Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 22.djvu/474

 450 S T A S T A two later she travelled abroad, but her cravings after distinction were not satisfied until she became the chief of her uncle's household in August 1803. She sat at the head of his table and assisted in welcoming his guests, gracing the board with her stately beauty and enlivening the company by her quickness and keenness of conver- sation. Although her brightness of style cheered the declining days of Pitt and amused most of his political friends, her satirical remarks sometimes created enemies when more consideration for the feelings of her associates would have converted them into friends. Lady Hester Stanhope possessed great business talents, and when Pitt was out of office she acted as his private secretary. She was with him in his dying illness, and some of his last thoughts were concerned with her future, but any anxiety which might have arisen in her mind on this point was dispelled through the grant by a nation grateful for her uncle's qualities of a pension of 1200 a year, dating from 30th January 1806, which Lady Hester Stanhope enjoyed for the rest of her days. On her uncle's death she lived in Montague Square, London, but life in London without the interest caused by associating with the principal politicians of the Tory party proved irksome to her, and she sought relief from lassitude in the fastnesses of Wales. Whilst she remained on English soil happiness found no place in her heart, and her native land was finally abandoned for the East in February 1810. After many wanderings she settled on Mount Lebanon, and from this solitary position she wielded an almost absolute authority over the surrounding districts. Her control over the natives was sufficiently commanding to induce Ibrahim Pasha, when about to invade Syria in 1832, to solicit her neutrality, and this supremacy was maintained by her commanding character and by the belief that she possessed the gift of divination. Her cherished companion Miss Williams, and her trusted physician Dr Charles Lewis Meryon, dwelt with her for some time; but the former died in 1828, and the latter was not with Lady Hester when she died. In this lonely residence, the villa of Djoun, 8 miles from Sidon, in a house "hemmed in by arid mountains," and with the troubles of a household of twenty-three servants, unregulated by a single English attendant or friend and only waiting for her death to plunder the house, Lady Hester Stanhope's strength slowly wasted away, and at last she died on 23d June 1839, aged sixty-three. The disappointments of her life, and the necessity of overaweing her servants as well as the chiefs who surrounded Djoun, had intensified a temper naturally imperious. In appearance as in voice she resembled her grandfather, the first Lord Chatham, and like him she domineered over the circle, large or small, in which she was placed. Some years after her death there appeared three volumes of Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope as related ly herself in Con- versations with her Physician (i.e., Dr Meryon), 1845, and these were followed in the succeeding year by three volumes of Travels of Lady Hester Stanhope, forming the Completion of Jicr Memoirs narrated by her Physician. They presented a lively picture of this strange woman's life and character, and contained many anecdotes of Pitt and his colleagues in political life for a quarter of a century before his death, STANHOPE, PHILIP DORMER, fourth earl of Chester- field. See CHESTERFIELD. STANISLAU (Pol. Stanislavof), the chief town in the district of the same name in Galicia, Austria, on the Albrecht and Lemberg-Czernowitz railways, in 49 4' N. lat., 24 30' E. long., has two real-schools, a gymnasium, and large ironworks. It has also a good trade in corn. The population (1885) numbers 18,626. STANISLAUS (1677-1766), king of Poland. Stanislaw Leszczynski or Leszinski was born at Lemberg on October 20, 1677. His father, Raphael Leszczynski, was a Polish nobleman, distinguished by his rank and the important offices which he held, but still more by his personal qualities. Stanislaus, after visiting the courts of Vienna, Paris, and Rome, was raised to the dignity of voivode of Posen, and in 1704 was sent as ambassador by the assembly of Warsaw to Charles XII. of Sweden, who had just declared the deposition of the recently elected Augustus II. The king was so greatly taken with the ambassador that he recommended him to the diet as a suitable candidate for the vacant throne ; the election accordingly followed on 12th July 1704, but the corona- tion of Stanislaus and his wife Catharina Opaliuska did not take place until 4th October of the following year (compare POLAND, vol. xix. p. 297). After the reverse of Poltava in 1709 Augustus returned to Poland, and, assisted by the Russians, compelled Stanislaus to leave the country. The next five years saw him leading a wander- ing and somewhat adventurous life in Europe, one of his objects being to procure a favourable peace for Charles (compare CHARLES XII.). He then settled on Charles's estate at Zweibriicken, and after Charles's death in 1718 had a residence assigned to him by the French court at Weissenburg in Alsace. In 1725 his daughter Maria became the wife of Louis XV. of France. On the death of Augustus in 1733 Stanislaus once more returned to Poland, where a majority declared for him, but his com- petitor, the young elector of Saxony, had the advantage of the support of the emperor Charles VI., and also of the empress of Russia. Dantzic, to which Stanislaus had retired, was quickly taken by the Russians and the Saxons, and with great difficulty the unfortunate prince succeeded in making good his escape in disguise, after hearing that the Russians had set a price on his head. In 1736, when peace was concluded between the emperor and France, it was agreed that Stanislaus should abdicate the throne, but that he should be acknowledged king of Poland and grand-duke of Lithuania, and continue to bear these titles during life, and further, that he should be put in peaceable possession of the duchies of Lorraine and Bar, but that immediately after his death those duchies should be united for ever to the crown of France. The remaining years of his life were prosperous and happy. He died at Lune"ville on February 23, 1766, in consequence of injuries received from his nightdress accidentally taking fire. Stanislaus, who was a patron of the arts and sciences, wrote several works in politics and philosophy, which were collected and published at Paris in 1763, in 2 vols. 8vo, under the title CEuvrcs dii Philosoplic, Bienfaisant. The (Euvrcs Choisics de Stanislas, Hoi do Polognc, Due de Lorraine ct de Bar, with an historical notice by Madame de Saiut-Ouen, were published in an 8vo volume at Paris in 1825. STANISLAUS AUGUSTUS, the last king of Poland, was born at Wolczyn in Lithuania in 1732 and died at St Petersburg in 1798. See PONIATOWSKI, vol. xix. p. 453, and POLAND, vol. xix. pp. 297-8. STANLEY, ARTHUR PENRHYN (1815-1881), dean of Westminster from 1863, was born at Alderley in Cheshire on December 13, 1815. His father, the Rev. E. Stanley, rector of Alderley, bishop of Norwich from 1837 to 1849, was the younger brother of Sir John Stanley of Alderley Park, seventh baronet, who in 1839 was created Baron Stanley of Alderley, and was the representative of a branch of the same family as that of the earls of Derby. His mother, Catherine Stanley, was the daughter of the Rev. Oswald Leycester, rector of Stoke-on-Tern. Both parents were persons of remarkable force and individuality of character. The influence of each is to be traced in the career of their son. It was his father's prayer as bishop of Norwich " that he might be an instrument in God's providence of extending more enlarged and more Christian views among the clergy, and thus the means of disseminating a wider