at court. Dupuis was born 5 Nov. 1733, and was brought up as a chorister in the Chapel Royal under Bernard Gates and John Travers. On 3 Dec. 1758 he was elected a member of the Royal Society of Musicians. In 1773 (and probably earlier) he was organist of the Charlotte Street Chapel (now St. Peter's Chapel), near Buckingham Palace, and on the death of Boyce he was elected (24 March 1779) organist and composer to the Chapel Royal. On 26 June 1790 Dupuis accumulated the degrees of Mus.Bac. and Mus.Doc. at Oxford. In the same year he originated a sort of musical club, known as the Graduates' Meeting. He died at King's Row, Park Lane, 17 July 1796, and was buried in the west cloister of Westminster Abbey on the 24th. His wife, who predeceased him, was named Martha Skelton. They had three sons, Thomas Skelton (1766-1795), George (died an infant), and Charles (1770-1824). The arms on his monument in the abbey cloister arc. Or, an eagle rising from a mount ppr. impaling, for Skelton, az. on a fesse between three fleur-de-lis or, a Cornish chough sa. By the will of Bernard Gates Dupuis became entitled to an estate at North Aston, Oxfordshire. A ​collection of his cathedral music, in 3 vols., was published after his death by his pupil John Spencer. Prefixed to this work is a portrait. There is also an engraving by C. Turner, after Russell. He was an admirable organist.
W. B. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Finlay, John

​FINLAY, JOHN (1782–1810), Scottish poet, was born of humble parents at Glasgow in December 1782. He was educated in one of the academies at Glasgow, and at the age of fourteen entered the university, where he had as a classmate John Wilson ('Christopher North'), who states that he was distinguished 'above most of his contemporaries.' While only nineteen, and still at the university, he published 'Wallace, or the Vale of Ellerslie, and other Poems' in 1802, dedicated to Mrs. Dunlop of Dunlop, the friend of Burns, a second edition with some additions appearing in 1804, and a third in 1817. Professor Wilson describes it as displaying 'a wonderful power of versification,' and possessing 'both the merits and defects which we look for in the early compositions of true genius.' The prospect of obtaining a situation in one of the public offices led him to visit London in 1807, and while there he contributed to the magazines some articles on antiquarian subjects. Not finding suitable employment he returned to Glasgow in 1808, and in that year he published 'Scottish Historical and Romantic Ballads, chiefly ancient, with Explanatory Notes and a Glossary.' As the title indicates, the majority of the ballads were not his own composition, but Sir Walter Scott nevertheless wrote of the book: 'The beauty of some imitations of the old Scottish ​ballads, with the good sense, learning, and modesty of the preliminary dissertations, must make all admirers of ancient lore regret the early loss of this accomplished young man.' He also published an edition of Blair's 'Grave,' wrote a life of Cervantes, and superintended an edition of Adam Smith's 'Wealth of Nations.' In 1810 he left Glasgow to visit Professor Wilson at Ellerlay, Westmoreland, but on the way thither was seized with illness at Moffat, and died there on 8 Dec. He had begun to collect materials for a continuation of Warton's 'History of Poetry.'
T. F. H.