Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 24.djvu/112

 Farnaby Lennard), and Henry Fitzmaurice. He had one sister, who died unmarried, leaving him her fortune.

(1811–1833), was born in Bedford Place, London, on 1 Feb. 1811. He showed a sweet disposition, a marked thoughtfulness, and a great power of learning from his earliest years. In a visit to Germany and Switzerland in 1818 he mastered French and forgot Latin. A year later he was able to read Latin easily, took to dramatic literature, and wrote infantile tragedies. He was placed under the Rev. W. Carmalt at Putney, and after two years became a pupil of E. C. Hawtrey [q. v.], then assistant-master at Eton. Though fairly successful in his school tasks, he devoted himself chiefly to more congenial studies, becoming thoroughly familiar with the early English dramatists and poets. He wrote essays for the school debating societies, showing an increasing interest in philosophical and political questions. He contributed some papers to the Eton ‘Miscellany’ in the early part of 1827. In the following summer he left the school, and passed eight months with his parents in Italy. He became so good an Italian scholar as to write sonnets in the language, warmly praised by Panizzi as superior to anything which could have been expected from a foreigner. He was much interested in art, and especially loved the early Italian and German schools. Returning to England in June 1828, he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a pupil of Whewell in the following October. He disliked mathematics, and had not received the exact training necessary for success in classical examination. His memory for dates, facts, and even poetry was not strong. He won the first declamation prize at his college in 1831 for an essay upon the conduct of the Independent party during the civil war, and in the following Christmas delivered the customary oration, his subject being the influence of Italian upon English literature. He had won another prize for an essay upon the philosophical writings of Cicero. (The last two appear in his ‘Remains.’) At Cambridge he formed the intimacy with Tennyson made memorable by the ‘In Memoriam’ (issued in 1850).

He left Cambridge after graduating in 1832, and entered the Inner Temple, living in his father's house. He took an interest in legal studies, and entered the chambers of a conveyancer, Mr. Walters of Lincoln's Inn. His health had improved, after some symptoms of deranged circulation. In 1833 he travelled with his father to Germany. While staying at Vienna he died instantaneously on 15 Sept. 1833, from a rush of blood to the head, due to a weakness of the heart and the cerebral vessels. He was buried on 3 Jan. 1834, in the chancel of Clevedon Church, Somersetshire, belonging to his maternal grandfather, Sir A. Elton. A touching memoir written by his father was privately printed in 1834, with a collection of remains. They go far to justify the anticipations cherished by his illustrious friends. After a schoolboy admiration for Byron, he had become a disciple of Keats, of Shelley, whose influence is very marked, and finally of Wordsworth, whom he might have rivalled as a philosophical poet. He was, however, diverging from poetry to metaphysics, and looking up to Coleridge as a master. His powers of thought are shown in the essay upon Cicero, while his remarkable knowledge of Dante is displayed in an able criticism of Professor Rossetti's ‘Disquisizione sullo spirito antipapale,’ chiefly intended as a protest against the hidden meaning found in Dante's writings by Rossetti. Hallam had begun to translate the ‘Vita Nuova.’ A criticism (first published in the ‘Englishman's Magazine,’ 1831) of Tennyson's first poems is also noteworthy for its sound judgment and exposition of critical principles.

(1824–1850), named after his godfather, Lord Lansdowne, was born on 31 Aug. 1824, was educated at Eton from 1836 to 1841, and won the Newcastle medal. In October 1842 he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, won a scholarship on his first trial at Easter, 1844, and won the first declamation prize (upon ‘The Influence of Religion on the various Forms of Art’) in his third year; graduated as ‘senior optime’ and second chancellor's medallist in January 1846, and left Cambridge at Christmas following. He had founded the ‘Historical’ debating club in his first year, belonged to the society generally known as ‘The Apostles,’ and occasionally spoke at the Union, and especially distinguished himself in defence of the Maynooth grant. He was called to the bar in Trinity term, 1850, and joined the midland circuit. He travelled with his family in the summer to Rome, was taken ill from feebleness of circulation, and died of exhaustion at Siena on 25 Oct. 1850. He was buried by the side of his brother, mother, and sister (Ellen) on 23 Dec. at Clevedon. A brief account of him by his friends, H. S. Maine and Franklin Lushington, showing that he was as much beloved as his brother, was privately printed soon after his death, and was added to the reprint of his brother's ‘Remains’ in 1853. The volume was published in 1863.