Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/618

606 visited the city, and Henry the VII., accompanied by his queen and mother in 1494. In 1507, 1517, and 1550, Chester shared with other places the visitation of the sweating sickness, which carried off many of its inhabitants. It was also so severely scourged by the plague, 1602 to 1605, that the city fairs were suspended, and the court of exchequer removed to Tarvin, and the assizes to Nant- wich. In 1647-48 this epidemic for the last time raged with a terrible fatcolity; from June 22 to April 20 it is said that 2099 persons perished of the plague in the several city parishes. But of all the events in the history of Chester, there is none so memorable as the protracted siege which the city endured in its loyalty to Charles I. The king, having hoisted his standard at Nottingham, arrived at Chester in the autumn of 1642, where he was enthusias tically received. The sacrifices made by the citizens for the royal cause were great. In 1644, the pecuniary levies upon them amounted to as much as 200 every fortnight. The siege began in July 1643, and in the autumn of 1645 the assailants, despairing of taking it by assault, converted the siege into a blockade. In 1646-7 the citizens were in such extremities as to be in want of the commonest necessaries of life. It was only alter a tenth sum mons that, on February 3, 1646, they at last agreed to the articles of surrender, by which the garrison were allowed to march out with all the honours of war, the safety of the persons and property of the citizens with liberty to trade was secured, and the sanctity of the sacred edifices and their title deeds preserved. In 1659 Sir George Booth and a large party of the citizens seized the garrison for Charles II., then still an exile, but they were afterwards re pulsed in an action fought near Wilmington bridge, by Lambert, the Parliamentary general. In 1660 the joy felt by the citizens at the Restoration, was expressed by the magnificent reception accorded to the learned Dr Brian Walton, the new bishop of Chester, on his coming to take possession of his see. The spirit of the inhabitants evinced, however, a change in 1683, when the presence of the duke of Monmouth was the cause of a tumultuous mob, who, after committing other acts of violence, forced the cathedral doors, destroyed most of the painted glass, demolished the font, and did other damage there. James II. visited the city in 1687, and his successor, William III., in 1690. Coming to more modern times, the city accorded a hearty and brilliant welcome to the Prince of Wales on the 14th October 1869, when he honoured them with his presence to open the new Town Hall.  CHESTER, a city of the United States, in the county of Delaware, Pennsylvania, on the right bank of the Delaware River, 10 miles south-west of Philadelphia by the railway to Wilmington. It has five or six churches, two high schools, and a national hall, and carries on the manufacture of cotton and woollen goods, machinery, and carriages. Founded by the Swedes in 1643 under the namB of Upland, it ranks as the oldest town in the State, and was the seat of the provisional assembly held by Penn in 1682. From that date till the formation of Delaware county in 1789, it was the chief town of the county of Chester, a position now held by the city of West Chester. Population in 1850, 1667 ; and in 1870, 9485.  CHESTERFIELD, a municipal borough and market- town of England, in East Derbyshire, 1 2 miles south of Sheffield by the Midland Railway. It is situated on the Rother and Hipper, and is the terminus of a canal extending a distance of 46 miles to the Trent at Stockwith. It is irregularly built, with narrow streets, but has a spacious market-place. The church of All-Saints is a large and elegant edifice of the 13th century, with a remarkable twisted spire 230 feet high, which has given rise to con siderable discussion as to whether it was so constructed or owes its deformity to the warping of the woodwork. There are eight or nine dissenting churches, a free grammar school, founded by Queen Elizabeth, and rebuilt in 1710 and 1845, a girls industrial school established in 1819, and various other educational institutions, a municipal hall erected in 1849, a market-hall (which dates from 1855-7 and contains a corn-exchange), a town-library, a mechanics institute, a prison, assembly rooms, a hospital, a theatre, and an institute of mining, civil, and mechanical engineers. The manufactures include cotton, silk, earthen ware, machinery, and tobacco ; and there are coal, iron, and lead mines in the vicinity. Races are held on Whit- tington Common, about a mile from the town, in the neighbourhood of the famous Revolution House. The population of the municipal borough in 1861 was 9836, and in 1871 it was 11,427. Chesterfield was a Roman station on the road from Derby to York, and its name is partly of Roman origin. At the time of the Con quest it was of but little importance, but in the reign of King John it received a charter of incorporation. In the year 1266 the rebellious barons were defeated in the neighbourhood by Henry, the nephew of Henry III. In 1642 the town was occupied by the forces of Sir John Gell, and in 1643 by Sir Thomas Fairfax.  CHESTERFIELD, (1694-1773), the son of Philip Stanhope, the third earl, and Elizabeth Savile, daughter of the marquis of Halifax, was born in London. Deprived at an early age of his mother, the care of the little Lord Stanhope devolved upon his grandmother, the marchioness of Halifax, a lady of culture and connection, whose house was frequented by the most distinguished Whigs of the epoch. He soon began to prove himself possessed of that systematic spirit of conduct and effort which appeared so much in his life and character. Divined by Ruvigny, earl of Galway, who perceived in him a nascent aptitude for pleasure and politics overlaid with a strong natural tendency to indolence, he was advised by that nobleman, if he would become a man of mark, to rise early ; he acquired the habit, and kept it. His education, commenced under a private tutor, was con tinued (1712) at Trinity Hall, Cambridge; here he seems to have read hard, and to have acquired a considerable knowledge of ancient and modern languages. The great orators of all times were a special object of study with him, and he describes his boyish pedantry pleasantly enough, but by no means without a touch of self-satisfaction in the memory. His university training was supplemented (1714) by a Continental tour, untrammelled by a governor ; at the Hague his ambition for the applause awarded to adventure made a gamester of him, and at Paris he began, from the same motive, that worship of the conventional Venus, the serious inculcation of which has earned for him the largest and most unenviable part of his reputation. The death of Anne and the accession of George I. opened up a career for him and brought him back to England. His relative James Stanhope, the king s favourite minister, procured for him the place of gentleman of the bedchamber to the Prince of Wales. In 1715 he entered the House of Commons as member for St Germans, and when the impeachment of James, duke of Ormond (June 21, 1715), came before the House, he used the occasion to put to proof his old rhetorical studies. His maiden speech was youthfully fluent and dogmatic ; but on its conclusion the orator was reminded, with many compliments, by au honourable member, that he wanted six weeks of his majority, and consequently that he was amenable to a heavy fine for speaking in the House. Lord Stanhope quitted the Commons with a low bow, and started for the Continent. From Paris he rendered the Government important service by gathering and transmitting information respecting the Jacobite plot ; and in 1716 he returned to England, resumed his seat, and took frequent part in the debates. In that year came the quarrel between the king and the heir apparent. Stanhope, whose politic instinct obliged him to worship the rising rather than the setting sun, remained faithful to the prince, although the ministry made several attempts to win him over. In 1723 a vote for the Government got him the place of captain of the yeomen of the guard ; his happy reply to his predecessor, Lord Townshend, is a fine example of spirituel urbanity, and is valuable as indicating, among other examples, his contempt for the money-jobbing system that obtained at court. In 1725, on the revival of the Bath, the red riband was offered to him, but was declined.