Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 40.djvu/172

 entitled ‘Living Loves between Christ and Dying Christians,’ London, 1654.

(fl. 1710), son of Benjamin (baptised 5 March 1656 at St. Margaret Moses), was appointed additional writing clerk to the House of Lords on 25 March 1679, and later on clerk-assistant to the House of Commons, which latter post he retained till December 1710, when he was ‘disabled by palsie.’ He published ‘Debates of the House of Commons in January 1704,’ London, 1721 (2nd ed.)

[Wood's Athenæ (Bliss), vol. iv. col. 48; Wood's Fasti (Bliss), vol. ii. col. 110; Robinson's Reg. of Merchant Taylors' School, i. 136; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; Burrows's Reg. of Visitors of Univ. of Oxford (Camden Soc.), p. 550; Wilson's Hist. of Merchant Taylors' School, pp. 257–8, 295–8, 303, 315, 732, 825–6, 1195; Dunn's Divines, p. 17; Lords's Journals, x. 428 a, xiii. 487 a; Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. App. ii. p. 172, App. iv. p. 143; parish register of Odiham per the Rev. W. H. Windle, of St. Margaret Moses per the Rev. C. Lloyd Engström.] 

NEEDLER, HENRY (1685–1760), amateur of music, the last of the Needlers of Surrey, was born in London in 1685. As a young man he entered the excise office, and in March 1710 was appointed accountant for the candle duty, but through life he managed, without neglecting his profession, to practise music, ‘his only pleasure’. His father, an accomplished violinist, give him his earliest lessons. Daniel Purcell taught him harmony, and the younger John Banister, first violin at Drury Lane Theatre, carried on his training. In due time Needler performed at the house of Thomas Britton [q. v.], ‘the musical small-coal man,’ and at weekly private concerts in noblemen's houses. He came to know Handel, who visited him in Clement's Lane, behind the church in the Strand, and he was an active member of the Academy of Vocal Music, a society meeting at the Crown Tavern in the Strand. Here he led the violins, and undertook librarian's and secretary's duties, cataloguing the music.

It is related that a volume of twelve of Corelli's concertos came accidentally into Needler's hands during a musical meeting, and that he and his friends forthwith played through the whole number. His admiration of Corelli led Needler to study his violin music until he excelled in its interpretation. He was in fact a fine and delicate performer, and equal to any difficulty before his arm grew stiff. Twenty-eight volumes of Needler's extensive transcriptions from the Oxford and other libraries are in the British Museum Addit. MSS. 5035 to 5062. He died on 8 Aug. 1760, in his seventy-fifth year, and was buried at Frindsbury, near Rochester, where, in the previous century, the Needlers had owned for a time the famous quarry house and lands. He married late in life, and had no children. Needler had inherited property at Horley, Surrey, of which he left by will the life interest to his widow Hester, and to his sister Elizabeth, and the reversion to other relatives and rightful heirs. A portrait of Needler, engraved by Grignion after Mathias, is given in Hawkins's ‘History of Music,’ 1776.

A volume of anthems composed by Mrs. Needler, and dated 1751, is in Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 5053.

[Hawkins's Hist. of Music, pp. 791, 806; Grove's Dict. of Music, ii. 450; Autobiography and Correspondence of Mrs. Delany, i. 228; Archæologia Cantiana, xvii. 177; Records of the Acad. of Vocal Music, Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 11732; Registers of Wills, P. C. C. Lynch, 333; Official Registers of the Excise Office; inscriptions at Frindsbury Church, kindly supplied by the Rev. W. H. Jackson.] 

NEELE, HENRY (1798–1828), poet and miscellaneous writer, was born on 29 Jan. 1798 in the Strand, London, where his father carried on business as a map and heraldic engraver. He was educated at a private school at Kentish Town, and afterwards articled to a solicitor, and admitted to practice after the expiration of the usual period. He never relinquished his profession, but his attention must have been mainly devoted to literature. In January 1817, while yet serving his articles, he had published at his father's expense ‘Odes, and other Poems,’ betraying the influence of Collins, which attracted the attention of Dr. Nathan Drake, by whom they were highly commended. A second edition was printed in July 1820; and in March 1823 appeared ‘Poems, Dramatic and Miscellaneous,’ inscribed to Joanna Baillie. This volume obtained considerable success, and made Neele a popular contributor to magazines and annuals, for which he continued to produce tales and poems during the remainder of his short life. He prepared in 1826, and delivered in 1827, a course of lectures on English poetry, which were published after his death, and which, if in no way original, exhibit a sensitive perception of poetical beauty and a correct taste. An edition of Shakespeare, issued in parts, was soon discontinued for want of support. In 1827 he published a collected edition of his poems (2 vols. 16mo), and in the same year produced his ‘Romance of English History,’ in three volumes, a collection of