Page:Cousins's Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.djvu/278

 266 Dictionary of English Literature

holding various minor offices became in 1871 clerk to the House of Commons, retiring in 1886, when he was raised to the peerage. He had previously, 1866, been made K.C.B. He was the author of a treatise on the laws, privileges, etc., of Parliament, which, first pub. in 1844, reached in 1901 its tenth ed., and was translated into various languages. His Constitutional History of England, 1760-1860 is practically a continuation of Hallam's great work. He also wrote Democracy in Europe. As an historical writer M. was learned, painstaking, and impartial.

MAYNE, JASPER (1604-1672). Dramatist, was at Oxf.,

entered the Church, and became Archdeacon of Chichester. He wrote two dramas, The City Match (1639), and The Amorous War (1648), in neither of which did he sustain the clerical character. He had, however, some humour.

MAYNE, JOHN (1759-1836). Poet, was b. in Dumfries.

In 1780 he pub. the Siller Gun in its original form in Ruddiman's Magazine. It is a humorous poem descriptive of an ancient custom in Dumfries of shooting for the " Siller Gun." He was continually adding to it, until it grew to 5 cantos. He also wrote a poem on Hallowe'en, and a version of the ballad, Helen of Kirkconnel. His verses were admired by Scott.

MELVILLE, HERMAN (1819-1891). Novelist, b. in New

York, and took to the sea, which led to strange adventures, includ ing an imprisonment of some months in the hands of cannibals in the Marquesas Islands. His first novel, Typee (1846), is based upon this experience. Omoo followed in 1847, Moby Dick, or the White Whale, a powerful sea story, in 1852, and Israel Potter in 1855. He was a very unequal writer, but occasionally showed considerable power and originality.

MELVILLE, JAMES (1556-1614). Scottish divine and re former, s. of the laird of Baldovie, in Forfarshire, and nephew of the great reformer and scholar, Andrew M., by whom, when Principal of the Univ. of Glasgow, he was chosen to assist him as a regent or professor. When, in 1580, Andrew became Principal of St. -Mary's Coll., St. Andrews, James accompanied him, and acted as Prof, of Hebrew and Oriental Languages. He wrote many poems, but his chief work was his Diary, an original authority for the period, written with much naivete, and revealing a singularly at tractive personality. M., who for his part in Church matters, had been banished to England, d. at Berwick on his way back to Scotland.

MELVILLE, SIR JAMES (1535-1617). Historian, s. of Sir

John M., of Hallhill, was a page to Mary Queen of Scots at the French Court, and afterwards one of her Privy Council. He also acted as her envoy to Queen Elizabeth; and the Elector Palatine! He was the author of an autobiography which is one of the original authorities for the period. The MS., which lay for long hidden in Edin. Castle, was discovered in 1660, and pub. 1683. A later ed. was brought out in 1827 by the Bannatyne Club. The work is