Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 58.djvu/158

 . It was at this time that Varley conceived the idea of making an artificial line, composed of resistances and condensers, which should exactly represent the working conditions of a submarine cable. The resistances corresponded to the copper conductor, while the condensers reproduced the induction which takes place between the two sides of the dielectric, and thus by the aid of the artificial line it became possible to predicate the speed of signalling through any proposed cable, and a subject which up to that time had been much obscured was placed upon a scientific basis. As a result of his experiments he offered to guarantee that the proposed cable should transmit twelve words a minute, a rate of speed which in practice was soon exceeded. He afterwards, in 1867, read a paper at the Royal Institution (Proceedings, 1869, pp. 45-59) 'On the Atlantic Telegraph,' when his lucid explanations and practical demonstrations contributed greatly to the restoration of public confidence in Atlantic telegraphy, and to the renewal of that most important enterprise.

In 1865 he was elected a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and on 8 June 1871 a fellow of the Royal Society. He likewise took a great interest in the establishment of the Society of Telegraph Engineers in 1871, and was a member of the council. His papers in the 'Philosophical Transactions,' the 'Reports of the British Association,' and the 'Electrician' are all connected with the subjects of electricity and telegraphic communication. Like his uncle John, Varley was a rather credulous investigator of spiritualistic and other occult 'phenomena.' He died at Cromwell House, Bexley Heath, Kent, on 2 Sept. 1883, and was buried at Christ Church, Bexley, on 6 Sept. His second wife, whom he married on 11 Jan. 1877, was Jesse, daughter of Captain Charles Smith of Forres, Scotland. By a former wife, from whom he was divorced, he left two sons and two daughters. His two brothers, Frederick Henry Varley and Samuel Alfred Varley, were also improvers and inventors in connection with telegraphy.



VARLEY, JOHN (1778–1842), landscape-painter, art-teacher, and astrologer, was born at Hackney on 17 Aug. 1778, the son of Richard Varley, who came to Hackney from Epworth in Nottinghamshire. His mother was a descendant of the General Fleetwood who married Cromwell's daughter Bridget. His father's profession is uncertain, but according to Redgrave he was of scientific attainments and tutor to the son of Earl Stanhope. John was the eldest of five children, two of whom, Cornelius and William Fleetwood, are treated separately. One of his sisters (Elizabeth) married [q. v.] As a boy Varley was distinguished by his great muscular strength, his pugilistic propensities, and his love for sketching. His father, objecting to art as a profession, placed him at the age of thirteen with a silversmith; but at the death of his father in 1791, after a short time with a law stationer, his mother allowed him to follow his bent. Poverty compelled the family to move from Hackney, and a few years after 1791 they were living in an obscure court off Old Street, City Road, opposite St. Luke's Hospital. Varley drew indefatigably, obtained some employment from a portrait-painter in Holborn, and when about fifteen or sixteen years of age became pupil and assistant of Joseph Charles Barrow, a landscape-painter and drawing-master of 12 Furnival's Court, Holborn, where [q. v.] was his fellow assistant. In 1796, when out sketching, he made the acquaintance of [q. v.], and formed a friendship which lasted for life. He agreed to help Neale with the landscapes to illustrate his 'Picturesque Cabinet of Nature,' the first and only part of which was published in September 1796, and contains none of Varley's work. He also became acquainted with Dr. Monro, the celebrated encourager of young artists [see, 1759-1833]. Barrow took him on a professional visit to Peterborough, and he made his first success with a drawing of the cathedral, finely finished in pencil, which was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1798. He now, or soon after, started as a teacher on his own account, and prospered sufficiently to become the chief support of his family. During the years 1798-1802 he made three tours in Wales (during one of which he was tossed by a bull, an accident which thrice befell him), and in 1803 to Yorkshire, Northumberland, Devonshire, and other counties, laying in a store of sketches and studies which, with his earlier ones on the Thames and about London, formed the principal material for his exhibited drawings for many years. From 1799 to 1804 he exhibited at the Royal Academy three to six works yearly till 1804, when he assisted in the formation of the Watercolour Society