Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 27.djvu/133

Hole and some of the fellows in 1720. Mr. C. W. Boase calls him ‘a weak man.’

Hole's chief writings dealt with the English liturgy. He issued: 1. ‘Antidote against Infidelity,’ 1702, written under the disguise of ‘A Presbyter of the Church of England.’ A ‘Second Part of the Antidote’ came out under his own name in 1717. 2. ‘A Practical Exposition of the Church Catechism,’ 1708, in three parts; reissued in 1715. 3. ‘Practical Discourses on all the Parts and Offices of the Liturgy of the Church of England,’ vol. i., 1714, vols. ii. and iii. in one, 1715, and vol. iv. in three parts, 1716, and to the set was prefixed his portrait, engraved by Vander Gucht. 4. ‘Practical Discourses upon the Communion Service,’ vol. v., 1717. 5. ‘Practical Discourses on the Offices of Baptism, Confirmation, and Matrimony,’ vol. vi. in three parts, 1719. Six of the discourses in these two collections were embodied in ‘The Family Chaplain,’ 1775, and the whole of them were republished, under the editorship of Dr. J. A. Giles, in 1837–8. Hole delighted in preaching throughout his life. A large number of his discourses, many of them preached in the churches of Somerset, and others before the university, were printed. One of them, a visitation sermon, preached at Bridgwater in 1695, on a fixed form of liturgy, led to the appearance of ‘A Correct Copy of some Letters written to J. M., a Nonconformist Teacher, concerning the Gift and Forms of Prayer,’ 1698, and to a second series in 1699, as well as to a rejoinder from J. M.

 HOLE, RICHARD (1746–1803), poet and antiquary, was the son of William Hole, archdeacon of Barnstaple and canon of Exeter Cathedral, who died in 1791. He was born at Exeter in 1746 and educated at its grammar school, where he was famed for his dry humour and for his skill in acting. On 23 March 1764 he matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford, and graduated B.C.L. on 3 May 1771. While at the university he wrote humorous pieces, and proposed entering the army; but after taking his degree he was ordained in the English church, where the influence of his father could secure him preferment. For some time he served the curacy of Sowton, near Exeter, and continued to hold it after his presentation, in 1777, to the neighbouring vicarage of Buckerell, which was without a parsonage. In 1792 he was promoted by the Bishop of Exeter to the rectory of Faringdon in the same district, and took a dispensation to retain with it the benefice of Buckerell. He afterwards became rector of Inwardleigh, near Okehampton, which he enjoyed with Faringdon until his death. After a painful illness, Hole died at Exmouth on 28 May 1803. He married, in 1776, Matilda Katencamp, daughter of a merchant at Exeter, who survived him.

Hole dabbled in literature from his youth. Very soon after the appearance of Macpherson's volume of the epic poem of ‘Fingal’ by Ossian, he began turning it into verse, and his ‘Poetical Translation of Fingal’ was published in 1772 with an ‘Ode to Imagination,’ which was much admired. At the request of Samuel Badcock, he rendered into English verse the poem known as ‘Homer's Hymn to Ceres,’ and the translation was published at Exeter in 1781. It was subsequently reprinted in Anderson's ‘Collection of the Poets,’ xii. 845–57; Whittingham's edition of the ‘British Poets;’ ‘Works of the Greek and Roman Poets translated,’ iv. 19–57; Wakefield's edition of Pope's version of the ‘Odyssey,’ ii. 457–96; and in the ‘Minor Poems of Homer,’ New York, 1872, pp. 149–70. One expression in Hole's translation was sharply criticised by a correspondent in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ (1782, pp. 234, 278), and in the same periodical (ib. 1788, pt. ii. p. 788) is a letter from him explaining the circumstances of its publication and the character of the assistance which he had received in the translation. In 1789 he issued his poetical romance of ‘Arthur, or the Northern Enchantment. In seven books,’ a flowing poem, pronounced by the critics as ‘from the school of Ariosto.’ The notes displayed much knowledge of Scandinavian mythology. Hole was one of the first members of the Exeter Literary Society, and addressed to it ‘Remarks on the Arabian Nights' Entertainments; in which the Origin of Sindbad's Voyages and other Oriental Fictions is particularly considered,’ which were published in an expanded form in 1797. The inquiry was begun in a sceptical mood, but the belief gradually seized him that the narratives had a basis of truth. For some time before his death Hole was engaged on a work to be entitled ‘Remarks on the Voyages of Ulysses as narrated in the Odyssey,’ but the part which was designed as an introduction was alone completed. This was in 1807 edited by his friend Bartholomew Parr, M.D., of Exeter, under the title of ‘An Essay on the 