Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/301

 clerk in the board of works, which he resigned in 1805. Among his chief works for private patrons are a temple in the grounds at Saffron Walden in Essex for Lord Braybrooke, and a mausoleum in Scotland for the Fraser family; Winchester House, St. James' Square, erected originally for the Duke of Leeds; 9 Berkeley Square, afterwards sold to the Marquis of Buckingham; Buckingham House, 91 Pall Mall, rebuilt in 1794 by Sir John Soane; Lansdowne House, Berkeley Square; 80 Piccadilly, for Sir Francis Burdett; Charlton, Wiltshire, for the Earl of Suffolk; Waldersham,Kent, for the Earl of Guilford; Felbrigg Hall, Norfolk, for the Hon. W. Wyndham; Longleat, Wiltshire; and Roehampton, Surrey, and Hillsborough House in Ireland, both for the Marquis of Downshire. He is also supposed by some to have designed Maidenhead Bridge, on the Thames; but this is believed to be a mistake, the authorship of that design, which was executed in 1772, being invariably ascribed by the best authorities to Sir Robert Taylor. Brettingham was held in much regard by his professional brethren, and was the esteemed master of many who have since attained eminence in the architectural profession. The exact date of his death is not known.



BREVAL, JOHN DURANT (1680?–1738), miscellaneous writer, was descended from a French refugee protestant family, and was the son of Francis Durant de Breval, prebendary of Westminster, where he was probably born about 1680. Sir John Bramston, in his 'Autobiography,' p. 157, describes the elder Breval in 1672 as 'formerly a priest of the Romish church, and of the companie of those in Somerset House, but now a convert to the protestant religion and a preacher at the Savoy.' Bramston gives 1666 as the date of his conversion. The younger Breval was admitted a queen's scholar of Westminster School 1693, was elected to Trinity College, Cambridge, 1697, and was one of the Cambridge poets who celebrated in that year the return of William III after the peace of Ryswick. Breval proceeded B.A. 1700, and M.A. 1704. In 1702 he was made fellow of Trinity ('of my own electing,' said Bentley). In 1708 he was involved in a private scandal, which led to his removal from the fellowship. He engaged in an intrigue with a married lady in Berkshire, and cudgelled her husband, who illtreated his wife. The husband brought an action against Breval, who was held to bail for the assault, 'but, conceiving that there was an informality in the proceedings against him,' did not appear at the assizes, and was outlawed. Thereupon Bentley took the matter up, and on 5 April 1708 expelled Breval from the college. Bentley admitted that Breval was 'a man of good learning and excellent parts,' but said his 'crime was so notorious as to admit of no, evasion or palliation' (State of Trinity College, p. 29 et seq. 1710). Breval, however, declared on oath that he was not guilty of immoral conduct in the matter, and bitterly resented the interposition of Bentley, who, he declared, had a private grudge both against his father and himself. His friends said 'that the alleged offence rested on mere rumour and suspicion,' and that the expelled fellow would have good grounds for an action against the college. Such an action, however, was never brought, probably on account of Breval's poverty. As Bentley wrote, 'his father was just dead [Francis Breval d. February 1707] in poor circumstances, and all his family were beggars.' Breval, in want and with his character ruined, enlisted in despair as a volunteer in our army in Flanders, where he soon rose to be an ensign. Here what Nichols calls 'his exquisite pencil and genteel behaviour,' as well as his skill in acquiring languages, attracted the attention of Marlborough. The general appointed him captain, and sent him on diplomatic missions to various German courts, which he accomplished very creditably. The peace of Utrecht closed the war in 1713, and a few years after we find Breval busily writing for the London booksellers, chiefly under the name of Joseph Gay. He then wrote 'The Petticoat,' a poem in two books (1716), of which the third edition was published under the name of 'The Hoop Petticoat' (1720): 'The Art of Dress,' a poem (1717); 'Calpe or Gibraltar,' a poem (1717); 'A Compleat Key to the Nonjuror' (1718), in which he accuses Colley Cibber of stealing his characters, &c., from various sources, but chiefly from Mohere's 'Tartuffe,' for the revival of which Breval wrote a prologue; 'MacDermot, or the Irish Fortune Hunter,' a poem (1719), a witty but extremely gross piece; and 'Ovid in Masquerade' (1719). He also wrote a comedy, 'The Play is the Plot' (1718), which was acted, though not very successfully, at Drury Lane. When altered and reprinted afterwards as a farce, called 'The Strollers' (second impression 1727), it had better fortune.

About 1720 Breval went abroad with George, lord viscount Malpas, as travelling tutor. It was probably during this journey that he met with the romantic adventure that