OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peend, Thomas

​PEEND or DE LA PEEND, THOMAS (fl. 1565), translator and poet, educated, apparently, at Oxford University, was a London barrister. According to Wood he ‘much delighted in poetry and classical learning.’ His chief work was ‘The Pleasant Fable of Hermaphroditus and Salmacis, by T. Peend, Gent. With a Morall in English Verse. Anno Domini 1565; Mense Decembris. Imprinted by Thomas Colwell,’ 8vo. This is dedicated by T. Peend, esq., ‘from my chamber over agaynst Sergeants Inne in Chancery Lane, 1564,’ to Nicholas St. Leger. Peend says he had translated and in part printed much more of the original, but he kept it back lest ‘I shall seeme to abuse the writer or reader of those four bookes of Metamorphosis whych be so learnedly translated all redye.’ Golding's translation had just appeared. Peend's extract is from Book IV. of the ‘Metamorphoses,’ and is in fourteen-syllable verse. It is followed by an original ‘morall to the fable,’ and ‘a pleasaunt question’ in irregular verse, written with force and ease. This is signed ‘T. D. Peend.’ A short account in prose of the persons alluded to in the poems concludes the volume. Peend also issued a translation from the Spanish, entitled ‘The moste notable Historie of John Lord Mandozze,’ 1565, 12mo. The dedication is addressed from the Middle Temple to a kinsman, Sir Thomas Kemp, knight. It is followed by a poetical address to the reader and an argument. The poem is in alternate fourteen and sixteen syllable lines. In the margin attention is called to copious passages ‘added by the Translatour.’ There are some verses by Peend prefixed to John Studley's ‘Agamemnon’ (1566).
[Hunter's Chorus Vatum (Add. MS. 24491), p. 388; British Bibliographer, ii. 344, 373, 523, 587; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, i. 430; Warton's History of English Poetry (1871), iv. 297; Arber's Stationers' Register, i. 301; Tanner's Bibliotheca, p. 587.]
R. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peerson, Andrew

​PEERSON or PIERSON, ANDREW (d. 1594), divine, graduated B.A. from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, in 1540–1541 or 1542, and M.A. in 1544 or 1545 (cf. Cooper, Athenæ Cantabr. ii. 173; Masters, Hist. of C. C. C. pp. 354–5). Soon after graduating B.A. he was elected fellow of his college; for a time he was bursar, and laid out and planted with fruit trees the fellows' garden (Willis, Architectural History of Cambridge, i. 252, 261). In 1550–1 he served as proctor, and was also auditor of the Trinity chest. He vacated his fellowship about 1552, and seems to have accepted some cure in Cambridge, from which he was ejected on 3 Oct. 1553 for continuing to administer the communion in the form used under Edward VI. On Parker's election as archbishop he made Peerson his chaplain, almoner, and master of faculties, chose him to preach a sermon at the consecration on 21 Jan. 1559–60 of five bishops, bestowed upon him the livings of Brasted, Wrotham, and Chiddingstone in Kent, and, on the death of John Bale [q. v.] in 1563, secured his election to the eleventh prebendal stall in Canterbury Cathedral; he also recommended him for the provostship of Eton in 1561, but without success. In 1562–3 Peerson sat in convocation as proctor for the clergy of the diocese of Llandaff, subscribed the articles then agreed upon, and voted against the six ​articles for abolishing certain rites and ceremonies. Peerson took part in preparing for press the ‘Bishops' Bible,’ and revised the translation of Leviticus, Numbers, Job, and Proverbs (Parker Corresp. p. 355 n.) Tanner doubtfully attributes to him Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, and Proverbs. In 1569 he was one of two commissioners to visit the diocese of Canterbury, and on 4 Jan. 1570–1 had a license for non-residence. In September 1573 he entertained Burghley at his ‘fine house,’ as Parker called it, at Canterbury; the archbishop named Peerson one of his executors on his death in 1575, and bequeathed him a gilt cup, the gift of Elizabeth. On 30 June 1580 he was presented to the living of Hardres, Kent, but resigned it in 1582; on 1 Sept. 1589 he received the living of Harbledown, Kent. He died early in November 1594, having married at Sheldwich, on 16 April 1582, Sarah Sampson, widow; but he must have had a previous wife, as in his will he mentions his son, Andrew Peerson, and daughter-in-law, Joan, and their children (Hasted, Kent, iv. 492).
A. F. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peeris, William

​PEERIS, WILLIAM (fl. 1520), family chronicler, was a clerk in holy orders and secretary to Henry Algernon Percy, fifth earl of Northumberland [q. v.] He wrote in English verse a ‘Metrical Chronicle’ of the Percys from the Conquest downwards. It commences ‘here beginneth the Prologue of this little treaties followinge wch is ye dis-cent of the Lord Percies made … by me Wm Peeris, clerke and priest, secretary to the Rt noble Earl Harry the Vth Earl of Northumberland.’ According to De Fonblanque, who quotes copiously from it, it is full of inaccuracies; the original manuscript is now among the Royal MSS. in the British Museum Library (18 D ii) (Casley, Cat. p. 283), but a copy is also extant among the Dodsworth MSS. in the Bodleian (Bernard, Cat. Cod. No. 4192), which the Rev. John Besley, vicar of Long Benton, printed at Newcastle in 1845. Ritson also attributes to Peeris some proverbs in verse which adorned the walls of three apartments in Wressell Castle, Yorkshire, and have been printed in the ‘Antiquarian Repertory,’ ed. 1808, iv. 332, &c. A manuscript copy is among the Royal MSS. in the British Museum.
[Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib. p. 587; Ritson's Bibl. Poet. pp. 296–7; De Fonblanque's Annals of the House of Percy, i. 4–6, &c.; printed copy of Peeris's Work in Brit. Mus. Libr. 1845.]
A. F. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pegge, Christopher

​PEGGE, Sir CHRISTOPHER, M.D. (1765–1822), son of Samuel Pegge the younger [q. v.], by his first wife, was born in London in 1765. He entered Christ Church, Oxford, as a commoner on 18 April 1782, and graduated B.A. on 23 Feb. 1786. He was elected a fellow of Oriel College in 1788, and thence graduated M.A. and M.B. on 10 June and 18 July 1789. He returned to Christ Church, was appointed Lee's reader in anatomy there in 1790, and thence proceeded M.D. on 27 April 1792. On 9 Nov. 1790 he became physician to the Radcliffe Infirmary, and a fellow of the Royal Society in 1795. He was knighted on 26 June 1799, and in 1801 was appointed regius professor of physic at Oxford. He was elected a fellow of the College of Physicians on 25 June 1796, delivered the Harveian oration in 1805, and became a censor in 1817, having left Oxford the year before, and taken a house in George Street, Hanover Square, in hopes of obtaining relief from a severe asthma by change of abode. Soon after the same cause led him to move to Hastings. He had resigned his readership in 1816, but retained the regius professorship, an office the duties of which were small. He attended in the university, in accordance with the statutes, and died in Oxford, after an asthmatic seizure, on 3 Aug. 1822. He was master of the charitable foundation known as Ewelme Hospital, and was buried in Ewelme church, where his epitaph in the south aisle has become almost illegible. His portrait was painted by T. Nevins, and was engraved. He is represented in his full academical dress.
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peer, William

​PEER, WILLIAM (d. 1713), actor, owes the survival of his name to a humorous mention of his career by Steele in the ‘Guardian,’ No. 82. He is declared to have been an actor at the Restoration, and to have taken ‘his theatrical degree under Betterton, Kynaston, and Harris.’ No mention of him is traceable in early theatrical records, and Genest only quotes what is said by Steele. He is said to have ‘distinguished himself particularly in two characters, which no man ever could touch but himself.’ One was the speaker of the prologue to the play introduced into ‘Hamlet.’ This preface he spoke ‘with such an air as represented that he was an actor, and with such an inferior manner as only acting an actor, as made the others on the stage appear real great persons, and not representatives. This was a nicety in acting that none but the most subtle player could so much as conceive.’ His delivery of the three lines assigned him won universal applause. His second part was the Apothecary in the ‘Caius Marius’ of Otway, an adaptation of ‘Romeo and Juliet,’ first played at Dorset Garden in 1680. When Marius demanded the poison ‘Peer at length consented in the most lamentable tone imaginable, delivered the poison like a man reduced to the drinking of it himself, and said:
My poverty, but not my will consents; Take this and drink it off, the work is done.’
Steele continues: ‘It was an odd excellence, and a very particular circumstance this of Peer's, that his whole action of life depended upon speaking five lines better than any man else in the world.’ No other parts were apparently assigned him, and the management of the Theatre Royal (Drury Lane) gave him the post of property man. The easy circumstances thus induced made him grow fat and so disqualify himself for his theatrical parts. This, it is hinted, shortened his life, which closed near his seventieth year, presumably about June 1713. Steele then gives a list of the properties Peer left behind him, including items such as 8d. for ‘pomatum and vermilion to grease the face of the stuttering cook, 3d. for blood in Macbeth, 8d. for raisins and almonds for a witch's banquet,’ &c.
[Chalmers's British Essayists, 1802, xvii. 149–150; Genest's Account of the English Stage, ii. 517–19.]
J. K.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peeters, Gerard

​PEETERS, GERARD (fl. 1582–1592), author, was educated at Westminster School, whence he was elected scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1582; he matriculated on 13 Oct. in that year, graduated B.A. in 1586–7, and M.A. in 1590. In 1587 he was elected to a fellowship of Trinity, but vacated it between 1592 and 1595. He has Greek verses in the university collection on the death of Sir Philip Sidney (Acad. Cantabr. Lachrymæ, p. 72), and was probably the author of: 1. ‘Libellus de Memoria verissimaque bene recordandi scientia. Authore G. P. Cantabrigiense. Huc accessit ejusdem Admonitiuncula ad A. Dis-conum [sic] de Artificiosæ Memoriæ, quam publice profitetur, vanitate,’ London, 1584, printed by Robert Waldegrave and dedicated to John Verner. 2. ‘Antidicsonus cujusdam Cantabrigiensis G. P. Accessit libellus in quo dilucide explicatur impia Dicsoni Artificiosa Memoria,’ London (by Henry Midleton for John Harrison), 1584, 12mo. It is dedicated to Thomas Moufet [q. v.] Copies of both works are in the British Museum Library.
A. F. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peeters, John

​PEETERS or PIETERS, JOHN (1667–1727), painter, born at Antwerp in 1667, was related to the eminent marine painter Bonaventura Peeters. He studied painting at Antwerp under a history painter called Eeckhout, and in 1685 came to England with a recommendation to Sir Godfrey Kneller [q. v.] Peeters worked with Kneller for several years, being one of Kneller's chief drapery painters until 1712, when he left, and devoted himself chiefly to mending and repairing damaged pictures and drawings. From his success in this line he obtained the nickname of ‘Doctor Peeters.’ He was also a skilled copyist, especially of the works of Rubens. He was one of the masters of George Vertue [q. v.], the engraver, who spoke highly of his merits as a teacher. Peeters was a man of a lively disposition and improvident nature, and, after suffering much from the gout, he died in London in September 1727, and was buried in St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Moore, John (1730-1805)

​MOORE, JOHN (1730–1805), archbishop of Canterbury, son of Thomas Moore, was baptised in St. Michael's Church, Gloucester, on 13 Jan. 1729-30. His father is described as ' Mr.' in the parish register, and as 'gent.' in Gloucester municipal records in 1761, when John's name was entered on the freeman's roll. It is hence unlikely that the father was (as has been alleged) a butcher of the town, although he may have been a grazier of the neighbourhood. John was educated at the free grammar school of St. Mary de Crypt, Gloucester, and at Pembroke College, Oxford, where he entered with a Townsend close scholarship on 25 March 1744-5, graduated B.A. on 11 Oct. 1748, and proceeded M.A. on 28 June 1751. Having taken holy orders, he was for some years tutor to Lords Charles and Robert Spencer, younger sons of the second Duke of Marlborough. On 21 Sept. 1761 he was preferred to the fifth prebendal stall in the church of Durham, and in April 1763 to a canonry at Christ Church, Oxford. On 1 July following he took the degrees of B.D. and D.D. On 19 Sept. 1771 he was made dean of Canterbury, and on 10 Feb. 1775 bishop of Bangor. On the death of Archbishop Cornwallis he was translated to the see of Canterbury, 26 April 1783, on the joint recommendation of Bishops Lowth and Hurd, both of whom had declined the primacy. Though not a great ecclesiastic, Moore was an amiable and worthy prelate, a competent administrator, and a promoter of the Sunday-school movement and of missionary enterprise. He appears to have dispensed his patronage with somewhat more than due regard to the interests of his own family. He died at Lambeth Palace on 18 Jan. 1805, and was buried in Lambeth Church. Portraits of him (one by Romney) are at Lambeth and at the Deanery, Canterbury. Moore married twice, viz. first, a daughter of Robert Wright, chief justice of South Carolina; secondly, on 23 Jan. 1770, Catherine, daughter of Sir Robert Eden, bart., of West Auckland. He left issue.
[Foster's 'Alumni Oxon. 1715-1886; Public Characters of 1798-9, London, 1801, p. 276; Gent. Mag. 1763 p. 258, 1770 p. 46, 1805 pt. i. p. 94; Ann. Reg. 1805, Chron. pp. 80-2; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. iii. 219, v. 630, viii. 94-6; Illustr. Lit. viii. 380; Dr. Parr's Works, ed. Johnstone, vii. 380; Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Eliot, first Earl of Minto, i. 130; Wraxall's Hist, and Posth. Mem. ed. Wheatley, iii. 23-5; Colchester Corresp. i. 483; Auckland Corresp. i. 434; Hurd's Autobiography; Hasted's Kent, iv. 663, 760; Le Neve's Fasti Eccl. Angl.; Hutchinson's Durham, iii. 338-9; Lodge's Genealogy of the
Peerage and Baronetage, 1859, p. 868; Burke's Peerage, 'Eden;' Church Times, 26 June, 3 and 17 July 1891; Abbey's English Church and its Bishops; Gloucestershire Notes and Queries, iv. 128, &c.; information kindly supplied by Canon Scott Robertson.]
J. M. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Moore, John Francis

​MOORE, JOHN FRANCIS (d. 1809), sculptor, a native of Hanover, resided in London for many years in Berners Street, Oxford Street. He obtained a premium from the Society of Arts in 1766 for an allegorical bas-relief. He was a member of the Free Society of Artists, and a frequent contributor to their exhibitions from 1766 to 1775, sending statues and busts in marble, models in clay, medallions, and bas-reliefs, the latter including one of the 'Aldobrandini Marriage.' When the corporation of Lon- don resolved to erect a monument to Lord Mayor William Beckford [q. v.], Moore was successful in the competition, and the monument now existing in the Guildhall was erected from his design at a cost of 1,300l. He exhibited the design in 1772, and an engraving of it by C. Grignion was published. Moore also executed monuments to Earl Ligonier and Robert, earl Ferrers. He executed for Dr. Thomas Wilson, in St. Stephen's, Walbrook, a statue of Mrs. Catherine Macaulay [q. v.],and a monument to Mrs. Wilson. He died in York Buildings, New Road, London, on 21 Jan. 1809. He had three sons, who practised as artists, and exhibited with the Free Society of Artists: John Moore, jun., who also practised as a sculptor; Charles Moore, who was a painter; and James Moore, also a painter. The last is possibly identical with James Moore who executed some mezzotint engravings after Amiconi, Vanloo, and others.
[Redgrave's Dict., of Artists; Catalogues of the Free Soc. of Artists; Chaloner Smith's Brit. Mezzotinto Portraits; Gent. Mag. 1809, p. 94.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Moore, John Henry

​MOORE, Sir JOHN HENRY (1756–1780), poet, only son of Sir Henry Moore, bart. [q. v.], was born in Jamaica in 1756. His mother was Catharina Maria, eldest daughter of Samuel Long of Longville, Jamaica, and sister of Edward Long [q. v.], ​author of the 'History of Jamaica' (Nichols, Lit. Anecdotes, viii. 434). John succeeded to the baronetcy while still at Eton, in 1769, and proceeded to Cambridge, where he graduated from Emmanuel College, B.A. in 1773 and M.A. in 1776. In 1777 he issued, anonymously, through Almon, a volume of poems entitled 'The New Paradise of Dainty Devices,' which provoked a not unmerited sneer from the 'Critical Review' (xliii. 233). It contains, however, some fair occasional verses. The best of these, including an early parody of Gray's poem, entitled 'Elegy written in a College Library,' together with a few new pieces, and an excruciating 'palinode' deprecating the vigour of Langhorne and Kenrick, and beseeching them to 'untwist their bowels,' were issued again in 1778 as 'Poetical Trifles' (Bath, 1778, 12mp). Some lines ' To Melancholy ' evidently inspired Rogers's 'Go, you may call it madness, folly.' Moore frequently resided at Bath, deposited verses in Lady Miller's urn at Bath Easton [see Miller, Anna, Lady], and took part in the other harmless fooleries of her coterie. He died unmarried, at Taplow, on 16 Jan. 1780, when the baronetcy became extinct. A third edition of his 'Trifles' appeared posthumously in 1783, edited by his friend Edward Jerningham [q. v.] His poems appear between those of Hoy land and Headley in vol. lxxiii. of 'The British Poets,' 1822, and in similar company in vol. xli. of Park's ' British Poets,' 1808.
[Kimber and Johnson's Baronetage of England, iii. 201; Burke's Extinct Baronetage; Chambers's Encycl. of English Literature, i. 707; Brydges's Censura, vii. 223; Moore's Works in the British Museum Library; Halkett and Laing's Dict. of Anon, and Pseud. Lit, col. 1958.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Moore, John (1742-1821)

​MOORE, JOHN (1742–1821), biblical scholar, son of John Moore, rector of St. Bartholomew the Great, London, by his wife Susanna, daughter of Peter Surel of Westminster, was born on 19 Dec. 1742, and educated at Merchant Taylors' School, where he became head scholar in 1756. He matriculated from St. John's College, Oxford, on 28 June 1759, graduated B.A. 15 April 1763, and subsequently took the degree of LL.B. During his residence at the university he was singularly serviceable to Kennicott in the arduous task of collating the Hebrew manuscripts of the Old Testament. On 11 Nov. 1766 he became sixth minor prebendary in the cathedral of St. Paul, London, and he was transferred to the twelfth minor prebend and appointed sacrist in 1783. He became priest of the chapel royal; lecturer of St. Sepulchre's; rector of St. Michael Bassishaw, London, 19 Oct. 1781; rector of Langdon Hill, Essex, 1798; and president of Sion College, London, in 1800. He died at Langdon Hill on 16 June 1821.
He married Sarah Lilley, and had a daughter, Mary Anne, wife of Harry Bristow Wilson, B.D., under-master of Merchant Taylors', and mother of Henry Bristow Wilson, the historian of the school.
His works are: 1. ‘An Attempt to Recover the original reading of 1 Sam. xiii. 1, to which is added an Enquiry into the Duration of Solomon's Reign,’ London, 1797, 8vo. 2. ‘Prophetiæ de septuaginta hebdomadis apud Danielem explicatio; concio ad clerum habita in æde D. Alphægii; adjiciuntur ad calcem notæ, in quibus fusius tractantur quædam et illustrantur,’ London, 1802, 8vo. 3. ‘Case respecting the Maintenance of the London Clergy, briefly stated, and supported by Reference to Authentic Documents,’ London, 1802, 8vo; 2nd edit. 1803; 3rd edit. ‘altered to meet the Report made by a Special Committee of the Court of Common Council,’ London, 1812, 8vo. 4. ‘An attempt to throw further Light on the Prophecy of Isaiah, chap. vii. 14, 15, 16,’ London, 1809, 8vo.
He vainly endeavoured to publish by subscription Brian Walton's very rare and curious work on the ecclesiastical history of London (Todd, Life of Walton, i. 7).
[Biog. Dict. of Living Authors, 1816; Bodleian Cat. ii. 783; Darling's Cycl. Bibl. ii. 2096; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886, iii. 975; Gent. Mag. 1821, i. 574; Malcolm's Londinium Redivivum, i. 38, 39, iii. 29, 148, iv. 495; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. i. 344; Robinson's Register of Merchant Taylors' School, ii. 105; Watt's Bibl. Brit.; Wilson's Merchant Taylors' School, pp. 453, 454, 525, 1142, 1143, 1211, 1220.]
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Seymour, James

​SEYMOUR, JAMES (1702–1752), animal-painter, son of James Seymour, a banker and amateur artist, who lived on terms of intimacy with Sir Peter Lely and Sir Christopher Wren and died in 1739, was born in 1702. He gained a great reputation for his hunting subjects and portraits of racehorses, many of which were engraved by Thomas Burford [q. v.] and Richard Houston [q. v.] He was employed by Charles Seymour, sixth duke of Somerset [q. v.], to decorate a room at Petworth with portraits of his racehorses, and Walpole tells a curious story of his truculent behaviour to the duke when the latter took offence at Seymour claiming relationship to him. Seymour's picture of the famous carriage match against time at Newmarket in 1750, which was at one time in the collection of Sir Joshua Reynolds, now belongs to Colonel Smith-Barry, M.P. The Duke of Grafton owns his ‘Mr. Delmé's Foxhounds,’ and several of his hunting and racing works are in the possession of Sir Walter Gilbey, bart. Seymour's sketches of the horse in its various attitudes show extraordinary power, but he never acquired much skill as a painter, his technique being hard and coarse and his colouring unpleasant. He died on 30 June 1752.
F. M. O'D.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Saunders, George (1762-1839)

​SAUNDERS, GEORGE (1762–1839), architect, was born in 1762. In 1780 he designed the façade which was then added to the theatre in New Street, Birmingham, and which still remains, having survived the destruction of the main building by fire in 1820. In 1790 he published a ‘Treatise on Theatres,’ with plates chiefly copied from Dumont's ‘Salles de Spectacles.’ In 1795 Saunders was employed by Lord Mansfield to enlarge Caen Wood, his residence at Highgate. In 1804 he designed, for the trustees of the British Museum, an extension of Montagu House, consisting of a suite of thirteen rooms, in which were subsequently arranged the Townley marbles and other Greek and Roman antiquities. The gallery was opened by Queen Charlotte in June 1808 and removed about 1851 to make way for the enlargement of the new building. Saunders held the post of surveyor for the county of Middlesex, and for twenty-eight years was chairman of the commission of sewers. He was a member of the committee of three magistrates appointed to report upon the public bridges of Middlesex in 1826. He ​was elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1808 and also became a fellow of the Royal Society. Saunders published in 1805 a valuable paper on ‘Brick Bond as practised at Various Periods,’ and others on ‘The Origin of Gothic Architecture’ and ‘The Situation and Extent of the City of Westminster at Various Periods’ were printed in ‘Archæologia’ in 1811 and 1833. He died at his residence in Oxford Street, London, in July 1839. A marble bust of him by Cheverton, after Chantrey, belongs to the Royal Society of British Architects.
[Dict. of Architecture; Gent. Mag. 1839, ii. 321; Edwards's Founders of the British Museum, 1870, p. 392; Papworth's Views of London, 1816.]
F. M. O'D.