OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Lowe, John (1750-1798)

​LOWE, JOHN (1750–1798), Scottish poet, was born in 1750 at Kenmure, parish of Kells, East Galloway, his father being gardener at Kenmure Castle. After leaving the parish school he was apprenticed in New Galloway with John Heron, handloom weaver, father of Robert Heron (1764–1807) [q. v.] He improved his education at Carsphairn parish school, and with the help of friends entered Edinburgh University in 1771 to prepare for the church. He studied for two sessions, being tutor in the interval in the family of Mr. M'Ghie of Airds on the Dee, East Galloway. He became attached to one of the Misses M'Ghie, and found the subject for ‘Mary's Dream,’ his chief lyric, in the grief of her sister, whose lover, a ship surgeon, had been recently drowned. Near the house he had constructed an arbour in which he studied, and which, known as ‘Lowe's seat,’ Burns piously visited when he was in the neighbourhood in 1793 (Chambers, Burns, iv. 18).
Doubtful of success in the Scottish church, Lowe in 1773 went to the United States as tutor to the family of a brother of George Washington. Afterwards he conducted for a time a private school at Fredericksburgh, Virginia, where he presently took orders and obtained a living as a clergyman of the church of England. For a time he was, at least poetically, faithful to Miss M'Ghie, but he was at length fascinated by a beautiful Virginian lady, whose indifference impelled him to marry her more accommodating sister ‘from a sentiment of gratitude.’ The marriage was unhappy, Lowe became dissipated and died in 1798.
The remaining fragments of his poems (quoted from manuscript by Gillespie and Murray in their notices of Lowe) show a true, though undeveloped, love of natural beauty, and a vein of deep genuine feeling. His command of pathos is fully displayed in ‘Mary's Dream,’ his only complete lyric, which seems to have circulated in Galloway in a printed form before appearing in any collection. It has kinship with the story of Ceyx and Alcyone (as told from Ovid in Chaucer's ‘Deth of Blaunche’), and with Gay's ‘'Twas when the seas were roaring.’ When Robert Hartley Cromek [q. v.] was preparing his ‘Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song,’ 1810, Allan Cunningham foisted upon him as an antique an ingenious Scottish paraphrase of ‘Mary's Dream.’ Cromek gives both versions, and discourses with amusing seriousness on the superior merits of the pseudo-legendary strains.
[Gillespie's Life of Lowe in Cromek's Remains; Anderson's Scottish Nation, ii. 702; Grant Wilson's Poets and Poetry of Scotland; Murray's Literary Hist. of Galloway.]
T. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Lowe, John (d.1467)

​LOWE, JOHN (d. 1467), bishop successively of St. Asaph and Rochester, is said to have been a native of Worcestershire. Nash (Worcestershire, ii. 95) connects him with the Lowe family of the Lowe in Lindridge, Worcestershire, and makes him a descendant of Henry and Isabella Lowe, who lived in the reign of Richard II. He became an Augustinian eremite, and studied at Droitwich. He seems to have also been at Oxford, and is said to have been created a doctor there. He certainly came to London, where in 1428 he was prior of the house of his order, and provincial for England. About 1432 he was confessor to Henry VI. He became bishop of St. Asaph by bull dated 17 Aug. 1433, and was translated to the see of Rochester on 26 Oct. 1444. He made an agreement with the citizens of Rochester respecting his jurisdiction in the town, and before 1459 built a new palace. In politics Lowe was a Yorkist. In 1460 he joined Warwick's force at Rochester, went to Dunstable, and was sent as an emissary to Henry VI at Northampton. He did not, however, see the king, but in the same year was commissioned by the Londoners to accompany the bishop of Ely and others when they went to ask Edward's intentions respecting the crown. He made his will on 15 Aug. 1460, and feeling very infirm in 1465 wished to resign. Edward wrote to the pope on the subject, but before any decision was arrived at Lowe died in 1467, and was buried on the north side of Rochester Cathedral, where there is an altar monument to him with an inscription. According to Tanner he wrote: 1. ‘Sermones coram Rege.’ 2. ‘Conciones per annum.’ 3. ‘Lecturæ ordinariæ.’ 4. ‘Temporum Historiæ.’ 5. ‘Disputationes Theologicæ.’ It is more certain that he founded the fine library in Austin Friars, which was dispersed at the dissolution. Bury, in the epistle prefixed to his ‘Gladius Salomonis,’ an adverse criticism of Pecock's ‘Repressor,’ praises Lowe's learning and piety, and says that Lowe helped him with his book. Lowe ​was certainly of Bury's way of thinking, and was one of those who took part in Pecock's condemnation in 1457 [see under Bourchier, Thomas, 1404?–1486].
[Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. vi. 91; Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, i. 134; Fasciculi Zizaniorum, ed. Shirley (Rolls Ser.), p. 416; Hasted's Kent, ii. 6, 30, 40; Thorpe's Registr. Roff. p. 701; Waurin's Chroniques, 1447–71 (Rolls Ser.), pp. 293–8, 316; Syll. of Rymer's Fœdera, ii. 60; Pecock's Repressor of over-much blaming the Clergy, ed. Babington (Rolls Ser.), ii. 572–3; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.]
W. A. J. A.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rigaud, Stephen Jordan

​RIGAUD, STEPHEN JORDAN (1816–1859), bishop of Antigua, eldest son of Stephen Peter Rigaud [q. v.], was born at Westminster on 27 March 1816, and educated at Greenwich. He matriculated from Exeter College, Oxford, on 23 Jan. 1834, graduating B.A. 1841, M.A. 1842, and D.D. 1854. He took a double first in 1838, and was elected fellow of his college on 30 June, and appointed mathematical lecturer in 1840. He was ordained deacon in 1840 and priest in 1841. In the same year he resigned his fellowship on his marriage, but was appointed tutor of the college in 1842.
In September 1846 Rigaud, who had formed a great friendship with Dean Liddell, went to Westminster School as Liddell's senior assistant master. Rigaud's house at the school still bears his name. While he lived in London he was appointed domestic chaplain to the Duke of Cambridge, and in 1850 he was elected head master of Queen Elizabeth's school, Ipswich. In 1856 he was select preacher at St. Mary's, Oxford. In 1858 he was chosen bishop of Antigua, was consecrated on 2 Feb. at Lambeth Palace, and went out to his diocese almost immediately. He began active work with the inspection of all the schools in Antigua; on 11 July he held his first confirmation at St. John's, and on the 15th started on a tour of his diocese, going first to Tortola and then visiting each island in turn. On 17 May 1859 he died of yellow fever.
Rigaud married, on 6 July 1841, Lucy, only daughter of Benjamin Lewis Vulliamy of Pall Mall, London.
He edited his father's ‘Correspondence of Scientific Men.’ London, 1841, and was author of: 1. ‘A Defence of Halley, and other Dissertations,’ London, 8vo, 1844. 2. ‘Sermons on the Lord's Prayer,’ London, 1852. 3. ‘The Inspiration of the Holy Scripture,’ two sermons, Oxford, 1856. His journal, published in the ‘Colonial Church Chronicle,’ vol. xiii. (1859), contains excellent descriptions of some of the less known West Indian Islands.
C. A. H.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Ridpath, George (1717?-1772)

Contains subarticle Philip Ridpath (1721–1788).
​RIDPATH or REDPATH, GEORGE (1717?–1772), historian of the Scottish border, born about 1717, was the eldest son of George Ridpath, minister of Ladykirk, Berwickshire. The elder George Ridpath studied theology under Professor Campbell at Edinburgh, where he graduated on 26 June 1699. He was licensed by the presbytery of Dunse on 23 April 1706, and ordained on 19 June 1712 and presented to the parish of Upsetlington, now Ladykirk. He died on 31 Aug. 1740, aged about 62, leaving three sons, George, Philip, and William (1731–1797), who all became ministers.
George Ridpath, the younger, was licensed by the presbytery of Chirnside on 27 May 1740, and ordained 16 Feb. 1742, when he was presented by George II and William, earl of Home, to the parish of Stitchell in Roxburghshire. In 1764 he published proposals for printing by subscription the ‘History and Antiquities of Berwick and part of Roxburghshire, as well as Northumberland and Durham, as far as Bamborough and Alnwick.’ He afterwards enlarged his plan, and at his death left in manuscript ‘The Border History of England and Scotland deduced from the earliest Times to the Union of the two Crowns, comprehending a particular Detail of the Transactions of the two Nations with one another.’ It appeared after the author's death, in 1776, and was reissued in 1808, 1810, and 1848. The work, which is accurate and impartial, contains exact references and a good index. Dibdin (Lib. Comp. p. 270) calls it a good introduction to the history of Scotland. Ridpath died on 31 Jan. 1772, leaving the reputation of a ‘judicious and learned man.’ He married, on 6 Sept. 1764, Wilhelmina Dawson, who survived till 16 April 1810. A daughter named Christian was issue of the marriage.
Philip Ridpath (1721–1788), the historian's next brother, was presented by George II in August 1759 to the parish of Hutton, Berwickshire, where he procured in 1765 the erection of a new church. In 1776 he took charge of the publication of his brother's ‘Border History;’ and in 1785 published, on his own account, a good edition of ‘Boethius's Consolation of Philosophy’ (translation, notes, and illustrations). He married, on 13 Oct. 1768, Alison Hume, who died in 1790 of ‘spontaneous combustion’ (Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. viii. 227).
[Hew Scott's Fasti Eccles. Scoticanæ, ii. 436, 441, 443, 475; Scots Mag. 1772, p. 51; Jeffrey's Roxburghshire, iii. 127; Preface to Ridpath's Border History; New Statistical Account of Scotland. vol. ii. pt. iii. p. 152; Watt's Bibl. Brit. i. 127; Allibone's Dict. Engl. Lit. ii. 1806.]
G. Le G. N.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rievaulx, Aelred of

​RIEVAULX, AELRED, AILRED, or ETHELRED of (1109?–1166), historical writer. [See Ethelred.]
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rigaud, Stephen Francis Dutilh

1904 Errata appended.
​RIGAUD, STEPHEN FRANCIS DUTILH (1777–1861), painter, only son of John Francis Rigaud, R.A. [q. v.], was born at 44 Great Titchfield Street, London, on 26 Dec. 1777. One of his godfathers was Stephen Rigaud, father of Stephen Peter Rigaud, Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford, who was in no way related to him. Rigaud was brought up by his father as an artist, and in 1792 was admitted a student of the Royal Academy. In 1794 he gained the silver palette from the Society of Arts for a classical group, and in 1799 the gold palette for an historical painting. In 1801 he gained the gold medal of the Royal Academy for an historical painting of ‘Clytemnestra.’ In 1798, while on a visit to the Rev. Robert Nixon at Foot's Cray in Kent, he accompanied Nixon and J. M. W. Turner on a sketching tour through Kent. He was the constant companion and assistant of his father in many of his decorative paintings at Packington, Windsor Castle, and elsewhere. In 1805 he was one of the first six members added to the foundation members of the ‘Old’ Society of Painters in Water-colours. He exhibited many drawings with the society as well as pictures at the Royal Academy and British Institution, his subjects being sacred, classical, or drawn from Milton, Ossian, and other poets. After the temporary dissolution of the water-colour society in November 1812, he dropped out of their ranks. In 1814 he was a member of a rival water-colour society which held exhibitions in that and the following years. Rigaud had, on 1 Jan. 1808, married Miss Margaret Davies ​of Milford Haven, and in 1817, owing to his wife's health, he gave up professional work as an artist and removed to Pembrokeshire. After his wife's death, on 1 Jan. 1839, he returned to London, but met with little success on resuming his profession. He died in 1861, at the age of eighty-five, and was buried in Abney Park cemetery. He left no family.
L. C.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.234 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
| Page | Col. | Line | |
| 297 | ii | 25 | Rigaud, Stephen F. D.: for 1862) read 1861) |
| | | l.l. | for in 1808 read on 1 Jan. 1808 and for Miss Margaret Davies read Margaret, daughter of John Davies |
| 298 | i | 4 | after death insert on 1 Jan. 1839 |
| | | 7 | for 1862 read 1861 |
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Passelewe, Edmund de

Sir Edmund Passele in the ODNB.
​PASSELEWE or PASSELE, EDMUND de (d. 1327), baron of the exchequer, belonged to a family many members of which appear in the rolls as holding judicial and other official positions during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries [cf. Passelewe, Robert, and Passelewe, Simon]. Different Passelewes held land in the march of Wales and in the fen country. Edmund Passelewe belonged to the Sussex branch of the clan, and was therefore closely connected with Robert Passelewe [q. v.] treasurer of Henry III. Edmund was probably son of another Robert Passelewe. Simon Passelewe [q. v.] the judge, was also probably his uncle or near kinsman. Among his contemporaries were John and Peter Passelewe. Edmund was a considerable landowner in Kent and Sussex, holding, for example, half a knight's fee in Wittersham and a third of a knight's fee in Smeeth, both in Kent, and the manor of Cramesham in Sussex of the archbishop of Canterbury. In 1310 he did homage for these lands to Archbishop Winchelsea (Peckham Register, iii. 999), a date which may be regarded as not far distant from the time of his entering into their possession. In 1313 he agreed that his lands and chattels in Kent should be chargeable for the large debt of 100l. to Thomas de Grele (Cal. Close Rolls, 1307–13, p. 584). In 1318 he made his lands and chattels in Sussex security for a debt to Robert de Bardelby (ib. 1313–18, p. 597). Part of his estate he ultimately devoted to pious uses.
In 1288 Edmund was appointed a member of a commission to inquire into some damage done to the Isle of Thanet by an inundation of the sea. In 1309 he was appointed, with Roger de Scotre, to be intendant to the king's affairs of pleas and other business whereof they may be charged (ib. 1307–13, p. 231). Dugdale calls him a serjeant. Henceforward he was constantly employed as a justice of assize. In June 1311 he was first summoned as a judge to parliament (ib. p. 362). In January 1321 he was appointed with his colleague, Walter Stirchelee, to hear pleas of the crown at an assize held in the Tower of London (‘Ann. Paulini’ in Stubbs's Chron. of Edw. I and Edw. II, i. 290–1). On 20 Sept. 1323 he was appointed a baron of the exchequer, and continued to hold that office until the end of the reign. He died in 1327. He was a layman and a knight. A widow and two sons survived him.
T. F. T.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Paston, Edward

​PASTON, EDWARD, D.D. (1641–1714), president of Douay College, born in Norfolk in 1640, was the son of William Paston, esq., of Appleton in that county. He was sent to the English College at Douay when only ten years of age, arriving there on 24 Sept. 1651; and he was ordained priest at Bruges on 10 April 1666. Afterwards he was appointed professor of divinity at Douay. On 5 Feb. 1680–1 he was created D.D. On 11 June 1682 he set out for England, with the intention of remaining here as a missioner; but he returned to Douay in May 1683, and was employed in teaching divinity, as before. On the accession of James II he revisited this country, and lived privately in London till June 1688, when he was chosen president of Douay College in the place of Dr. James Smith, who had been raised to the episcopal dignity. He arrived at Douay on 22 July, governed the college with success for about twenty-six years, and died on 21 July 1714.
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pasor, Matthias

​PASOR, MATTHIAS (1599–1658), mathematician, linguist, and theologian, was the son of George Pasor (1570–1637), an eminent philologist, and of his wife, Apollonia, daughter of Peter Hendschius, senator of Herborn in Nassau. He was born at Herborn on 12 April 1599, and there received his first instruction in Latin and Greek. In 1614 the plague caused him to spend a year at Marburg in Hesse, where he commenced the study of Hebrew. In 1616 he went to Heidelberg, where, in addition to his own study, he gave private lessons in mathematics and Hebrew. On 20 Feb. 1617 he took the degree of M.A. at Heidelberg, and in 1619 was made professor of philosophy at the university there. On 23 April 1620 he became professor of mathematics, but was obliged to fly in September 1622, when the town was sacked by the Bavarian troops under Tilly. In the disorder he lost his books and his manuscripts. In October 1622 he reached Herborn, and was employed in the academy there till the end of 1623, when he removed to Leyden. In 1624 he arrived in England, settled at Oxford, and taught mathematics and Hebrew. He was incorporated M.A. of Oxford on 5 June 1624. He passed the winter of 1624–5 in Paris, studying Chaldee and Arabic under Gabriel Sionita, and on his return to Oxford found the place deserted on account of the plague. He declined to accompany Ussher to Ireland, preferring to continue his studies in Oxford. As soon as the sickness abated, he obtained pupils in divinity and the oriental languages. On 25 Oct. 1626, at his own request, he was made reader of Arabic, Chaldee, and Syriac in the university. He held the post for about three years, together with a Hebrew lectureship at New College. Among his pupils were John Roberts or Robartes (1606–1685), afterwards Earl of Radnor [q. v.] and Edward Pocock [q. v.] He left Oxford in the summer of 1629, when he was made professor of philosophy in the university at Groningen. In 1635 the professorship of mathematics was added to that of philosophy. He received the degree of D.D. at Groningen on 24 Oct. 1645, when he gave up his professorship of mathematics, but retained that of philosophy. He died at Groningen on 28 Jan. 1658.
A list of Pasor's published theses is given in Witte's ‘Diarium Biographicum.’ He also published: 1. ‘Oratio pro Lingua Arabica,’ Oxford, 1627. 2. ‘Tractatus de Græcis Novi Testamenti Accentibus,’ London, 1644. Much of his time was spent in editing his father's works. A Latin life of him, containing extracts from his journal, was published at Groningen in 1658.
B. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Paston, Clement

​PASTON, CLEMENT (1515?–1597), sea-captain, second son of Sir William Paston (1479?–1554) [q. v.], is said by Lloyd (State Worthies) to have served the king of France in the time of Henry VII, but the inscription on his monument, which gives the date of his death, says: 'Twice forty years he lived and somewhat more,' fixing the date of his birth about 1515. He is first mentioned in 1544 as ‘one of the pensioners’ and a fitting man to command a king's ship. In 1545 he commanded the Pelican of Danzig, of three hundred tons, in the fleet under Lord Lisle. In 1546, still, presumably, in the Pelican, he captured a French galley, having on board the Baron St. Blanchard, who appears to have been coming to England on some informal embassy from the king of France. The galley was probably the Mermaid, which was added to the English navy; but of the circumstances of the capture no record can be found. It was afterwards debated whether the galley was ‘good prize,’ and whether St. Blanchard ought to pay ransom, for which Paston demanded five thousand crowns, with two thousand more for maintenance. At the request of Henry, on giving his bond for the money, the baron was released, and he returned to France with his servants, 'two horses, and twelve mastiff dogs.' Afterwards he pleaded that he was under compulsion at the time, and that the bond was worthless, nor does it appear that the money was paid. Paston, however, kept the plunder of the galley, of which a gold cup, with two snakes forming the handles, was in 1829 still in the possession of the family. Lloyd's statement that Paston captured the admiral of France and received thirty thousand crowns for his ransom is as incorrect as that 'he was the first that made the English navy terrible.' At the battle of Pinkie in 1547, Paston was wounded and left for dead. It is said that he was the captor of Sir Thomas Wyatt in 1554, which is contrary to evidence (Froude, Hist. of Engl. cabinet edit. v. 354), and that he commanded the fleet at Havre in 1562, which is fiction. In 1570 he was a magistrate of Norfolk, and a commissioner for the trial and execution of traitors (State Papers, Dom. Elizabeth, lxxiii. 28), and in 1587, though a deputy-lieutenant of the county, he was suspected of being lukewarm in the interests of religion (Strype, Annals, iii. ii. 460). In 1588 he was sheriff of Norfolk. He died on 18 Feb. 1597, and was buried in the church of Oxnead, where a ‘stately marble tomb’ testifies that
. . . princes he served four,
In peace and war, as fortune did command,
Sometimes by sea and sometimes on the
shore.
He married Alice, widow of Edward Lambert. Her maiden name was Packington. He appears to have had no children, and left the bulk of his property to his wife, with remainder to his nephew, Sir William Paston [cf. Paston, Sir William, 1479?–1554].
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Passelewe, Simon

​PASSELEWE, SIMON (fl. 1260), baron of the exchequer, probably a brother of Robert Passelewe [q. v.] was one of the clerks of Henry III. In 1237, and later, he was acting as justice of the Jews, and took his place in that capacity with the barons of the exchequer. In 1256 he received a fine for a house at Lincoln which had belonged to Vives, one of the Jews put to death on the charge of crucifying the boy Hugh (1246?–1255) [q. v.] The king, in 1258, employed him to raise money, nominally by loans, from various religious houses, and he promised Henry to obtain a large sum from him. He used guile and threats, but failed to obtain money at St. Albans, Reading and Waltham, and the scheme was therefore abandones (Matthew Paris, v. 682–7). In February 1260 he was sent by the council of regency with letters to the king, who was then in France (Royal Letters, ii. 154). Later in the same year he was appointed, with the bishop of Lichfield and others, to treat with Llywelyn; and Hugh Mortimer, one of the king's clerks, who was with the envoys, wrote to Henry praising the diligence and faithfulnees that he showed in the course of the negotiations (Fœdera, i. 400, 404; Royal Letters, ii. 165). He was one of the king's proctors at the court of Louis IX of France in 1263, and Walter, bishop of Exeter, the head of the embassy there, warmly expressed his obligation to Passelewe. He was again sent as envoy to France in October 1265. In 1267–8 he sat as a baron of the exchequer, and in 1268 was appointed one of the king's proctors at the court of France (ib. p. 476). He attested a charter in 1269. No later notice of him is known. Matthew Paris, who did not forgive Passelewe's attempt to extort money from St. Albans and other monasteries in 1258, describes him as false and crafty. At the smae time he seems to have been one of the most diligent and able of the king's ministers of the second rank.
W. H.