Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/148

Egan was 'English Hospitality in the Olden Time,' after G. Cattermole. Among his other engravings were 'Love's Reverie,' after J. R. Herbert, R.A., 'Abbot Boniface,' after C. S. Newton, R. A., 'The Morning after the Wreck,' after C. Bentley, 'The Study,' after E. Stone, 'The Mourner,' after J. M. Moore, 'The Young Wife,' 'The Citation of Wycliffe,' 'The Tribunal of the Inquisition,' and other pictures after S. J. E. Jones, and a portrait of John Lodge, librarian at Cambridge, after Walmisley. Egan, who married young, left a family, for whom a subscription was raised by his friends.

 EGAN, JOHN (1750?–1810) chairman of Kilmainham, co. Dublin, was born about 1750 at Charleville, co. Cork, where his father was a beneficed clergyman, and having entered Trinity College, Dublin, as a sizar, he graduated there B.A. 1773, and LL.B. 1776; the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him, honoris causa in 1790. He was called to the Irish bar in 1778, and, chiefly through the friendship of Lord Avonmore, chief baron of the exchequer, he made good way in his profession. In due course he received his silk gown; in 1787 he was elected a bencher of the Hon. Society of King's Inns, Dublin; and for several years before his death he held the judicial office of chairman of Kilmainham. For a considerable time he had been in the receipt of a very large share of business as a practising barrister, but his quarrel with Henry Grattan was professionally most injurious to him. In the Irish House of Commons he for some years represented the borough of Tallagh, co. Waterford, and his boldness as a member, especially on the question of the legislative union of Great Britain and Ireland, is well known to the student of Irish history. He died in 1810.

 EGAN, PIERCE, the elder (1772–1849), author of 'Life in London,' is believed to have been born in London in 1772. From an early time he dwelt in the suburbs, and continued to reside there until his death, making frequent expeditions to every part of England where notable races, prize fights, matches, or amusements were expected to take place. By 1812 his reputation was established as 'reporter of sporting events' in the newspapers, and his impromptu epigrams, songs, and witticisms enjoyed a wide circulation. In that year, having secured a permanent engagement, which he held until the end of 1823, as the accredited purveyor of sporting news on a journal printed by E. Young, he married and settled, and his son. [q. v.], was born in 1814. In the same year he wrote and set in type and worked off with his own hands a book (pp. 144) concerning the Prince Regent and Miss Robinson, entitled 'The Mistress of Royalty; or the Loves of Florizel and Perdita, printed by and for Pierce Egan,' 1814. His declaration of authorship, signed and dated 25 Jan. 1843, is extant. In 1818 he wrote and published a serial work, monthly, called 'Boxiana; or Sketches of Modern Pugilism,' giving memoirs and portraits of all the most celebrated pugilists, contemporary and antecedent, with full reports of their respective prize fights, victories, and defeats, told with so much spirited humour, yet with such close attention to accuracy, that the work holds a unique position. It was continued in several volumes, with copperplates, to 1824. At this date, having seen that Londoners read with avidity his accounts of country sports and pastimes, he conceived the idea of a similar description of the amusements pursued by sporting men in town. Accordingly he announced the publication of 'Life in London' in shilling numbers, monthly, and secured the aid of [q. v.] and his brother, [q. v.], to draw and engrave the illustrations in aquatint, to be coloured by hand, George IV had caused Egan to be presented at court, and at once accepted the dedication of the forthcoming work. This was the more generous on the king's part because he must have known himself to have been often satirised and caricatured mercilessly in the 'Green Bag' literature by G. Cruikshank, the intended illustrator. On 15 July 1821 appeared the first number of 'Life in London; or. The Day and Night Scenes of Jerry Hawthorn, Esq., and his elegant friend, Corinthian Tom, accompanied by Bob Logic, the Oxonian, in their Rambles and Sprees through the Metropolis.' The success was instantaneous and unprecedented. 'It took both town and country by storm.' So great was the demand for copies, increasing with the publication of each successive number, month by month, that the colourists could not keep pace with the printers. The alternate scenes of high life and low life, the contrasted characters, and revelations of misery side by side with prodigal waste and folly, attracted attention, while the vivacity of dialogue and description never flagged.