Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 15.djvu/611

Rh M A R M A B 583 water colours, and on china and glass. His leisure was occupied in the study of perspective and architecture. His first picture, Sadak in Search of the Waters of Oblivion, was executed in a month. It was exhibited in the Royal Academy of 1812, and sold for fifty guineas. It was followed by the Expulsion (1813), Paradise (1813), Clytie (1814), and Joshua (1815). In 1821 appeared the famous Belshazzar s Feast, which excited much favourable and hostile comment, and was awarded a prize of 200 at the British Institution, where the Joshua had previously carried off a premium of 100. Then came the Destruction of Herculaneum (1822), the Creation (1824), the Eve of the Deluge (1841), and a long series of other Biblical and imaginative subjects, many of which are widely known through engravings. In 1832-33 Martin received 2000 for drawing and engraving a fine series of designs to Milton, and along with Westall he produced a set of Bible illustrations. He was also much occupied with schemes for the improvement of London, and published various pamphlets and plans dealing with the metropolitan water supply, sewage, dock, and railway systems. During the last four years of his life he was engaged upon his large subjects of the Judgment, the Day of Wrath, and the Plains of Heaven. He was attacked with paralysis while painting, and died in the Isle of Man on the 17th of February 1854. The bold originality of Martin s productions startled and attracted the public, but they are without the qualities of solid execution and truth to nature upon which a lasting fame in the arts must be built. His figures are badly drawn, his colouring is hot and unpleasant. To most of liis professional brethren his works seemed theatrical and tricky ; and the best lay critics of his time, like Charles Lamb, were disposed to deny that they evinced true imaginative power. His popularity may be said to have cul minated in 1828, the year of his Fall of Nineveh ; since then it has been gradually declining. MARTINA FRANCA, a city of Italy in the province of Lecce, 18 miles north of Taranto, on a hill near the sources of the Tara. It was a fief of the Caraccioli family, and dates from a comparatively modern epoch. The ducal palace is one of the finest buildings of its kind in the south of Italy, somewhat similar in style of architecture to the Palazzo Pamfili in Naples. The population of the city was 13,088 in 1861 ; that of the commune has increased from 16,637 in that year to 19,257 in 1881, MARTINEAU, HARRIET (1802-1876), English woman of letters, was born at Norwich, where her father was a manufacturer. The family was of Huguenot extraction, but had adopted Unitarian views. Her education, which in cluded Latin and French, as well as domestic accomplish ments, was received partly at home, and partly under a Mr Perry, to whose lessons in logical English composition she ascribed something of her later clearness of thought and statement. The atmosphere of her home was indus trious, intellectual, and austere ; she herself was clever, weakly, and unhappy, and was, moreover, already growing deaf. At the age of fifteen the state of her health and temper led to a prolonged visit to her father s sister, Mrs Kentish, who kept a school at Bristol. Here, in the companionship of amiable and talented people, her life became happier. Here, also, she fell under the influence of the Unitarian minister, Dr Carpenter, from whose in structions, she says, she derived &quot; an abominable spiritual rigidity and a truly respectable force of conscience strangely mingled together.&quot; From 1819 to 1830 she again resided chiefly at Norwich. The first part of this period was mainly spent in quiet and almost secret study and in needlework. About her twentieth year her deafness became confirmed, and she habitually from that time used an ear trumpet. In 1821 she began to write anonymously for the Monthly Repository, a Unitarian periodical, and was assured by her brother that authorship was her proper career. A little later she published Devotional Exercises and Addresses, Prayers, and Hymns. In 1826 her father died, leaving a bare maintenance to his wife and daughters. His death had been preceded by that of his eldest son, and was shortly followed by that of the young man to whom Harriet was engaged. Mrs Martineau and her daughters soon after lost all their means by the failure of the house where their money was placed. Harriet had to earn her living, and, being precluded by her deafness from teaching, took up author ship in earnest and toiled with incredible industry. She reviewed for the Repository at the rate of 15 a year, wrote stories (afterwards collected as Traditions of Pales tine], gained in one year (1830) three essay-prizes of the Unitarian Association, and eked out her income by needlework. In 1831 she was seeking a publisher for a series of tales designed as Illustrations of Political Economy. After many failures she accepted very disadvan tageous terms, and the first number appeared amidst gloomy prognostications from the publisher. The sale, however, was immediate and enormous, the demand increased with each new number, and from that time her literary success was secured. In 1832 she moved to London; she at once became the fashien, and her acquaintance was eagerly sought. Till 1834 she continued to be occupied with her political economy series and with a supplemental series of Illustrations of Taxation. Four stories dealing with the poor-law came out about the same time. These tales, direct, lucid, written without any appearance of effort, and yet practically effective, display the characteristic qualities of their author s style. In 1834, when the whole series was complete, Miss Martineau paid a long visit to America. Here her open adhesion to the Abolitionist party, then small and very unpopular, gave great offence, which was deepened by the publication, soon after her return, of Society in America and a Relrospect of Western Travel. An article in the Westminister Review, &quot; The Martyr Age of the United States,&quot; introduced English readers almost for the first time to the struggles of the Abolitionists. In these American writings Miss Martineau shows less than her usual calmness and judicial common sense, but it will scarcely be denied that there was some ground for her vehemence. The American books were followed by a novel, Deerbrook, a story of middle class country life, lacking the delicate humour of Miss Austen or the touch of farce that enlivens Miss Edgeworth s tales, but delightfully clear in style, wholesome in spirit, and well sustained in point of interest. To the same period belong two or three little handbooks, forming parts of a Guide to Service. The veracity of her Maid of all Work led to a widespread belief, which she regarded with some com placency, that she had once been a maid of all work herself. In 1839, during a visit to the Continent, Miss Martineau s health, which had long been bad, broke down entirely. She retired to solitary lodgings in Tynemouth, and remained a prisoner to her couch till 1844. She was still busy, and, besides a novel (The Hour and the Man}, published some tales for children, and Life in the Kick-room. These volumes contain some of her best work, and possess a charm of tender feeling to balance the somewhat cold rationality that predominates in most of Miss Martineau s writing. During this illness she for a second time declined a pension on the civil list, fearing to compromise her political independence. Her letter on the subject was published, and some of her friends raised a small annuity for her soon after. In 1844 Miss Martineau underwent a course of mesmerism, and in a few months was restored to health. Her recovery excited much discussion and controversy.