Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 52.djvu/394

  merit, entitled, ‘Mans May or a Moneths minde: wherein the libertie of mans minde is compared to the Moneth of May, by Peter Smalle, Batchelour in the Lawes, London: printed by George Purslowe for Samuel Rand,’ 1615, 4to. It is prefaced by verses ‘to all Gentlemen Students and Schollers,’ ‘to the Reader the Authors Resolution,’ ‘to the Right Worshipfull my most loving good friend Sir Henry Blomar of Hatherup in the county of Gloucester, knt.,’ and finally by a single stanza ‘Ad eundem.’ The poet not only shows a keen appreciation of natural beauty, but describes contemporary fashions with quaint vividness. Copies of the book are in the British Museum and Bodleian libraries.



SMALLWOOD, CHARLES (1812–1872), meteorologist, was born in Birmingham in 1812. He studied medicine at University College, London, and in 1853, removing to Canada, he settled at St. Martin, Isle Jesus, Canada East, where he obtained a large practice. Soon after he established a meteorological and electrical observatory, and began a series of important experiments. He discovered the influence of atmospheric electricity in the formation of the snow crystal, and investigated the relations of ozone with light, and the influence of electricity on the germination of seeds. In 1858 Smallwood received the honorary degree of LL.D. from the McGill University at Montreal, and was appointed professor of meteorology. In 1860 the Canadian government made him a grant to obtain magnetic instruments, and in 1861 he began regular meteorological observations, which he published periodically. He died at Montreal on 22 Dec. 1872. He was a member of many English and foreign scientific societies.



SMALRIDGE, GEORGE (1663–1719), bishop of Bristol, the son of Thomas Smalridge, a citizen and dyer of Lichfield, who was sheriff of that city in 1674, was born in Sandford Street, Lichfield, in 1663. He was first sent to Lichfield grammar school, where he had as a contemporary Joseph Addison, and where his ability was discerned by the antiquary, [q. v.] The latter paid the expenses of his being sent to Westminster. In like manner Smalridge himself subsequently benefited Bishop [q. v.] In 1680, two years after his admission at Westminster, presumably out of compliment to Ashmole, he wrote elegies in Latin and English upon the famous astrologer William Lilly, now preserved among the Bodleian MSS. He was elected to Christ Church, Oxford, in 1682, matriculating on 18 Dec. and graduating B.A. in 1686, whereupon he became a college tutor. In conjunction with Aldrich and Atterbury (a warm friend at Westminster and through life), whose opinions he had adopted, he published in 1687 ‘Animadversions on the Eight Theses laid down [by Obadiah Walker and Abraham Woodhead] in a discourse entitled “Church Government, Part V,” lately printed at Oxford,’ in which the Anglican position is vindicated with some vigour. In 1689 he published ‘Auctio Davisiana’ (Oxford, 4to), a description, in Latin verse of exceptional merit, of the sale of the library of the Oxford bookseller, Richard Davis; it was reprinted in ‘Musæ Anglicanæ.’ In the same year he graduated M.A. and took orders. Within three years from ordination he was appointed by the dean and chapter of Westminster to Tothill Fields chapel, and in June 1693 he was collated to the prebend of Flixton in Lichfield Cathedral. He was selected to speak the oration in praise of Sir Thomas Bodley in 1694, and in 1698 had the most important share, after Atterbury, in discharging the flimsy ordnance of the Oxford wits against the erudition of Bentley on ‘Dr. Bentley's Dissertations … examined.’ Smalridge is credited with the designedly humorous part of the performance, attempting to prove that the ‘Dissertation on the Phalaris Letters’ was not written by Bentley (Quarterly Review, xlvi. 134 seq.). The attempt (which led indirectly to Swift's ‘Battle of the Books’) was responsible for the supposition of Sacheverell, some years later, that Smalridge was the real author of the ‘Tale of a Tub,’ an imputation which Smalridge denied with much grief and bitterness.

In 1698 Smalridge was appointed minister of the new chapel (Broadway), Westminster, and at the same time graduated B.D., proceeding D.D. on 28 May 1701. On 14 Feb. 1702 he was chosen a Busby trustee. From 1700 with short intervals until 1707 he acted as deputy regius professor of divinity for Dr. [q. v.] Among those whom he presented for an honorary degree was Dr. Grabe, in conjunction with whom,