Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/773

 DELAVIGNE DELAWARE 769 was the son of a merchant, and at first a labo- rious rather than brilliant student at the Napo- leon lyceum in Paris. His brother Germain, likewise a writer of plays, and his lifelong friend Eugene Scribe, then his fellow students, were his most intimate associates. In 1811 he produced a dithyramb on the birth of the king of Rome, which obtained for him the encour- agement of Andrieux and the patronage of Francais de Nantes, a high officer of state. In 1814 he competed for the prize offered by the academy with his Charles XII. d Narva, which, though unsuccessful, received honorable mention. He published in 1818 his three ele- gies, Les Messeniennes, so called in allusion to the songs of the conquered Messenians. In these he lamented the misfortunes of France resulting from the wars of Napoleon, and urged his countrymen to union and patriotism. They were very popular, and accorded so nearly with the national spirit without exciting partisan passion, that Louis XVIII. bestowed a sine- cure librarianship upon the author. He wrote two elegies on the life and death of Joan of Arc, and then produced his first tragedy, Les vepres siciliennes, which was performed at the Odeon in 1819, and was received with enthusiasm. It was soon followed by Les co- mediens, written to ridicule the company of the theatre Francais by which his first drama had been rejected, and in 1821 by Le Paria, in which he pleads the principle of the natural equality of men. His liberal ideas, repeated in several new lyrics, to which also he gave the name of Messeniennes, and his association with leaders of the opposition, lost him his place under the government, when the duke of Or- leans, the future king Louis Philippe, made him librarian of the Palais Royal. He pro- duced in 1823 his ficole des vieillards, a play which gained him in 1825 admission to the French academy. Refusing a pension now offered him by the government, which he be- lieved hostile to public liberty, he resided a year in Italy, and returned to find that the public taste was changing from the classical to the romantic drama. Delavigne conceived the idea of conciliating the two schools, of uniting classical elegance and purity with romantic boldness, and joined the romanticists, with the purpose of proving to them that pity, terror, and overpowering interest were not incompati- ble with sobriety of action and correctness of language. His Marino Faliero (1829), in the new form, obtained great success. He had be- gun the tragedy of Louis XI. in Italy, but had abandoned it on the death of Talma, as he de- spaired of finding any other actor qualified to perform the principal part, till he witnessed the powers of Ligier in the part of Faliero. He now set himself to finish it, and was only briefly interrupted by the revolution of 1830, during which he improvised La Parisienne, the most popular song at the time of the insurrec- tion, and wrote also a new Messenienne entitled Une semaine a Paris. Declining any personal profit from the triumph of the liberal cause, he resumed his labors, and completed Louis XI., which was produced in 1832 ; it is the greatest work of Delavigne in his second style, and has remained one of the most remarkable dramas on the stage. It was followed by Lea enfants d'fidouard (1833); Don Juan d?Autriche, in prose, and one of his best pieces (1835) ; Une famille au temps de Luther (1836) ; La popu- larite (1838) ; Lafille du Cid, in which he re- turned to his early manner (1839) ; and Le con- seiller rapporteur (1841). While at work on another tragedy, Melusine, he was taken sick, and died on a journey to Italy. His plays are distinguished as much for their purity of senti- ment as their perfection of art ; and notwith- standing the concessions which he made to the reigning school, he may justly be called a great classical dramatist. His works, with a memoir by his brother, appeared in 1845, in 6 vols., and a new edition of his plays in 1863, in 3 vols. DELAWARE, one of the original thirteen states of the American Union, situated between lat. 38 28' and 39 50' N., and Ion. 75 and 75 46' W., bounded N. by Pennsylvania, W. and S. by Maryland, and E. by Delaware river and bay (separating Delaware and New Jersey) and Seal of Delaware. the Atlantic ocean ; length N. and S. 96 m. ; breadth from 9 to 12 m. on the N. to 36 or 37 m. on the S. line; area, 2,120 sq. m., or 1,356,- 800 acres. The state is divided into three counties, viz. : New Castle in the north, Kent in the middle, and Sussex in the south; and these are subdivided into hundreds. Wilming- ton (pop. in 1870, 30,841), the only city, near the confluence of Brandywine and Christiana creeks, is extensively engaged in manufactu- ring. Dover (pop. 1,906), the capital, is situa- ted on Jones's creek, 5 m. from the Delaware. Other towns in the order of population, having more than 500 inhabitants, are Smyrna, North Milford, Camden, and Frederica, in Kent co. ; New Castle, Delaware City, Middletown, New- ark, and Odessa, in New Castle co. ; Seaford, Lewes, Laurel, Milton, South Milford, and Georgetown, in Sussex co. The population in 1790, and at subsequent decennial periods down to the year 1870, has been as follows :