Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 52.djvu/408

 two years, editor of ‘Sharpe's Magazine,’ at first without remuneration, and afterwards at a nominal salary. In it he published as a Christmas story the least successful of his tales, ‘The Fortunes of the Colville Family’ (London, 1853 and 1855, 8vo). In 1854 he edited three numbers of the short-lived ‘George Cruikshank's Magazine’ (to the first number of which Cruikshank contributed his characteristic ‘Tail of a Comet’), and, next year, in the ambitious form of shilling monthly parts, each with two illustrations by ‘Phiz,’ he issued his very unequal ‘Harry Coverdale's Courtship’ (London, 1855, 1856, 1862, 1864, 1867; New York and Philadelphia, 1861). While this was in progress he published, in conjunction with [q. v.], a shilling book of nonsense verses entitled ‘Mirth and Metre, by two Merry Men’ (London, 1855, 12mo). He subsequently contributed a few papers to ‘The Train,’ a magazine founded by Yates in 1856, from which date his health began rapidly to deteriorate. In 1863 he purchased, as a summer retreat, Beech Wood, near Marlow. Next year, on May-day, he was carried off by a fit of apoplexy at Grove Lodge, Regent's Park. He was buried on 9 May at Great Marlow, a mural tablet being erected to his memory in the church. In 1865 some of his verses were collected in ‘Gathered Leaves,’ to which are prefixed an engraved portrait and a memorial sketch by his friend Edmund Yates.

To give a satisfactory picture of youth in a state of pupilage, which should entertain at the same time boys and their elders, is a difficult if not impossible task; but, after ‘Tom Brown's Schooldays’ (and excluding ‘Vice Versâ’), it is probable that no book has arrived nearer a solution of the problem than ‘Frank Fairlegh,’ the first few chapters of which represent the summit of Smedley's literary achievement. In obtaining his success, the author happily eschews any attempt at pathos and relies on well-devised incident and a genuine, if somewhat rudimentary, vein of pleasantry.



SMEDLEY, JONATHAN (fl. 1689–1729), dean of Clogher, son of John Smedley, was born in 1671, and educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he entered on 18 Sept. 1689, graduating B.A. in 1695 and M.A. in 1698. Shortly afterwards he took orders and was presented to the rectory of Ringcurran, co. Cork. He seems to have resided mainly in Dublin, was popular in whig circles, sought acknowledgment as the laureate of his party, and in 1713 distinguished himself by some rasping verses affixed to the portal of St. Patrick's upon the announcement of Swift's appointment as dean. During the next three years he published several partisan sermons, one, in 1715, ‘upon the anniversary of the Irish massacre by papists,’ on the strength of which Steele and some other stewards of the anniversary meeting of Irish protestants in London wrote warmly in Smedley's behalf to Lord Townshend [see, second ]. This does not seem to have borne any immediate fruit; but on 6 Sept. 1718, on Townshend's recommendation, Smedley was presented to the deanery of Killala. The secretary's memory may have been jogged by the appearance of Smedley's virulent ‘Rational and Historical Account of the Principles which gave Birth to the late Rebellion and of the present Controversies of the English Clergy’ (London, 1718, 8vo), in which he endeavours incidentally to vindicate the Duchess of Marlborough from the charge of partisanship. Some of his occasional pieces were printed in Matthew Concanen's collection of ‘Miscellaneous Poems by several hands,’ in 1724, in which year Smedley resigned his ill-paid deanery as incommensurate with his merit; he was, however, instituted dean of Clogher a few months later, on 24 June 1724. At his new deanery he seems to have been visited by the future historian and antiquary, Thomas Birch, in co-operation with whom he projected a ‘Universal View of all the eminent Writers on Holy Scripture;’ but of this excellent project only a ‘Specimen’ appeared (London, 1728, folio; cf. Bibl. Bibl. p. 268). In the meantime Smedley was indefatigable in the employment of his talent for facile complimentary verse, following up his ‘Christmas Invitation to the Lord Carteret’ (Dublin, 1725, 4to) by ‘Dean Smedley's Petition to the Duke of Grafton,’ the lord lieutenant (1726, 4to). Both were frank appeals for ampler preferment. In the latter the writer alluded familiarly to Swift as ‘t'other Jonathan.’ Swift retorted in ‘The Duke's Answer,’ commencing—

The unequal contest was continued by Smedley in his ‘The Metamorphosis, a poem, shewing the Change of Scriblerus into