Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 45.djvu/159

 Vincent Fulnetby, was born probably at his father's manor of Barkwith, Lincolnshire, about 1580. The father was reader at Gray's Inn in Lent 1582, and also attorney-general in the northern parts. The son, on 26 Oct. 1602, entered Gray's Inn, where he was called to the bar in 1608, elected ancient in 1622, being then one of the ‘common pleaders’ for the city of London, bencher in 1623, and reader in the autumn of 1624. On 19 May 1640 he was called to the degree of serjeant-at-law, and on 10 March following was prayed as counsel by attorney-general Sir Thomas Herbert on his impeachment, but excused himself on the score of ill-health. In 1641 he was justice of assize and nisi prius for the county of Nottingham. He was recorder of London in the interval, 2–30 May 1643, between the dismissal of Sir Thomas Gardiner [q. v.] and the election of Sir John Glynne [q. v.]

On 30 Sept. 1645 Phesant, who had been recommended to the king for a judgeship in the parliament's propositions for peace of 1 Feb. 1642–3, was voted a judge of the court of common pleas by the House of Commons, and on the 28th of the following month was sworn in as such. On the abolition of the monarchy he accepted a new commission on condition that the fundamental laws were not abolished. He died on 1 Oct. following, at his manor of Upwood, near Ramsay, Huntingdonshire, and was buried in Upwood church.

Phesant married, about 1609, Mary Bruges, of a Gloucestershire family, who, dying about the same time as himself, was buried by his side. By her he had several children. Phesant's epitaph credits him with ability, conscientiousness, and courage.

[Philipps's Grandeur of the Law, p. 195; Oldfield and Dyson's Tottenham, p. 82; Marshall's Genealogist, iv. 25; Douthwaite's Gray's Inn; Foster's Gray's Inn Admission Register; Overall's Analytical Index to Remembrancia, p. 511; Parl. Hist. ii. 1125, 1327; Dugdale's Orig. p. 295, Chron. Ser.; Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1635–1636 p. 194, 1637–8 p. 197, 1649–50 p. 197; Cal. Committee for Advance of Money, vol. i. (1642–5), p. 312; Hist. MSS. Comm. 4th Rep. App. p. 64, 5th Rep. App. p. 89, 7th Rep. App. pp. 29, 46; Clarendon's Rebellion, bk. vi. § 231; Whitelocke's Memorials, pp. 174, 178, 378, 409; Sir John Bramston's Autobiogr. (Camden Soc.); Inderwick's Interregnum, p. 155; Noble's Protectoral House of Cromwell, 3rd edit. i. 430; Brayley's Beauties of England and Wales, vii. 549*.] 

PHILIDOR, FRANÇOIS ANDRÉ DANICAN (1726–1795), chess-player and composer, was the youngest son of André Danican, a musician, and member of the Grande Écurie, the chambre and the chapelle of Louis XIV, by his second wife, Elisabeth Leroy. The family had long been connected with the French court in the capacity of musicians. When his great-grandfather, Michel Danican, a native of Dauphiné and a celebrated oboist, first appeared at court, Louis XIII exclaimed, ‘I have found another Filidori,’ this being the name of a Sienese hautboy-player who had caused a sensation at the French court by his brilliant performance. The royal compliment procured for the family the agnomen ‘Philidor.’

François André was born at Dreux on 7 Sept. 1726. At the age of six he entered the Chapelle du Roy at Versailles, and learned harmony of André Campra. About eighty musicians were constantly in waiting at the chapelle, and, cards not being allowed in the sanctuary, they had a long table inlaid with a number of chessboards. Philidor learnt the game by watching his elders, and various anecdotes are told of the amazement caused by his prowess when he was first admitted to play. Scarcely less precocious as a musician, at the age of eleven he composed a motet, which was performed in the chapelle. When his voice broke he left the chapelle, at the age of fourteen, and went to Paris, with a view to supporting himself, like Rousseau, by giving lessons and copying music. But he seems to have neglected his pupils for the chess cafés, in particular the Café de la Régence, where fortune guided him to the board of M. de Kermuy, Sire de Légal, the best player in France. From Légal he derived the by no means new idea of playing without seeing the board, and his feat of playing two games in this manner simultaneously was commemorated by Diderot in his article ‘Échecs’ in the ‘Encyclopédie’ as an extraordinary example of strength of memory and imagination. About the same period (1744–5) Philidor assisted Rousseau to put into shape the latter's opera ‘Les Muses Galantes.’

In the autumn of 1745, owing to the pressure of creditors, Philidor made a tour in Holland. At Amsterdam he supported himself by exhibition games at chess and at Polish draughts. At The Hague he met some Englishmen, at whose invitation he came to England in the latter part of 1747. The principal chess club in England at this time held its meetings at Old Slaughter's Coffee-house in St. Martin's Lane. The best English player, who was the strongest player Philidor met, with the exception of his old tutor, M. de Legal, was Sir Abraham Janssen. During his stay in London he played a match of ten games with Philip Stamma, a native of Aleppo, and author of ‘Les Stratagèmes du jeu d'Echecs,’ giving him the move,