Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 46.djvu/103

 and descriptive Guide to York Cathedral’ (with Hugall), York, 1850, 8vo. 14. ‘Architectural, historical, and picturesque Illustrations of the Chapel of St. Augustine, Skirlaugh, Yorkshire’ (edited by Poole), Hull, 1855, 8vo. 15. ‘Diocesan History of Peterborough,’ London, 1880, 8vo.

[Times, 28 Sept. 1883; Guardian, 3 Oct. 1883; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Northamptonshire Notes and Queries, January 1884; Poole's Works.] 

POOLE, JACOB (1774–1827), antiquary, son of Joseph Poole and his wife Sarah, daughter of Jacob Martin of Aghfad, co. Wexford, was born at Growtown, co. Wexford, 11 Feb. 1774. His parents were members of the Society of Friends, and he was seventh in descent from Thomas and Catherine Poole of Dortrope, Northamptonshire. Their son, Richard Poole, came to Ireland with the parliamentary army in 1649, turned quaker, was imprisoned for his religion at Wexford and Waterford, and died in Wexford gaol, to which he was committed for refusing to pay tithe in 1665. Jacob succeeded to the family estate of Growtown, in the parish of Taghmon, in 1800, and farmed his own land. He studied the customs and language of the baronies of Bargy and Forth, on the edge of the former of which his estate lay. The inhabitants used to speak an old English dialect, dating from the earliest invasion of the country, and he collected the words and phrases of this expiring language from his tenants and labourers. This collection was edited by the Rev. William Barnes from the original manuscript, and published in 1867 as ‘A Glossary, with some pieces of verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy.’ The glossary contains about fifteen hundred words, noted with great fidelity. The dialect is now extinct, and this glossary, with a few words in Holinshed and some fragments of verse, is its sole authentic memorial. Poole completed the glossary and a further vocabulary or gazetteer of the local proper names in the last five years of his life. He died 20 Nov. 1827, and was buried in the graveyard of the Society of Friends at Forest, co. Wexford. He married, 13 May 1813, Mary, daughter of Thomas and Deborah Sparrow of Holmstown, co. Wexford, and had three sons and three daughters. A poem in memory of Poole, called ‘The Mountain of Forth,’ by Richard Davis Webb, who had known and admired him, was published in 1867, and it was owing to Mr. Webb's exertions that the glossary was published.

[Barnes's edit. of a glossary of the old Dialect, London, 1867; Mary Leadbeater's Biographical Notices of Members of the Soc. of Friends who were resident in Ireland, London, 1823; information from his grandson, Benjamin Poole of Ballybeg, co. Wexford.]  POOLE, JOHN (1786?–1872), dramatist and miscellaneous writer, was born in 1786, or, according to some accounts, in 1787. His dedications to his printed works prove him to have held some social position, and his success as a dramatist was pronounced in early life. On 17 June 1813, for the benefit of Mr. and Mrs. Liston, he produced at Drury Lane ‘Hamlet Travestie,’ in two acts, in which Mathews was the original Hamlet, Mrs. Liston Gertrude, and Liston Ophelia. This, written originally in three acts, was printed in 1810, and frequently reprinted. ‘Intrigue,’ described as an interlude, followed at the same house on 26 March 1814, and was succeeded by ‘Who's Who, or the Double Imposture,’ on 15 Nov. 1815, a work earlier in date of composition. To Drury Lane he gave ‘Simpson & Co.,’ a comedy, on 4 Jan. 1823; ‘Deaf as a Post,’ a farce, on 15 Feb. 1823; ‘The Wealthy Widow, or They're both to blame,’ a comedy, on 29 Oct. 1827; ‘My Wife! What Wife?’ a farce, on 2 April 1829; ‘Past and Present,’ a farce, and ‘Turning the Tables,’ a farce. To Covent Garden, ‘A Short Reign and a Merry one,’ a comedy in two acts, from the French, on 19 Nov. 1819; ‘Two Pages of Frederick the Great,’ a comedy in two acts, from the French, on 1 Dec. 1821; ‘The Scape-Goat,’ a one-act adaptation of ‘Le Précepteur dans l'embarras,’ on 25 Nov. 1825; ‘Wife's Stratagem,’ an adaptation of Shirley's ‘Gamester,’ on 13 March 1827; and ‘More Frightened than Hurt.’ And to the Haymarket, ‘Match Making,’ a farce, on 25 Aug. 1821; ‘Married and Single,’ a comedy from the French, on 16 July 1824; ‘'Twould puzzle a Conjuror,’ a farce, on 11 Sept. 1824; ‘Tribulation, or Unwelcome Visitors,’ a comedy in two acts, on 3 May 1825; ‘Paul Pry,’ a comedy in three acts, on 13 Sept. 1825; ‘'Twixt the Cup and the Lip,’ a farce (Poole's greatest success), on 12 June 1826; ‘Gudgeons and Sharks,’ comic piece in two acts, on 28 July 1827; ‘Lodgings for Single Gentlemen,’ a farce, on 15 June 1829.

In these pieces Charles Kemble, Liston, William Farren, and other actors advanced their reputation. Most, but not all, of them were successful, and were transferred to various theatres. Genest almost invariably, while admitting the existence of some merit, says they were more successful than they deserved. Some of them remain unprinted, and others are included in the collections of