Page:Imperialdictiona02eadi Brandeis.pdf/196

DUN regular man, highly esteemed." Dunkin does not seem to have obtained the living in England; for in 1746 we find him placed by the viceroy, Chesterfield, over the endowed school of Enniskillen. In 1741 a volume of epistles from Dunkin's pen was published at Dublin, and in 1774 his poetical works and epistles in two volumes 4to appeared. Of his English poems that entitled "Carberry Rocks" has, perhaps, been the most generally admired. Dunkin's close intimacy with Swift seems to have provoked the envy of various minor and malignant minstrels with which Dublin society then teemed. There are many contemporary broadsides in existence, which mercilessly lash the good-humoured doctor of divinity. Dunkin continued to associate constantly with Swift, whose will he witnessed, and he followed him quickly to the grave.—W. J. F.  DUNN,, a teacher of mathematics, who was born at Crediton in Devonshire, but of whose birth and death the dates are not known. He kept a school, first at his native place, and afterwards at Chelsea. Dunn was ultimately appointed mathematical examiner of the candidates for the East India Company's service. He contributed several scientific papers to the Philosophical Transactions. He bequeathed an estate of about £30 sterling a year to establish a mathematical school at Crediton, the first master of which was appointed in 1793.—R. M., A.  DUNNING,, Baron Ashburton, born at Ashburton in 1731, and died in 1783. Dunning was the son of an eminent attorney, and educated in his father's office for that profession. He was called to the bar in 1756, and went the western circuit for some years without a single brief. The disputes between the English and Dutch East India Companies gave him his first distinction. Lord Bute called on the English company to answer some memorial of the Dutch company, and Dunning was employed to do so. His defence of the English company was regarded as perfect. Dunning received a fee of five hundred guineas. We trace his name occasionally in the law reports of the period. A compliment from Lord Mansfield to him in one case is preserved, where he said that he argued the matter he had to discuss "like a lawyer, and had not uttered a word too much or too little." His practice rapidly increased, and in 1763 was worth about £1000 a year. In the discussions which arose out of Wilkes' publications, he was employed by Wilkes throughout the prolonged litigation. On the 18th of June, 1765, he delivered his great speech against the validity of general warrants. In 1766 he was chosen recorder of Bristol; and we find him in 1767 solicitor-general. In 1768 he was returned by Lord Shelburne for the borough of Calne, for which he again sat in the parliaments of 1774 and 1780. In 1770 Thurlow succeeded him as solicitor, and he returned to the bar. Dunning, in his parliamentary career, acted with Lord Shelburne, to whom he owed his seat. In 1780 he brought forward a motion, that "the influence of the crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished;" and in a few days after, a motion asking for returns of what sums, in the shape of pensions or salaries, were received by members of the house of commons. On the first motion he had a majority of eighteen; on the second of but two. A third motion was hazarded by him and lost. In the next session Lord North resigned. On the change of administration Dunning snatched at a coronet, and became within a week chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, thus securing a seat in the cabinet. This same chancellorship was one of those sinecures which a few months before he insisted ought to be abolished. The Rockingham administration was soon succeeded by that of Lord Shelburne, and Dunning now obtained a pension of £4000 a year. This seemed a strange inconsistency in a very rich man who had so lately spoken with great strength against such pensions. Dunning had purchased landed property to a large amount, and had besides saved £180,000. His learning was great, and his acquirements very remarkable, particularly when it is remembered that his "only university was his father's office." He required but a few hours to learn a book of Virgil by heart. He was fond of mathematics. When but ten years of age he had gone through the first book of Euclid. In after years he used to say he owed all his success to Euclid and Newton. When Dunning was in the receipt of £10,000 a year by his practice, he was asked how he got through his business. His reply was—"Some did itself; some he did; and some remained undone." Sir William Jones speaks of Dunning's wit; Bentham of his closeness in argumentation. Lord Shelburne, for one of whose boroughs he sat, and whose views he supported in parliament, said "he never seemed to do anything con amore, but when wrong was on his side." Dunning had great natural disadvantages to contend with, and overcame them all. His stature was very small; his limbs almost deformed—there was some bandiness and an unusual protrusion of the shin-bones in front. He had a short crooked nose; his voice was bad, and obstructed by what seemed a perpetual cold; and the shaking of his head was like one afflicted with the palsy. The rapidity of his utterance was such that it was often difficult to catch his words, and he had a Devonshire accent; yet no man had such power of exciting and rivetting attention. His power was the same with juries, with judges, and in parliament. Dunning's friends appear to have been greatly attached to him; Johnson speaks of him with praise; Horne Tooke addressed to him the remarkable letter on philology, which was afterwards expanded into the Diversions of Purley. Dunning was fond of his club, a petit souper, and a bottle. On Saturdays he would take a few friends to his house at Fulham, from which they returned on the following Monday. His parents survived to witness his great prosperity.—J. A., D.  DUNOIS,, called the Bastard of Orleans, Count of Dunois and Longueville, one of the most famous heroes of France, was born about 1403. He was the illegitimate son of Louis, duke of Orleans, second son of Charles V., and was educated in his father's palace. France was at this time reduced to the lowest extremity, and was nearly brought into complete subjection to England. Dunois took up arms in defence of his country, and at the head of one thousand men compelled the earl of Warwick to raise the siege of Montargis in 1427. But this success, though it showed that the English were not invincible, did not check their triumphant progress. They soon after laid siege to Orleans, the last resource of the French king. Dunois threw himself into the city and defended it with indomitable resolution; but at last the state of affairs became so desperate that he thought of setting the city on fire, and attempting to cut his way through the enemy. At this crisis Joan of Arc undertook to raise the siege, and Dunois cordially seconded her heroic efforts for the liberation of their country. He supported her project for crowning Charles VII. at Rheims, and his banner floated along with hers over the altar where that ceremony was performed. After the capture and death of Joan, Dunois continued with unabated courage and zeal to press the expulsion of the English from the country. He captured Chartres, raised the siege of Lagny, defeated the enemy at Patay in 1429, and assisted in the reduction of the capital, which he entered in triumph on the 13th of April, 1436. The provinces of Normandy and Guienne were all that now remained to the English, and Dunois having been invested with the office of lieutenant-general by the king, invaded Normandy in 1449 at the head of a powerful army. Town after town opened its gates almost without resistance, and the whole province was soon in the hands of the French. The invasion of Guienne by Dunois followed, and was attended with equal success; and in little more than a year, Calais alone remained to the English of all the conquests on which they had lavished so much blood and treasure. After these brilliant achievements the French king legitimated Dunois, bestowed upon him the county of Longueville and other lands, with the office of great chamberlain, as an acknowledgment of his invaluable services to the crown. His great renown and influence, however, rendered him obnoxious to the successor of Charles VII., the crafty and treacherous Louis XI., who deprived him of his office of lieutenant-general, of the government of Normandy, and other dignities. Dunois, disgusted with this unjust and ungrateful treatment, joined the insurrection called the "League for the public good;" but after the treaty of Conflans he was restored to his dignities and estates, and was placed at the head of the council then instituted for the regulation of the police and other affairs of the kingdom. He died in 1468. Dunois received an education greatly superior to that of the other nobles of his age. Jean Chartres says he was one of the best speakers of the French language.—J. T.  DUNS SCOTUS, a scholastic divine, born about 1265. According to some he was born at Dunstance in the parish of Embleton, near Alnwick, in Northumberland. Others affirm that he was a Scotchman, a native of Dunse in Berwickshire. Others again say that he was an Irishman. Camden quotes, in favour of his English birthplace, an inscription at the end of a MS. copy of Duns' works in the library of Merton college, Oxford, 