Page:Cousins's Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.djvu/212

200 youth of adventure, partly in the Mexican Navy, he returned to England, and began in 1828 a highly combative literary career with a poem, Hecatompylos, in the Athenæum. His next appearance, The False Medium (1833), an exposition of the obstacles thrown in the way of "men of genius" by literary middlemen, raised a nest of hornets; and Orion, an "epic poem," pub. 1843 at the price of one farthing, followed. His plays, which include Cosmo de Medici (1837), The Death of Marlowe (1837), and Judas Iscariot, did not add greatly to his reputation. In The New Spirit of the Age (1844), he had the assistance of. Though a writer of talent, he was not a poet.

  (1780-1862).—Theologian, ed. at Christ's Hospital, was for a time in the law, but became a great biblical scholar, and in 1818 pub. Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures (1818), in consideration of which he was admitted to orders without the usual preliminaries, and in 1833 obtained a benefice in London and a prebend in St. Paul's, and was senior assistant in the printed books department of the British Museum (1824-60). He wrote an Introduction to the Study of Bibliography (1814), and various other works, but he is chiefly remembered in connection with that first mentioned, which was frequently reprinted, and was very widely used as a text-book both at home and in America.

  (1809-1885).—Poet, s. of Robert (known as "single-speech") M., b. in London, and ed. privately and at Camb. He sat in the House of Commons for Pontefract from 1837-63, when he was raised to the Peerage. His interests were, however, mainly literary and philanthropic, and it was said of him that he "knew everybody worth knowing at home and abroad;" and his sympathies being of the widest, he was able to bring together the most opposite extremes of life and opinion. He championed the cause of oppressed nationalities, and of the slave. He pub. many vols. of poetry, among which were Poetry for the People (1840), and Palm Leaves (1848). He also wrote a Life of Keats, and various books of travels. Though he had not the depth of mind or intensity of feeling to make a great poet, his verse is the work of a man of high culture, graceful and refined, and a few of his shorter poems—such as The Beating of my own Heart, and Strangers Yet, strike a true note which gained for them wide acceptance.

  (d. 1841).—Novelist, a sea-comrade of Captain Marryat, and as sub ed. assisted him in conducting the Metropolitan Magazine. He wrote several sea novels, of which Rattlin the Reefer, sometimes attributed to Marryat, is the best known. Others were Outward Bound and Jack Ashore.

  (1626-1698).—Dramatist, s. of the Earl of Berkshire, and brother-in-law of. On the outbreak of the Civil War he was of the King's party, and was imprisoned during the Commonwealth. After the Restoration, however, he was in favour with the Court, and held many important