Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Dagupan" to "David" Volume 7, Slice 9
chapter iii. of the canonical text. They certainly fill up excellently a
manifest gap in this text. "The Song of the Three Children" was first added after the verses just referred to, and subsequently the Prayer of Azariah was inserted before these verses.
LITERATURE.--Ball in the _Speaker's Apocr._ ii. 305 sqq.; Rothstein in Kautzsch's _Apocr. und Pseud._ i. 173 sqq.; Schurer,^3 _Gesch._ iii. 332 sqq. (R. H. C.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Four personages of the name of Daniel appear in the Old Testament: (1) the patriarch of Ezekiel (see above); (2) a son of David (1 Chron. iii. 1); (3) a Levite contemporary with Ezra (Ezra viii. 2; Neh. x. 6); (4) our Daniel.
[2] Ant. x. 10, 1.
[3] Chap, x., on the Prophets.
[4] Panarion, _adv._ Haeres. 55, 3.
[5] Prince, _Dan._ p. 26, n. 6.
[6] _Dan._ p. viii.
[7] The account in chap. ii. of the promotion of Daniel to be governor of Babylon, as a reward for his correct interpretation of Nebuchadrezzar's dream, is very probably an imitation of the story of Joseph in Gen. xl-xli. The points of resemblance are very striking. In both accounts, we have a young Hebrew raised by the favour of a heathen king to great political prominence, owing to his extraordinary God-given ability to interpret dreams. In both versions, the heathen astrologers make the first attempt to solve the difficulty, which results in failure, whereupon the pious Israelite, being summoned to the royal presence, in both cases through the friendly intervention of a court official, triumphantly explains the mystery to the king's satisfaction (cf. Prince, _Dan._ p. 29).
[8] See Bevan, _Dan._ 28-40, on the Hebrew and Aramaic of Daniel.
[9] According to Lagarde, _Mitteilungen_, iv. 351 (1891); also Gott, _Gelehrte Anzeigen_ (1891), 497-520.
[10] The latest connected Babylonian inscription is that of Antiochus Soter (280-260 B.C.), but the language was probably spoken until Hellenic times; cf. Gutbrod, _Zeitschr. fur Assyriol._ vi. 27.
[11] Prince, _Dan._ 12.
[12] Bertholdt, Dan. 15; Franz Delitzsch, in Herzog, _Realencyklopadie_, 2nd ed., iii. 470.
[13] Bevan, _Dan._ 27 ff.; Prince, _Dan._ 13.
[14] For this whole discussion, see Prince, _Dan._ 15 ff.
[15] The investigations of Haug, Spiegel and Windischmann show that this was a real Zoroastrian doctrine.
[16] Prince, _Dan._ 35-42.
[17] Certain tablets published by Strassmaier, bearing date continuously from Nabonidus to Cyrus, show that neither Belshazzar nor "Darius the Mede" could have had the title "king of Babylon." See Driver, _Introduction_,[3] xxii.
[18] Prince, _Dan._ 44-56.
[19] Prince, _Dan._ 19-20, 140, 155, 179 ff.
[20] That "Messiah" or "Anointed One" was used of the High-Priest is seen from Lev. x, 3, v. 16.
[21] Prince, _Dan._ 22-24.
DANIEL (DANIL), of Kiev, the earliest Russian travel-writer, and one of the leading Russian travellers in the middle ages. He journeyed to Syria and other parts of the Levant about 1106-1107. He was the _igumen_, or abbot, of a monastery probably near Chernigov in Little Russia: some identify him with one Daniel, bishop of Suriev (fl. 1115-1122). He visited Palestine in the reign of Baldwin I., Latin king of Jerusalem (1100-1118), and apparently soon after the crusading capture of Acre (1104); he claims to have accompanied Baldwin, who treated him with marked friendliness, on an expedition against Damascus (c. 1107). Though Daniel's narrative, beginning (as it practically ends) at Constantinople, omits some of the most interesting sections of his journey, his work has considerable value. His picture of the Holy Land preserves a record of conditions (such as the Saracen raiding almost up to the walls of Christian Jerusalem, and the friendly relations subsisting between Roman and Eastern churches in Syria) peculiarly characteristic of the time; his account of Jerusalem itself is remarkably clear, minute and accurate; his three excursions--to the Dead Sea and Lower Jordan (which last he compares to a river of Little Russia, the Snov), to Bethlehem and Hebron, and towards Damascus--gave him an exceptional knowledge of certain regions. In spite of some extraordinary blunders in topography and history, his observant and detailed record, marked by evident good faith, is among the most valuable of medieval documents relating to Palestine: it is also important in the history of the Russian language, and in the study of ritual and liturgy (from its description of the Easter services in Jerusalem, the Descent of the Holy Fire, &c.). Several Russian friends and companions, from Kiev and Old Novgorod, are recorded by Daniel as present with him at the Easter Eve "miracle," in the church of the Holy Sepulchre.
There are seventy-six MSS. of Daniel's Narrative, of which only five are anterior to A.D. 1500; the oldest is of 1475 (St Petersburg, Library of Ecclesiastical History 9/1086). Three editions exist, of which I. P. Sakharov's (St Petersburg, 1849) is perhaps the best known (in _Narratives of the Russian People_, vol. ii. bk. viii. pp. 1-45). See also the French version in _Itineraires russes en orient_, ed M^e B. de Khitrovo (Geneva, 1889) (_Societe de l'orient latin_); and the account of Daniel in C. R. Beazley, _Dawn of Modern Geography_, ii. 155-174. (C. R. B.)
DANIEL, GABRIEL (1649-1728), French Jesuit historian, was born at Rouen on the 8th of February 1649. He was educated by the Jesuits, entered the order at the age of eighteen, and became superior at Paris. He is best known by his _Histoire de France depuis l'etablissement de la monarchie francaise_ (first complete edition, 1713), which was republished in 1720, 1721, 1725, 1742, and (the last edition, with notes by Father Griffet) 1755-1760. Daniel published an abridgment in 1724 (English trans., 1726), and another abridgment was published by Dorival in 1751. Though full of prejudices which affect his accuracy, Daniel had the advantage of consulting valuable original sources. His _Histoire de la milice francaise_, &c. (1721) is superior to his _Histoire de France_, and may still be consulted with advantage. Daniel also wrote a by no means successful reply to Pascal's _Provincial Letters_, entitled _Entretiens de Cleanthe et d'Eudoxe sur les lettres provinciales_ (1694); two treatises on the Cartesian theory as to the intelligence of the lower animals, and other works.
See Sommervogel, _Bibliotheque de la Compagnie de Jesus_, t. ii.
DANIEL, SAMUEL (1562-1619), English poet and historian, was the son of a music-master, and was born near Taunton, in Somersetshire, in 1562. Another son, John Daniel, was a musician, who held some offices at court, and was the author of _Songs for the Lute, Viol and Voice_ (1606). In 1579 Samuel was admitted a commoner of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, where he remained for about three years, and then gave himself up to the unrestrained study of poetry and philosophy. The name of Samuel Daniel is given as the servant of Lord Stafford, ambassador in France, in 1586, and probably refers to the poet. He was first encouraged and, if we may believe him, taught in verse, by the famous countess of Pembroke, whose honour he was never weary of proclaiming. He had entered her household as tutor to her son, William Herbert. His first known work, a translation of Paulus Jovius, to which some original matter is appended, was printed in 1585. His first known volume of verse is dated 1592; it contains the cycle of sonnets to _Delia_ and the romance called _The Complaint of Rosamond_. Twenty-seven of the sonnets had already been printed at the end of Sir Philip Sidney's _Astrophel and Stella_ without the author's consent. Several editions of _Delia_ appeared in 1592, and they were very frequently reprinted during Daniel's lifetime. We learn by internal evidence that Delia lived on the banks of Shakespeare's river, the Avon, and that the sonnets to her were inspired by her memory when the poet was in Italy. To an edition of _Delia_ and _Rosamond_, in 1594, was added the tragedy of _Cleopatra_, a severe study in the manner of the ancients, in alternately rhyming heroic verse, diversified by stiff choral interludes. _The First Four Books of the Civil Wars_, an historical poem in _ottava rima_, appeared in 1595. The bibliography of Daniel's works is attended with great difficulty, but as far as is known it was not until 1599 that there was published a volume entitled _Poetical Essays_, which contained, besides the "Civil Wars," "Musophilus," and "A letter from Octavia to Marcus Antonius," poems in Daniel's finest and most mature manner. About this time he became tutor to Anne Clifford, daughter of the countess of Cumberland. On the death of Spenser, in the same year, Daniel received the somewhat vague office of poet-laureate, which he seems, however, to have shortly resigned in favour of Ben Jonson. Whether it was on this occasion is not known, but about this time, and at the recommendation of his brother-in-law, Giovanni Florio, he was taken into favour at court, and wrote a _Panegyric Congratulatorie offered to the King at Burleigh Harrington in Rutlandshire_, in _ottava rima_. In 1603 this poem was published, and in many cases copies contained in addition his _Poetical Epistles_ to his patrons and an elegant prose essay called _A Defence of Rime_ (originally printed in 1602) in answer to Thomas Campion's _Observations on the Art of English Poesie_, in which it was contended that rhyme was unsuited to the genius of the English language. In 1603, moreover, Daniel was appointed master of the queen's revels. In this capacity he brought out a series of masques and pastoral tragi-comedies,--of which were printed _A Vision of the Twelve Goddesses_, in 1604; _The Queen's Arcadia_, an adaptation of Guarini's _Pastor Fido_, in 1606; _Tethys Festival or the Queenes Wake_, written on the occasion of Prince Henry's becoming a Knight of the Bath, in 1610; and _Hymen's Triumph_, in honour of Lord Roxburgh's marriage in 1615. Meanwhile had appeared, in 1605, _Certain Small Poems_, with the tragedy of _Philotas_; the latter was a study, in the same style as _Cleopatra_, written some five years earlier. This drama brought its author into difficulties, as Philotas, with whom he expressed some sympathy, was taken to represent Essex. In 1607, under the title of _Certaine small Workes heretofore divulged by Samuel Daniel_, the poet issued a revised version of all his works except _Delia_ and the _Civil Wars_. In 1609 the Civil Wars had been completed in eight books. In 1612 Daniel published a prose _History of England_, from the earliest times down to the end of the reign of Edward III. This work afterwards continued, and published in 1617, was very popular with Drayton's contemporaries. The section dealing with William the Conqueror was published in 1692 as being the work of Sir Walter Raleigh, apparently without sufficient grounds.
Daniel was made a gentleman-extraordinary and groom of the chamber to Queen Anne, sinecure offices which offered no hindrance to an active literary career. He was now acknowledged as one of the first writers of the time. Shakespeare, Selden and Chapman are named among the few intimates who were permitted to intrude upon the seclusion of a garden-house in Old Street, St Luke's, where, Fuller tells us, he would "lie hid for some months together, the more retiredly to enjoy the company of the Muses, and then would appear in public to converse with his friends." Late in life Daniel threw up his titular posts at court and retired to a farm called "The Ridge," which he rented at Beckington, near Devizes in Wiltshire. Here he died on the 14th of October 1619.
The poetical writings of Daniel are very numerous, but in spite of the eulogies of all the best critics, they were long neglected. This is the more singular since, during the 18th century, when so little Elizabethan literature was read, Daniel retained his poetical prestige. In later times Coleridge, Charles Lamb and others expended some of their most genial criticisms on this poet. Of his multifarious works the sonnets are now, perhaps, most read. They depart from the Italian sonnet form in closing with a couplet, as is the case with most of the sonnets of Surrey and Wyat, but they have a grace and tenderness all their own. Of a higher order is _The Complaint of Rosamond_, a soliloquy in which the ghost of the murdered woman appears and bewails her fate in stanzas of exquisite pathos. Among the _Epistles to Distinguished Persons_ will be found some of Daniel's noblest stanzas and most polished verse. The epistle to Lucy, countess of Bedford, is remarkable among those as being composed in genuine _terza rima_, till then not used in English. Daniel was particularly fond of a four-lined stanza of solemn alternately rhyming iambics, a form of verse distinctly misplaced in his dramas. These, inspired it would seem by like attempts of the countess of Pembroke's, are hard and frigid; his pastorals are far more pleasing; and _Hymen's Triumph_ is perhaps the best of all his dramatic writing. An extract from this masque is given in Lamb's _Dramatic Poets_, and it was highly praised by Coleridge. In elegiac verse he always excelled, but most of all in his touching address _To the Angel Spirit of the Most Excellent Sir Philip Sidney_. We must not neglect to quote _Musophilus_ among the most characteristic writings of Daniel. It is a dialogue between a courtier and a man of letters, and is a general defence of learning, and in particular of poetic learning as an instrument in the education of the perfect courtier or man of action. It is addressed to Fulke Greville, and written, with much sententious melody, in a sort of _terza rima_, or, more properly, _ottava rima_ with the couplet omitted. Daniel was a great reformer in verse, and the introducer of several valuable novelties. It may be broadly said of his style that it is full, easy and stately, without being very animated or splendid. It attains a high average of general excellence, and is content with level flights. As a gnomic writer Daniel approaches Chapman, but is far more musical and coherent. He is wanting in fire and passion, but he is preeminent in scholarly grace and tender, mournful reverie.
Daniel's works were edited by A. B. Grosart in 1885-1896. (E. G.)
DANIELL, JOHN FREDERIC (1700-1845), English chemist and physicist, was born in London on the 12th of March 1790, and in 1831 became the first professor of chemistry at the newly founded King's College, London. His name is best known for his invention of the Daniell cell (_Phil. Trans._, 1836), still extensively used for telegraphic and other purposes. He also invented the dew-point hygrometer known by his name (_Quar. Journ. Sci._, 1820), and a register pyrometer (_Phil. Trans._, 1830); and in 1830 he erected in the hall of the Royal Society a water-barometer, with which he carried out a large number of observations _(Phil. Trans._, 1832). A process devised by him for the manufacture of illuminating gas from turpentine and resin was in use in New York for a time. His publications include _Meteorological Essays_ (1823), an _Essay on Artificial Climate considered in its Applications to Horticulture_ (1824), which showed the necessity of a humid atmosphere in hothouses devoted to tropical plants, and an _Introduction to the Study of Chemical Philosophy_ (1839). He died suddenly of apoplexy on the 13th of March 1845, in London, while attending a meeting of the council of the Royal Society, of which he became a fellow in 1813 and foreign secretary in 1839.
DANIELL, THOMAS (1749-1840), English landscape painter, was born at the Chertsey inn, kept by his father, in 1749, and apprenticed to an heraldic painter. Daniell, however, was animated with a love of the romantic and beautiful in architecture and nature. Up to 1784 he painted topographical subjects and flower pieces. By this time his two nephews (see below) had come under his influence, the younger, Samuel, being apprenticed to Medland the landscape engraver, and the elder, William, being under his own care. In this year (1784) he embarked for India accompanied by William, and found at Calcutta ample encouragement. Here he remained ten years, and on returning to London he published his largest work, _Oriental Scenery_, in six large volumes, not completed till 1808. From 1795 till 1828 he continued to exhibit Eastern subjects, temples, jungle hunts, &c., and at the same time continued the publication of illustrated works. These are--_Views of Calcutta_; _Oriental Scenery_, 144 plates; _Views in Egypt_; _Excavations at Ellora_; _Picturesque Voyage to China_. These were for the most part executed in aquatint. He was elected an Academician in 1799, fellow of the Royal Society about the same time, and at different times member of several minor societies. His nephews both died before him; his Indian period had made him independent, and he lived a bachelor life in much respect at Kensington till his death on the 19th of March 1840.
WILLIAM DANIELL (1769-1837), his nephew, was fourteen when he accompanied his uncle to India. His own publications, engraved in aquatint, were--_Voyage to India_; _Zoography_; _Animated Nature_; _Views of London_; _Views of Bootan_, a work prepared from his uncle's sketches; and a _Voyage Round Great Britain_, which occupied him several years. The British Institution made him an award of L100 for a "Battle of Trafalgar," and he was elected R.A. in 1822. He turned to panorama painting before his death, beginning in 1832 with Madras, the picture being enlivened by a representation of the Hindu mode of taming wild elephants.
SAMUEL DANIELL, William's younger brother, was brought up as an engraver, and first appears as an exhibitor in 1792. A few years later he went to the Cape and travelled into the interior of Africa, with his sketching materials in his haversack. The drawings he made there were published, after his return, in his _African Scenery_. He did not rest long at home, but left for Ceylon in 1806, where he spent the remaining years of his life, publishing _The Scenery, Animals and Natives of Ceylon_.
DANNAT, WILLIAM T. (1853- ), American artist, was born in New York city in 1853. He was a pupil of the Royal Academy of Munich and of Munkacsy, and became an accomplished draughtsman and a distinguished figure and portrait painter. He early attracted attention with sketches and pictures made in Spain, and a large composition, "The Quartette," now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, was one of the successes of the Paris Salon of 1884. Dannat settled in Paris, became an officer of the Legion of Honour, and is represented in the Luxembourg.
DANNECKER, JOHANN HEINRICH VON (1758-1841), German sculptor, was born at Stuttgart, where his father was employed in the stables of the duke of Wurttemberg, on the 15th of October 1758. The boy was entered in the military school at the age of thirteen, but after two years he was allowed to take his own taste for art. We find him at once associating with the young sculptors Scheffauer and Le Jeune, the painters Guibal and Harper, and also with Schiller, and the musician Zumsteeg. His busts of some of these are good; that of Schiller is well known. In his eighteenth year he carried off the prize at the Concours with his model of Milo of Crotona. On this the duke made him sculptor to the palace (1780), and for some time he was employed on child-angels and caryatides for the decoration of the reception rooms. In 1783 he left for Paris with Scheffauer, and placed himself under Pajou. His Mars, a sitting figure sent home to Stuttgart, marks this period; and we next find him, still travelling with his friend, at Rome in 1785, where he settled down to work hard for five years. Goethe and Herder were then in Rome and became his friends, as well as Canova, who was the hero of the day, and who had undoubtedly a great authoritative influence on his style. His marble statues of Ceres and Bacchus were done at this time. These are now in the Residenz-schloss, at Stuttgart. On his return to Stuttgart, which he never afterwards quitted except for short trips to Paris, Vienna and Zurich, the double influence of his admiration for Canova and his study of the antique is apparent in his works. The first was a girl lamenting her dead bird, which pretty light motive was much admired. Afterwards, Sappho, in marble for the Lustschloss, and two offering-bearers for the Jagdschloss; Hector, now in the museum, not in marble; the complaint of Ceres, from Schiller's poem; a statue of Christ, worthy of mention for its nobility, which has been skilfully engraved by Amsler; Psyche; kneeling water-nymph; Love, a favourite he had to repeat. These stock subjects with sculptors had freshness of treatment; and the Ariadne, done a little later, especially had a charm of novelty which has made it a European favourite in a reduced size. It was repeated for the banker Von Bethmann in Frankfort, and it now appears the ornament of the Bethmann Museum. Many of the illustrious men of the time were modelled by him. The original marble of Schiller is now at Weimar; after the poet's death it was again modelled in colossal size. Lavater, Metternich, Countess Stephanie of Baden, General Benkendorf and others are much prized. Dannecker was director of the Gallery of Stuttgart, and received many academic and other distinctions. His death in 1841 was preceded by a period of mental failure.
DANNEWERK, or DANEWERK (Danish, _Dannevirke_ or _Danevirke_, "Danes' rampart"), the ancient frontier rampart of the Danes against the Germans, extending 10(1/2) m. from just south of the town of Schleswig to the marshes of the river Trene near the village of Hollingstedt. The rampart was begun by Guethoethr (_Godefridus_), king of Vestfold, early in the 9th century. In 934 it was passed by the German king Henry I., after which it was extended by King Harold Bluetooth (940-986), but was again stormed by the emperor Otto II. in 974. The chronicler Saxo Grammaticus mentions in his _Gesta Danorum_ the "rampart of Jutland" (_Jutiae moenia_) as having been once more extended by Valdemar the Great (1157-1182), which has been cited among the proofs that Schleswig (_Sonderjylland_) forms an integral part of Jutland (_Manuel hist. de la question de Slesvig_, 1906). After the union of Schleswig and Holstein under the Danish crown, the Danevirke fell into decay, but in 1848 it was hastily strengthened by the Danes, who were, however, unable to hold it in face of the superiority of the Prussian artillery, and on the 23rd of April it was stormed. From 1850 onwards it was again repaired and strengthened at great cost, and was considered impregnable; but in the war of 1864 the Prussians turned it by crossing the Schlei, and it was abandoned by the Danes on the 6th of February without a blow. It was thereupon destroyed by the Prussians; in spite of which, however, a long line of imposing ruins still remains. The systematic excavation of these, begun in 1900, has yielded some notable finds, especially of valuable runic inscriptions (F. de Jessen, _La Question de Slesvig_, pp. 25, 44-50, &c.).
See Lorenzen, _Dannevirke og Omegn_ (2nd ed., Copenhagen, 1864); H. Handelmann, _Das Dannewerk_ (Kiel, 1885); Philippsen and Sunksen, _Fuhrer durch das Danewerk_ (Hamburg, 1903).
DANSVILLE, a village of Livingston county, New York, U.S.A., 49 m. S. of Rochester, on the Canaseraga Creek. Pop. (1890) 3758; (1900) 3633, of whom 417 were foreign-born; (1905) 3908; (1910) 3938. The village is served by the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, and the Dansville & Mount Morris railways. At Dansville is the Jackson Health Resort, a large sanatorium, with which a nurses' training school is connected. There is a public library. The village has large nurseries and vineyards, flour and paper mills, a large printing establishment, a foundry, and a shoe factory. Dansville, named in honour of Daniel P. Faulkner, was settled about 1800, and was incorporated in 1845.
DANTE, Dante (or Durante) Alighieri (1265-1321), the greatest of Italian poets, was born at Florence about the middle of May 1265. He was descended from an ancient family, but from one which at any rate for several generations had belonged to the burgher and not to the knightly class. His biographers have attempted on very slight grounds to deduce his origin from the Frangipani, one of the oldest senatorial families of Rome. We can affirm with greater certainty that he was connected with the Elisei who took part in the building of Florence under Charles the Great. Dante himself does not, with the exception of a few obscure and scattered allusions, carry his ancestry beyond the warrior Cacciaguida, whom he met in the sphere of Mars (_Par._ xv. 87, foll.). Of Cacciaguida's family nothing is known. The name, as he told Dante (_Par._ xv. 139, 5), was given him at his baptism; it has a Teutonic ring. The family may well have sprung from one of the barons who, as Villani tells us, remained behind Otto I. It has been noted that the phrase "Tonde venner quivi" (xvi. 44) seems to imply that they were not Florentines. He further tells his descendant that he was born in the year 1106 (or, if another reading of xvi, 37, 38 be adopted, in 1091), and that he married an Aldighieri from the valley of the Po. Here the German strain appears unmistakably; the name Aldighiero (Aldiger) being purely Teutonic. He also mentions two brothers, Moronte and Eliseo, and that he accompanied the emperor Conrad III. upon his crusade into the Holy Land, where he died (1147) among the infidels. From Eliseo was probably descended the branch of the Elisei; from Aldighiero, son of Cacciaguida, the branch of the Alighieri. Bellincione, son of Aldighiero, was the grandfather of Dante. His father was a second Aldighiero, a lawyer of some reputation. By his first wife, Lapa di Chiarissimo Cialuffii, this Aldighiero had a son Francesco; by his second, Donna Bella, whose family name is not known, Dante and a daughter. Thus the family of Dante held a most respectable position among the citizens of his beloved city; but had it been reckoned in the very first rank they could not have remained in Florence after the defeat of the Guelphs at Montaperti in 1260. It is clear, however, that Dante's mother at least did so remain, for Dante was born in Florence in 1265. The heads of the Guelph party did not return till 1267.
Dante was born under the sign of the twins, "the glorious stars pregnant with virtue, to whom he owes his genius such as it is." Astrologers considered this constellation as favourable to literature and science, and Brunetto Latini, the philosopher and diplomatist, his instructor, tells him in the _Inferno_ (xv. 25, foll.) that, if he follows its guidance, he cannot fail to reach the harbour of fame. Boccaccio relates that before his birth his mother dreamed that she lay under a very lofty laurel, growing in a green meadow, by a very clear fountain, when she felt the pangs of childbirth,--that her child, feeding on the berries which fell from the laurel, and on the waters of the fountain, in a very short time became a shepherd, and attempted to reach the leaves of the laurel, the fruit of which had nurtured him,--that, trying to obtain them he fell, and rose up, no longer a man, but in the guise of a peacock. We know little of Dante's boyhood except that he was a hard student and was profoundly influenced by Brunetto Latini. Boccaccio tells us that he became very familiar with Virgil, Horace, Ovid and Statius, and all other famous poets. From the age of eighteen he, like most cultivated young men of that age, wrote poetry assiduously, in the philosophical amatory style of which his friend, older by many years than himself, Guido Cavalcanti, was a great exponent, and of which Dante regarded Guido Guinicelli of Bologna as the master (_Purg._ xxvi. 97, 8). Leonardo Bruni of Arezzo, writing a hundred years or more after his death, says that "by study of philosophy, of theology, astrology, arithmetic and geometry, by reading of history, by the turning over many curious books, watching and sweating in his studies, he acquired the science which he was to adorn and explain in his verses." Of Brunetto Latini Dante himself speaks with the most loving gratitude and affection, though he does not hesitate to brand his vices with infamy. Under such guidance Dante became master of all the science of his age at a time when it was not impossible to know all that could be known. He had some knowledge of drawing; at any rate he tells us that on the anniversary of the death of Beatrice he drew an angel on a tablet. He was an intimate friend of Giotto, who has immortalized his youthful lineaments in the chapel of the Bargello, and who is recorded to have drawn from his friend's inspiration the allegories of Virtue and Vice which fringe the frescoes of the Scrovegni Chapel at Padua. Nor was he less sensible to the delights of music. Milton had not a keener ear for the loud uplifted angel trumpets and the immortal harps of golden wires of the cherubim and seraphim; and the English poet was proud to compare his own friendship with Henry Lawes with that between Dante and Casella, "met in the milder shades of purgatory." Of his companions the most intimate and sympathetic were the lawyer-poet Cino of Pistoia, Lapo Gianni, Guido Cavalcanti and others, similarly gifted and dowered with like tastes, who moved in the lively and acute society of Florence, and felt with him the first warm flush of the new spirit which was soon to pass over Europe. He has written no sweeter or more melodious lines than those in which he expresses the wish that he, with Guido and Lapo, might be wafted by enchantment over the sea wheresoever they might list, shielded from tempest and foul weather, in such contentment that they should wish to live always in one mind, and that the good enchanter should bring Monna Vanna and Monna Bice and that other lady into their barque, where they should for ever discourse of love and be for ever happy. It is a wonderful thing (says Leonardo Bruni) that, though he studied without intermission, it would not have appeared to anyone that he studied, from his joyous mien and youthful conversation. Like Milton he was trained in the strictest academical education which the age afforded; but Dante lived under a warmer sun and brighter skies, and found in the rich variety and gaiety of his early life a defence against the withering misfortunes of his later years. Milton felt too early the chill breath of Puritanism, and the serious musing on the experience of life, which saddened the verse of both poets, deepened in his case rather into grave and desponding melancholy, than into the fierce scorn and invective which disillusion wrung from Dante.
Political life.
We must now consider the political circumstances in which lay the activity of Dante's manhood. From 1115, the year of the death of Matilda countess of Tuscany, to 1215, Florence enjoyed a nearly uninterrupted peace. Attached to the Guelph party, it remained undivided against itself. But in 1215 a private feud between the families of Buondelmonte and Uberti introduced into the city the horrors of civil war. Villani (lib. v. cap. 38) relates how Buondelmonte de' Buondelmonti, a noble youth of Florence, being engaged to marry a lady of the house of Amidei, allied himself instead to a Donati, and how Buondelmonte was attacked and killed by the Amidei and Uberti at the foot of the Ponte Vecchio, close by the pilaster which bears the image of Mars. "The death of Messer Buondelmonte was the occasion and beginning of the accursed parties of Guelphs and Ghibellines in Florence." Of the seventy-two families then in Florence thirty-nine became Guelph under the leadership of the Buondelmonte and the rest Ghibelline under the Uberti. The strife of parties was for a while allayed by the war against Pisa in 1222, and the constant struggles against Siena; but in 1248 Frederick II. sent into the city his natural son Frederick "of Antioch," with 1600 German knights. The Guelphs were driven away from the town, and took refuge, part in Montevarchi, part in Capraia. The Ghibellines, masters of Florence, behaved with great severity, and destroyed the towers and palaces of the Guelph nobles. At last the people became impatient. They rose in rebellion, reduced the powers of the podesta, elected a captain of the people to manage the internal affairs of the city, with a council of twelve, established a more democratic constitution, and, encouraged by the death of Frederick II. in December 1250, recalled the exiled Guelphs. Manfred, the bastard son of Frederick, pursued the policy of his father. He stimulated the Ghibelline Uberti to rebel against their position of subjection. A rising of the vanquished party was put down by the people, in July 1258 the Ghibellines were expelled from the town, and the towers of the Uberti razed to the ground. The exiles betook themselves to the friendly city of Siena. Manfred sent them a reinforcement of German horse, under his kinsman Count Giordano Lancia. The Florentines, after vainly demanding their surrender, despatched an army against them. On the 4th of September 1260 was fought the great battle of Montaperti, which dyed the Arbia red, and in which the Guelphs were entirely defeated. The hand which held the banner of the republic was sundered by the sword of a traitor (_Inf._ xxxii. 106). For the first time in the history of Florence the Carroccio was taken. Florence lay at the mercy of her enemies. A parliament was held at Empoli, in which the deputies of Siena, Pisa, Arezzo and other Tuscan towns consulted on the best means of securing their new war power. They voted that the accursed Guelph city should be blotted out. But Farinata degli Uberti stood up in their midst, bold and defiant as when he stood erect among the sepulchres of hell, and said that if, from the whole number of the Florentines, he alone should remain, he would not suffer, whilst he could wield a sword, that his country should be destroyed, and that, if it were necessary to die a thousand times for her, a thousand times would he be ready to encounter death. Help came to the Guelphs from an unexpected quarter. Clement IV., elected pope in 1265, offered the crown of Apulia and Sicily to Charles of Anjou. The French prince, passing rapidly through Lombardy, Romagna and the Marches, reached Rome by way of Spoleto, was crowned on the 6th of January 1266, and on the 23rd of February defeated and killed Manfred at Benevento. In such a storm of conflict did Dante first see the light. In 1267 the Guelphs were recalled, but instead of settling down in peace with their opponents they summoned Charles of Anjou to vengeance, and the Ghibellines were driven out. The meteor passage of Conradin gave hope to the imperial party, which was quenched when the head of the fair-haired boy fell on the scaffold at Naples. Pope after pope tried in vain to make peace. Gregory X. placed the rebellious city under an interdict; in 1278 Cardinal Latini by order of Nicholas III. effected a truce, which lasted for four years. The city was to be governed by a committee of fourteen _buonomini_, on which the Guelphs were to have a small majority. In 1282 the constitution of Florence received the final form which it retained till the collapse of freedom. From the three arti _maggiori_ were chosen six priors, in whose hands was placed the government of the republic. Before the end of the century, seven greater arts were recognized, including the _speziali_,--druggists and dealers in all manner of oriental goods, and in books--among whom Dante afterwards enrolled himself. They remained in office for two months, and during that time lived and shared a common table in the public palace. We shall see what influence this office had upon the fate of Dante. The success of the "Sicilian Vespers" (March 1282), the death of Charles of Anjou (January 1285), and of Martin IV. in the following March, roused again the courage of the Ghibellines. They entered Arezzo, where the Ghibellines at present had the upper hand, and threatened to drive out the Guelphs from Tuscany. Skirmishes and raids, of which Villani and Bruni have left accounts, went on through the winter of 1288-1289, forming a prelude to the great battle of Campaldino in the following summer. Then it was that Dante saw "horsemen moving camp and commencing the assault, and holding muster, and the march of foragers, the shock of tournaments, and race of jousts, now with trumpets and now with bells, with drums and castle signals, with native things and foreign" (_Inf._ xxii. 1, foll.). On the 11th of June 1289, at Campaldino near Poppi, in the Casentino, the Ghibellines were utterly defeated. They never again recovered their hold on Florence, but the violence of faction survived under other names. In a letter quoted, though not at first hand, by Leonardo Bruni, which is not now extant, Dante is said to mention that he himself fought with distinction at Campaldino. He was present shortly afterwards at the battle of Caprona (_Inf._ xxi. 95, foll.), and returned in September 1289 to his studies and his love. His peace was of short duration. On the 9th of June 1290 died Beatrice, whose mortal love had guided him for thirteen years, and whose immortal spirit purified his later life, and revealed to him the mysteries of Paradise.
Dante had first met Beatrice Portinari at the house of her father Folco on May-day 1274. In his own words, "already nine times after my birth the heaven of light had returned as it were to the same point, when there appeared to my eyes the glorious lady of my mind, who was by many called Beatrice who knew not what to call her. She had already been so long in this life that already in its time the starry heaven had moved towards the east the twelfth part of a degree, so that she appeared to me about the beginning of her ninth year, and I saw her about the end of my ninth year. Her dress on that day was of a most noble colour, a subdued and goodly crimson, girdled and adorned in such sort as best suited with her tender age. At that moment I saw most truly that the spirit of life which hath its dwelling in the secretest chamber of the heart began to tremble so violently that the least pulses of my body shook therewith; and in trembling it said these words, 'Ecce deus fortior me qui veniens dominabitur mihi.'" In the _Vita Nuova_ is written the story of his passion from its commencement to within a year after the lady's death (June 9th, 1290). He saw Beatrice only once or twice, and she probably knew little of him. She married Simone de' Bardi. But the worship of her lover was stronger for the remoteness of its subject. The last chapter of the Vita Nuova relates how, after the lapse of a year, "it was given me to behold a wonderful vision, wherein I saw things which determined me to say nothing further of this blessed one until such time as I could discourse more worthily concerning her. And to this end I labour all I can, as she in truth knoweth. Therefore if it be His pleasure through whom is the life of all things that my life continue with me a few years, it is my hope that I shall yet write concerning her what hath not before been written of any woman. After the which may it seem good unto Him who is the master of grace that my spirit should go hence to behold the glory of its lady, to wit, of that blessed Beatrice who now gloriously gazes on the countenance of Him qui est per omnia saecula benedictus." In the _Convito_ he resumes the story of his life. "When I had lost the first delight of my soul (that is, Beatrice) I remained so pierced with sadness that no comforts availed me anything, yet after some time my mind, desirous of health, sought to return to the method by which other disconsolate ones had found consolation, and I set myself to read that little-known book of Boetius in which he consoled himself when a prisoner and an exile. And hearing that Tully had written another work, in which, treating of friendship, he had given words of consolation to Laelius, I set myself to read that also." He so far recovered from the shock of his loss that in 1292 he married Gemma, daughter of Manetto Donati, a connexion of the celebrated Corso Donati, afterwards Dante's bitter foe. It is possible that she is the lady mentioned in the _Vita Nuova_ as sitting full of pity at her window and comforting Dante for his sorrow. By this wife he had two sons and two daughters, and although he never mentions her in the _Divina Commedia_, and although she did not accompany him into exile, there is no reason to suppose that she was other than a good wife, or that the union was otherwise than happy. Certain it is that he spares the memory of Corso in his great poem, and speaks kindly of his kinsmen Piccarda and Forese.
In 1293 Giano della Bella, a man of old family who had thrown in his lot with the people, induced the commonwealth to adopt the so-called "Ordinances of Justice," a severely democratic constitution, by which among other things it was enacted that no man of noble family, even though engaged in trade, could hold office as prior. Two years later Giano was banished, but the ordinances remained in force, though the _grandi_ recovered much of their power.
Dante now began to take an active part in politics. He was inscribed in the _arte_ of the _Medici_ and _Speziali_, which made him eligible as one of the six _priori_ to whom the government of the city was entrusted in 1282. Documents still existing in the archives of Florence show that he took part in the deliberations of the several councils of the city in 1295, 1296, 1300 and 1301. The notice in the last year is of some importance. The pope had demanded a contingent of 100 Florentine knights to serve against his enemies, the Colonna family. On the 19th of June we read in the contemporary report of the debate on this question in the Council of a Hundred: "_Dantes Alagherius consuluit quod de servitio faciendo Domino Papae nihil fieret_." Other instances of his invariable opposition to Boniface occur. Filelfo says that he served on fourteen embassies, a statement not only unsupported by evidence, but impossible in itself. Filelfo does not mention the only embassy in which we know for certain that Dante was engaged, that to the town of San Gemignano in May 1300. From the 15th of June to the 15th of August 1300 he held the office of prior, which was the source of all the miseries of his life. The spirit of faction had again broken out in Florence. The two rival families were the Cerchi and the Donati,--the first of great wealth but recent origin, the last of ancient ancestry but poor. A quarrel had arisen in Pistoia between the two branches of the Cancellieri,--the Bianchi and Neri, the Whites and the Blacks. The quarrel spread to Florence, the Donati took the side of the Blacks, the Cerchi of the Whites. Pope Boniface was asked to mediate, and sent Cardinal Matteo d'Acquasparta to maintain peace. He arrived just as Dante entered upon his office as prior. The cardinal effected nothing, but Dante and his colleagues banished the heads of the rival parties in different directions to a distance from the capital. The Blacks were sent to Citta della Pieve in the Tuscan mountains; the Whites, among whom was Dante's dearest friend Guido Cavalcanti, to Serrezzano in the unhealthy Maremma. After the expiration of Dante's office both parties returned, Guido Cavalcanti so ill with fever that he shortly afterwards died. At a meeting held in the church of the Holy Trinity the Whites were denounced as Ghibellines, enemies of the pope. The Blacks sought for vengeance. Their leader, Corso Donati, hastened to Rome, and persuaded Boniface VIII. to send for Charles of Valois, brother of the French king, Philip the Fair, to act as "peacemaker." The priors sent at the end of September four ambassadors to the pope, one of whom, according to the chronicler Dino, was Dante. There are, however, improbabilities in the story, and the passage quoted in support of it bears marks of later interpolation. He never again saw the towers of his native city. Charles of Valois, after visiting the pope at Anagni, retraced his steps to Florence, entering the city on All Saints' Day and taking up his abode in the Oltr' Arno. Corso Donati, who had been banished a second time, returned in force and summoned the Blacks to arms. The prisons were broken open, the podesta driven from the town, the Cerchi confined within their houses, a third of the city was destroyed with fire and sword. By the help of Charles the Blacks were victorious. They appointed Cante de' Gabrielli of Gubbio as podesta, a man devoted to their interests. More than 600 Whites were condemned to exile and cast as beggars upon the world. On the 27th of January 1302, Dante, with four others of the White party, was charged before the podesta, Cante de' Gabrielli, with _baratteria_, or corrupt jobbery and peculation when in office, and, not appearing, condemned to pay a fine of 5000 lire of small florins. If the money was not paid within three days their property was to be destroyed and laid waste; if they did pay the fine they were to be exiled for two years from Tuscany; in any case they were never again to hold office in the republic. The charge in Dante's case was obviously preposterous, though ingeniously devised; for he was known to be at the time in somewhat straitened circumstances, and had recently been in control of certain public works. But of all sins, that of "barratry" was one of the most hateful to him. No doubt the papal finger may be traced in the affair. On the 10th of March Dante and fourteen others were condemned to be burned alive if they should come into the power of the republic. Similar sentences were passed in September 1311 and October 1315. The sentence was not formally reversed till 1494, under the government of the Medici.
Leonardo Bruni, who accepts the story of the embassy to Rome, states that Dante received the news of his banishment in that city, and at once joined the other exiles at Siena. How he escaped arrest in the papal states is not explained. The exiles met first at Gargonza, a castle between Siena and Arezzo, and then at Arezzo itself. They joined themselves to the Ghibellines, to which party the podesta Uguccione della Faggiuola belonged. The Ghibellines, however, were divided amongst themselves, and the more strict Ghibellines were not disposed to favour the cause of the White Guelphs. On the 8th of June 1302, however, a meeting was held at San Godenzo, a place in the Florentine territory, Dante's presence at which is proved by documentary evidence, and an alliance was there made with the powerful Ghibelline clan of the Ubaldini. The exiles remained at Arezzo till the summer of 1304. In September 1303 the fleur-de-lis had entered Anagni, and Christ had a second time been made prisoner in the person of his vicar. At the instigation of Philip the Fair, William of Nogaret and Sciarra Colonna had entered the papal palace at Anagni, and had insulted and, it is said, even beaten the aged pontiff under his own roof. Boniface did not survive the insult long, but died in the following month. He was succeeded by Benedict XI., and in March the cardinal da Prato came to Florence, sent by the new pope to make peace. The people received him with enthusiasm; ambassadors came to him from the Whites; and he did his best to reconcile the two parties. But the Blacks resisted all his efforts. He shook the dust from off his feet, and departed, leaving the city under an interdict. Foiled by the calumnies and machinations of the one party, the cardinal gave his countenance to the other. It happened that Corso Donati and the heads of the Black party were absent at Pistoia. Da Prato advised the Whites to attack Florence, deprived of its heads and impaired by a recent fire. An army was collected of 16,000 foot and 9000 horse. Communications were opened with the Ghibellines of Bologna and Romagna, and a futile attempt was made to enter Florence from Lastra, the failure of which further disorganized the party. Dante had, however, already separated from the "ill-conditioned and foolish company" of common party-politicians, who rejected his counsels of wisdom, and had learnt that he must henceforth form a party by himself. In 1303 he had left Arezzo and gone to Forli in Romagna, of which city Scarpetta degli Ordelaffi was lord. To him, according to Flavius Blondus the historian (d. before 1484), a native of the place, Dante acted for a time as secretary.
Dante's Ghibellinism.
From Forli Dante probably went to Bartolommeo della Scala, lord of Verona, where the country of the great Lombard gave him his first refuge and his first hospitable reception. Can Grande, to whom he afterwards dedicated the _Paradiso_, was then a boy. Bartolommeo died in 1304, and it is possible that Dante may have remained in Verona till his death. We must consider, if we would understand the real nature of Dante's Ghibellinism, that he had been born and bred a Guelph; but he saw that the conditions of the time were altered, and that other dangers menaced the welfare of his country. There was no fear now that Florence, Siena, Pisa, Arezzo should be razed to the ground in order that the castle of the lord might overlook the humble cottages of his contented subjects; but there was danger lest Italy should be torn in sunder by its own jealousies and passions, and lest the fair domain bounded by the sea and the Alps should never properly assert the force of its individuality, and should present a contemptible contrast to a united France and a confederated Germany. Sick with petty quarrels and dissensions, Dante strained his eyes towards the hills for the appearance of a universal monarch, raised above the jars of faction and the spur of ambition, under whom each country, each city, each man, might, under the institutions best suited to it, lead the life and do the work for which it was best fitted. United in spiritual harmony with the vicar of Christ, he should show for the first time to the world an example of a government where the strongest force and the highest wisdom were interpenetrated by all that God had given to the world of piety and justice. In this sense and in no other was Dante a Ghibelline. The vision was never realized--the hope was never fulfilled. Not till 500 years later did Italy become united and the "greyhound of deliverance" chase from city to city the wolf of cupidity. But is it possible to say that the dream did not work its own realization, or to deny that the high ideal of the poet, after inspiring a few minds as lofty as his own, has become embodied in the constitution of a state which acknowledges no stronger bond of union than a common worship of the exile's indignant and impassioned verse?
Wanderings.
It is very difficult to determine with exactness the order and the place of Dante's wanderings. Many cities and castles in Italy have claimed the honour of giving him shelter, or of being for a time the home of his inspired muse. He certainly spent some time with Count Guido Salvatico in the Casentino near the sources of the Arno, probably in the castle of Porciano, and with Uguccione in the castle of Faggiuola in the mountains of Urbino. After this he is said to have visited the university of Bologna; and in August 1306 we find him at Padua. Cardinal Napoleon Orsini, the legate of the French pope Clement V., had put Bologna under a ban, dissolved the university and driven the professors to the northern city. In May or June 1307 the same cardinal collected the Whites at Arezzo and tried to induce the Florentines to recall them. The name of Dante is found attached to a document signed by the Whites in the church of St Gaudenzio in the Mugello. This enterprise came to nothing. Dante retired to the castle of Moroello Malespina in the Lunigiana, where the marble ridges of the mountains of Carrara descend in precipitous slopes to the Gulf of Spezzia. From this time till the arrival of the emperor Henry VII. in Italy, October 1310, all is uncertain. His old enemy Corso Donati had at last allied himself with Uguccione della Faggiuola, the leader of the Ghibellines. Dante thought it possible that this might lead to his return. But in 1308 Corso was declared a traitor, attacked in his house, put to flight and killed. Dante lost his last hope. He left Tuscany, and went to Can Grande della Scala at Verona. From this place it is thought that he visited the university of Paris (1309), studied in the rue du Fouarre and went on into the Low Countries. That he ever crossed the Channel or went to Oxford, or himself saw where the heart of Henry, son of Richard, earl of Cornwall, murdered by his cousin Guy of Montfort in 1271, was "still venerated on the Thames," may safely be disbelieved. The only evidence for it is in the _Commentary_ of John of Serravalle, bishop of Fermo, who lived a century later, had no special opportunity of knowing, and was writing for the benefit of two English bishops. The election in 1308 of Henry of Luxemburg as emperor stirred again his hopes of a deliverer. At the end of 1310, in a letter to the princes and people of Italy, he proclaimed the coming of the saviour; at Milan he did personal homage to his sovereign. The Florentines made every preparation to resist the emperor. Dante wrote from the Casentino a letter dated the 31st of March 1311, in which he rebuked them for their stubbornness and obstinacy. Henry still lingered in Lombardy at the siege of Cremona, when Dante, on the 16th of April 1311, in a celebrated epistle, upbraided his delay, argued that the crown of Italy was to be won on the Arno rather than on the Po, and urged the tarrying emperor to hew the rebellious Florentines like Agag in pieces before the Lord. Henry was as deaf to this exhortation as the Florentines themselves. After reducing Lombardy he passed from Genoa to Pisa, and on the 29th of June 1312 was crowned by some cardinals in the church of St John Lateran at Rome; the Vatican being in the hands of his adversary King Robert of Naples. Then at length he moved towards Tuscany by way of Umbria. Leaving Cortona and Arezzo, he reached Florence on the 19th of September. He did not dare to attack it, but returned in November to Pisa. In the summer of the following year he prepared to invade the kingdom of Naples; but in the neighbourhood of Siena he caught a fever and died at the monastery of Buonconvento, on the 24th of August 1313. He lies in the Campo Santo of Pisa; and the hopes of Dante and his party were buried in his grave.
Old age and death.
After the death of the emperor Henry (Bruni tells us) Dante passed the rest of his life as an exile, sojourning in various places throughout Lombardy, Tuscany and the Romagna, under the protection of various lords, until at length he retired to Ravenna, where he ended his life. Very little can be added to this meagre story. There is reason for supposing that he stayed at Gubbio with Bosone dei Rafaelli, and tradition assigns him a cell in the monastery of Sta Croce di Fonte Avellana in the same district, situated on the slopes of Catria, one of the highest peaks of the Apennines in that region. After the death of the French pope, Clement V., he addressed a letter, dated the 14th of July 1314, to the cardinals in conclave, urging them to elect an Italian pope. About this time he came to Lucca, then lately conquered by his friend Uguccione. Here he completed the last cantos of the _Purgatory_, which he dedicated to Uguccione, and here he must have become acquainted with Gentucca, whose name had been whispered to him by her countryman on the slopes of the Mountain of Purification (_Purg._ xxiv. 37). That the intimacy between the "world-worn" poet and the young married lady (who is thought to be identifiable with Gentucca Morla, wife of one Cosciorino Fondora) was other than blameless, is quite incredible. In August 1315 was fought the battle of Monte Catini, a day of humiliation and mourning for the Guelphs. Uguccione made but little use of his victory; and the Florentines marked their vengeance on his adviser by condemning Dante yet once again to death if he ever should come into their power. In the beginning of the following year Uguccione lost both his cities of Pisa and Lucca. At this time Dante was offered an opportunity of returning to Florence. The conditions given to the exiles were that they should pay a fine and walk in the dress of humiliation to the church of St John, and there do penance for their offences. Dante refused to tolerate this shame; and the letter is still extant in which he declines to enter Florence except with honour, secure that the means of life will not fail him, and that in any corner of the world he will be able to gaze at the sun and the stars, and meditate on the sweetest truths of philosophy. He preferred to take refuge with his most illustrious protector Can Grande della Scala of Verona, then a young man of twenty-five, rich, liberal and the favoured head of the Ghibelline party. His name has been immortalized by an eloquent panegyric in the seventeenth canto of the _Paradiso_. Whilst on a visit at the court of Verona he maintained, on the 20th of January 1320, the philosophical thesis _De aqua et terra_, on the levels of land and water, which is included in his minor works. The last three years of his life were spent at Ravenna, under the protection of Guido da Polenta. In his service Dante undertook an embassy to the Venetians. He failed in the object of his mission, and, returning disheartened and broken in spirit through the unhealthy lagoons, caught a fever and died in Ravenna on the 14th of September 1321. His bones still repose there. His doom of exile has been reversed by the union of Italy, which has made the city of his birth and the various cities of his wanderings component members of a common country. His son Piero, who wrote a commentary on the _Divina Commedia_, settled as a lawyer in Verona, and died in 1364. His daughter Beatrice lived as a nun in Ravenna, dying at some time between 1350 (when Boccaccio brought her a present of ten gold crowns from a Florentine gild) and 1370. His direct line became extinct in 1509.
Divina Commedia.
_Dante's Works._--Of Dante's works, that by which he is known to all the educated world, and in virtue of which he holds his place as one of the half-dozen greatest writers of all time, is of course the _Commedia_. (The epithet _divina_, it may be noted, was not given to the poem by its author, nor does it appear on a title-page until 1555, in the edition of Ludovico Dolce, printed by Giolito; though it is applied to the poet himself as early as 1512.) The poem is absolutely unique in literature; it may safely be said that at no other epoch of the world's history could such a work have been produced. Dante was steeped in all the learning, which in its way was considerable, of his time; he had read the _Summa Theologica_ of Aquinas, the _Tresor_ of his master Brunetto, and other encyclopaedic works available in that age; he was familiar with all that was then known of the Latin classical and post-classical authors. Further, he was a deep and original political thinker, who had himself borne a prominent part in practical politics. He was born into a generation in which almost every man of education habitually wrote verse, as indeed their predecessors had been doing for the last fifty years. Vernacular poetry had come late into Italy, and had hitherto, save for a few didactic or devotional treatises hitched into rough rhyme, been exclusively lyric in form. Amatory at first, later, chiefly in the hands of Guittone of Arezzo and Guido Cavalcanti, taking an ethical and metaphysical tone, it had never fully shaken off the Provencal influence under which it had started, and of which Dante himself shows considerable traces.
The age also was unique, though the two great events which made the 15th century a turning-point in the world's history--the invention of printing and the discovery of the new world (to which might perhaps be added the intrusion of Islam into Europe)--were still far in the future. But the age was essentially one of great men; of free thought and free speech; of brilliant and daring action, whether for good or evil. It is easy to understand how Dante's bitterest scorn is reserved for those "sorry souls who lived without infamy and without renown, displeasing to God and to His enemies."
The time was thus propitious for the production of a great imaginative work, and the man was ready who should produce it. It called for a prophet, and the prophet said, "Here am I." "Dante," says an acute writer, "is not, as Homer is, the father of poetry springing in the freshness and simplicity of childhood out of the arms of mother earth; he is rather, like Noah, the father of a second poetical world, to whom he pours forth his prophetic song fraught with the wisdom and the experience of the old world." Thus the _Commedia_, though often classed for want of a better description among epic poems, is totally different in method and construction from all other poems of that kind. Its "hero" is the narrator himself; the incidents do not modify the course of the story; the place of episodes is taken by theological or metaphysical disquisitions; the world through which the poet takes his readers is peopled, not with characters of heroic story, but with men and women known personally or by repute to him and those for whom he wrote. Its aim is not to delight, but to reprove, to rebuke, to exhort; to form men's characters by teaching them what courses of life will meet with reward, what with penalty, hereafter; "to put into verse," as the poet says, "things difficult to think." For such new matter a new vehicle was needed. We have Bembo's authority for believing that the _terza rima_, surpassed, if at all, only by the ancient hexameter, as a measure equally adaptable to sustained narrative, to debate, to fierce invective, to clear-cut picture and to trenchant epigram, was first employed by Dante.
The action of the _Commedia_ opens in the early morning of the Thursday before Easter, in the year 1300. The poet finds himself lost in a forest, escaping from which he has his way barred by a wolf, a lion and a leopard. All this, like the rest of the poem, is highly symbolical. This branch of the subject is too vast to be entered on at any length here; but so far as this passage is concerned it may be said that it seems to indicate that at this period of his life, about the age of thirty-five, Dante went through some experience akin to what is now called "conversion." Having led up till then the ordinary life of a cultivated Florentine of good family; taking his part in public affairs, military and civil, as an hereditary member of the predominant Guelph party; dallying in prose which with all its beauty and passion is full of the conceits familiar to the 13th century, and in verse which save for the excellence of its execution differs in no way from that of his predecessors, with the memory of his lost love; studying more seriously, perhaps, than most of his associates; possibly travelling a little,--gradually or suddenly he became convinced that all was not well with him, and that not by leading, however blamelessly, the "active" life could he save his soul. The strong vein of mysticism, found in so many of the deepest thinkers of that age, and conspicuous in Dante's mind, no doubt played its part. His efforts to free himself from the "forest" of worldly cares were impeded by the temptations of the world--cupidity (including ambition), the pride of life and the lusts of the flesh, symbolized by the three beasts. But a helper is at hand. Virgil appears and explains that he has a commission from three ladies on high to guide him. The ladies are the Blessed Virgin, St Lucy (whom for some reason never yet explained Dante seems to have regarded as in a special sense his protector) and Beatrice. In Virgil we are apparently intended to see the symbol of what Dante calls philosophy, what we should rather call natural religion; Beatrice standing for theology, or rather revealed religion. Under Virgil's escort Dante is led through the two lower realms of the next world, Hell and Purgatory; meeting on the way with many persons illustrious or notorious in recent or remoter times, as well as many well enough known then in Tuscany and the neighbouring states; but who, without the immortality, often unenviable, that the poet has conferred on them, would long ago have been forgotten. Popes, kings, emperors, poets and warriors, Florentine citizens of all degrees, are there found; some doomed to hopeless punishment, others expiating their offences in milder torments, and looking forward to deliverance in due time. It is remarkable to notice how rarely, if ever, Dante allows political sympathy or antagonism to influence him in his distribution of judgment. Hell is conceived as a vast conical hollow, reaching to the centre of the earth. It has three great divisions, corresponding to Aristotle's three classes of vices, incontinence, brutishness and malice. The first are outside the walls of the city of Dis; the second, among whom are included unbelievers, tyrants, suicides, unnatural offenders, usurers, are within; the first apparently on the same level as those without, the rest separated from them by a steep descent of broken rocks. (It should be said that many Dante scholars hold that Aristotle's "brutishness" has no place in Dante's scheme; but the symmetry of the arrangement, the special reference made to that division, and certain expressions used elsewhere by Dante, seem to make it probable that he would here, as in most other cases, have followed his master in philosophy.) The sinners by malice, which includes all forms of fraud or treachery, are divided from the last by a yet more formidable barrier. They lie at the bottom of a pit, the depth of which is not stated, with vertical sides, and accessible only by supernatural means; a monster named Geryon bearing the poets down on his back. The torments here are of a more terrible, often of a loathsome character. Ignominy is added to pain, and the nature of Dante's demeanour towards the sinners changes from pity to hatred. At the very bottom of the pit is Lucifer, immovably fixed in ice; climbing down his limbs they reach the centre of the earth, whence a cranny conducts them back to the surface, at the foot of the purgatorial mountain, which they reach as Easter Day is dawning. Before the actual Purgatory is attained they have to climb for the latter half of the day and rest at night. The occupants of this outer region are those who have delayed repentance till death was upon them. They include many of the most famous men of the last thirty years. In the morning the gate is opened, and Purgatory proper is entered. This is divided into seven terraces, corresponding to the seven deadly sins, which encircle the mountain and have to be reached by a series of steep climbs, compared by Dante in one instance to the path from Florence to Samminiato. The penalties are not degrading, but rather tests of patience or endurance; and in several cases Dante has to bear a share in them as he passes. On the summit is the Earthly Paradise. Here Beatrice appears, in a mystical pageant; Virgil departs, leaving Dante in her charge. By her he is led through the various spheres of which, according to both the astronomy and the theology of the time, Heaven is composed, to the supreme Heaven, or Empyrean, the seat of the Godhead. For one moment there is granted him the intuitive vision of the Deity, and the comprehension of all mysteries, which is the ultimate goal of mystical theology; his will is wholly blended with that of God, and the poem ends.
Convito.
The _Convito_, or _Banquet_, also called _Convivio_ (Bembo uses the first form, Trissino the other), is the work of Dante's manhood, as the _Vita Nuova_ is the work of his youth. It consists, in the form in which it has come down to us, of an introduction and three treatises, each forming an elaborate commentary in a long canzone. It was intended, if completed, to have comprised commentaries on eleven more canzoni, making fourteen in all, and in this shape would have formed a _tesoro_ or handbook of universal knowledge, such as Brunetto Latini and others have left to us. It is perhaps the least well known of Dante's Italian works, but crabbed and unattractive as it is in many parts, it is well worth reading, and contains many passages of great beauty and elevation. Indeed a knowledge of it is quite indispensable to the full understanding of the _Divina Commedia_ and the _De Monarchia_. The time of its composition is uncertain. As it stands it has very much the look of being the contents of note-books partially arranged. Dante mentions princes as living who died in 1309; he does not mention Henry VII. as emperor, who succeeded in 1310. There are some passages which seem to have been inserted at a later date. The canzoni upon which the commentary is written were probably composed between 1292 and 1300, when he was seeking in philosophy consolation for the loss of Beatrice. The _Convito_ was first printed in Florence by Buonaccorsi in 1490. It has never been adequately edited.
Vita Nuova.
The _Vita Nuova_ (_Young Life_ or _New Life_, for both significations seem to be intended) contains the history of his love for Beatrice. He describes how he met Beatrice as a child, himself a child, how he often sought her glance, how she once greeted him in the street, how he feigned a false love to hide his true love, how he fell ill and saw in a dream the death and transfiguration of his beloved, how she died, and how his health failed from sorrow, how the tender compassion of another lady nearly won his heart from its first affection, how Beatrice appeared to him in a vision and reclaimed his heart, and how at last he saw a vision which induced him to devote himself to study that he might be more fit to glorify her who gazes on the face of God for ever. This simple story is interspersed with sonnets, ballads and canzoni, arranged with a remarkable symmetry, to which Professor Charles Eliot Norton was the first to draw attention, chiefly written at the time to emphasize some mood of his changing passion. After each of these, in nearly every case, follows an explanation in prose, which is intended to make the thought and argument intelligible to those to whom the language of poetry was not familiar. The whole has a somewhat artificial air, in spite of its undoubted beauty; showing that Dante was still under the influence of the _Dugentisti_, many of whose conceits he reproduces. The book was probably completed by 1300. It was first printed by Sermartelli in Florence, 1576.
Canzoniere.
Besides the smaller poems contained in the _Vita Nuova_ and _Convito_ there are a considerable number of canzoni, ballate and sonnetti bearing the poet's name. Of these many undoubtedly are genuine, others as undoubtedly spurious. Some which have been preserved under the name of Dante belong to Dante de Maiano, a poet of a harsher style; others which bear the name of Aldighiero are referable to Dante's sons Jacopo or Pietro, or to his grandsons; others may be ascribed to Dante's contemporaries and predecessors Cino da Pistoia and others. Those which are genuine secure Dante a place among lyrical poets scarcely if at all inferior to that of Petrarch. Most of these were printed in _Sonetti e canzoni_ (Giunta, 1527). The best edition of the _Canzoniere_ of Dante is that by Fraticelli published by Barbera at Florence. His collection includes seventy-eight genuine poems, eight doubtful and fifty-four spurious. To these are added an Italian paraphrase of the seven penitential psalms in _terza rima_, and a similar paraphrase of the Credo, the seven sacraments, the ten commandments, the Lord's Prayer and the Ave Maria.
De monarchia.
The Latin treatise _De monarchia_, in three books, contains the mature statement of Dante's political ideas. In it he propounds the theory that the supremacy of the emperor is derived from the supremacy of the Roman people over the world, which was given to them direct from God. As the emperor is intended to assure their earthly happiness, so does their spiritual welfare depend upon the pope, to whom the emperor is to do honour as to the first-born of the Father. The date of its publication is almost universally admitted to be the time of the descent of Henry VII. into Italy, between 1310 and 1313, although its composition may have been in hand from a much earlier period. The book was first printed by Oporinus at Basel in 1559, and placed on the Index of forbidden books.
De vulgari eloquentia.
The treatise _De vulgari eloquentia_, in two books, also in Latin, is mentioned in the _Convito_. Its object was first to establish the Italian language as a literary tongue, and to distinguish the noble or "courtly" speech which might become the property of the whole nation, at once a bond of internal unity and a line of demarcation against external nations, from the local dialects peculiar to different districts; and secondly, to lay down rules for poetical composition in the language so established. The work was intended to be in four books, but only two are extant. The first of these deals with the language, the second with the style and with the composition of the canzone. The third was probably intended to continue this subject, and the fourth was destined to the laws of the ballata and sonetto. It contains much acute criticism of poetry and poetic diction. This work was first published in the Italian translation of Trissino at Vicenza in 1529. The original Latin was not published till 1577 at Paris by Jacopo Corbinelli, one of the Italians who were brought from Florence by Catherine de' Medici, from a MS. now preserved at Grenoble. The work was probably left unfinished in consequence of Dante's death.
Eclogues.
Boccaccio mentions in his life of Dante that he wrote two eclogues in Latin in answer to Johannes de Virgilio, who invited him to come from Ravenna to Bologna and compose a great work in the Latin language. The most interesting passage in the work is that in the first poem, where he expresses his hope that when he has finished the three parts of his great poem his grey hairs may be crowned with laurel on the banks of the Arno. Although the Latin of these poems is superior to that of his prose works, we may feel thankful that Dante composed the great work of his life in his own vernacular. The versification, however, is good, and there are pleasant touches of gentle humour. The _Eclogues_ have been edited by Messrs Wicksteed and Gardiner (_Dante and Giovanni del Virgilio_, London, 1902).
De aqua et terra.
A treatise _De aqua et terra_ has come down to us, which Dante tells us was delivered at Mantua in January 1320 (perhaps 1321) as a solution of the question which was being at that time much discussed--whether in any place on the earth's surface water is higher than the earth. It was first published at Venice in 1508, by an ecclesiastic named Moncetti, from a MS. which he alleged to be in his possession, but which no one seems to have seen. Its genuineness is accordingly very doubtful; but Dr Moore has from internal evidence made out a very strong case for it.
Letters.
The _Letters_ of Dante are among the most important materials for his biography. Giovanni Villani mentions three as specially remarkable--one to the government of Florence, in which he complains of undeserved exile; another to the emperor Henry VII., when he lingered too long at the siege of Brescia; and a third to the Italian cardinals to urge them to the election of an Italian pope after the death of Clement V. The first of these letters has not come down to us, the two last are extant. Besides these we have one addressed to the cardinal da Prato, one to a Florentine friend refusing the base conditions of return from exile, one to the princes and lords of Italy to prepare them for the coming of Henry of Luxembourg, another to the Florentines reproaching them with the rejection of the emperor, and a long letter to Can Grande della Scala, containing directions for interpreting the _Divina Commedia_, with especial reference to the _Paradiso_. Of less importance are the letters to the nephews of Count Alessandro da Romena, to the marquis Moroello Malespina, to Cino da Pistoia and to Guido da Polenta. The genuineness of all the letters has at one time or another been impugned; but the more important are now generally accepted. They have been translated by Mr C. S. Latham, ed. by Mr G. R. Carpenter (Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, 1891).
Dante's reputation has passed through many vicissitudes, and much trouble has been spent by critics in comparing him with other poets of established fame. Read and commented upon with more admiration than intelligence in the Italian universities in the generation immediately succeeding his death, his name became obscured as the sun of the Renaissance rose higher towards its meridian. In the 16th century he was held inferior to Petrarch; in the 17th and first half of the 18th he was almost universally neglected. His fame is now fully vindicated. Translations and commentaries issue from every press in Europe and America, and many studies for separate points are appearing every year.
AUTHORITIES.--It would be impossible here to give anything like a complete account even of the editions of Dante's works; still more of the books which have been written to elucidate the _Commedia_ as a whole, or particular points in it. The section "Dante" in the British Museum catalogue down to 1887 occupies twenty-nine folio pages; the supplement, to 1900, as many more. The catalogue of the Fiske collection, in Cornell University library, is in two quarto volumes and covers 606 pages. A few of the more important editions and of the more valuable commentaries and aids may, however, be recorded.
_Editions._--The _Commedia_ was first printed by John Numeister at Foligno, in April 1472. Two other editions followed in the same year: one at Jesi (_Federicus Veronensis_), and Mantua (_Georgius et Paulus Teutonici_). These, together with a Naples edition of about 1477 (Francesco del Tuppo), were included by Lord Vernon in _Le Prime Quattro Edizioni_ (1858). Another Neapolitan edition, without printer's name, is dated 1477, and in the same year Wendelin of Spires published the first Venetian edition. Milan followed in 1478 with that known from the name of its editor as the _Nidobeatine_. In 1481 appeared the first Florentine edition (_Nicolo and Lorenzo della Magna_) with the commentary of Cristoforo Landino, and a series of copper engravings ascribed to Baccio Baldini, varying in number in different copies from two to twenty; a sumptuous and very carelessly printed volume. Venice supplied most of the editions for many years to come. Altogether twelve existed by the end of the century. In 1502 Aldus produced the first "pocket" edition in his new "italic" type, probably cut from the handwriting of his friend Bembo. A second edition of this is dated 1515. The firm of Giunta at Florence printed the poem in a small volume with cuts, in 1506; and for the rest of the 16th century edition follows edition, to the number of about thirty in all. The most noteworthy commentaries are those of Alessandro Vellutello (Venice, 1544), and Bernardo Daniello (Venice, 1568), both of Lucca. The Cruscan Academicians edited the text in 1595. The first edition with woodcuts is that of Boninus de Boninis (Brescia, 1487). Bernardino Benali followed at Venice in 1491, and from that time onward few if any of the folio editions are without them. The 17th century produced three (or perhaps four) small, shabby and inaccurate editions. In 1716 a revival of interest in Dante had set in, and before 1800 some score of editions had appeared, the best-known being those of G. A. Volpi (Padua, 1727), Pompeo Venturi (Venice, 1739) and Baldassare Lombardi (Rome, 1791).
_Commentaries._--The _Commedia_ began to be the subject of commentaries as soon as, if not before, the author was in his grave. One known as the _Anonimo_ until in 1881 Dr Moore identified its writer as Graziole de' Bambaglioli, was in course of writing in 1324. It was published by Lord Vernon, to whose munificence we owe the accessibility of most of the earlier commentaries, in 1848. That of Jacopo della Lana is thought to have been composed before 1340. It was printed in the Venice and Milan editions of 1477, and 1478 respectively. The so-called _Ottimo Comento_ (Pisa, 1837) is of about the same date. It embodies parts of Lana's, but is largely an independent work. Witte ascribes it to Andrea della Lancia, a Florentine notary. Dante's sons Pietro and Jacopo also commented on their father's poem. Their works were published, again at Lord Vernon's expense, in 1845 and 1848. Boccaccio's lectures on the _Commedia_, cut short at _Inf._ xvii. 17 by his death in 1375, are accessible in various forms. His work was achieved by his disciple Benvenuto Rambaldi of Imola (d. c. 1390). Benvenuto's commentary, written in Latin, genial in temper, and often acute, was popular from the first. Extracts from it were used as notes in many MSS. Much of it was printed by Muratori in his _Antiquitates Italicae_; but the entire work was first published in 1887 by Mr William Warren Vernon, with the aid of Sir James Lacaita. No greater boon has ever been offered to students of Dante. Another early annotator who must not be overlooked is Francesco da Buti of Pisa, who lectured in that city towards the close of the same century. His commentary, which served as the basis of Landino's already mentioned, was first printed in Pisa in 1858. One more commentary deserves mention. During the council of Constance, John of Serravalle, bishop of Fermo, fell in with the English bishops Robert Hallam and Nicholas Bubwith, and at their request compiled a voluminous exposition of the _Commedia_. This remained in MS. till recently, when it was printed in a costly form.
_Translations._--Probably the first complete translation of Dante into a modern language was the Castilian version of Villena (1428). In the following year Andreu Febrer produced a rendering into Catalan verse. In 1515 Villegas published the _Inferno_ in Spanish. The earliest French version is that of B. Grangier (1597). Chaucer has rendered several passages beautifully, and similar fragments are embedded in Milton and others. But the first attempt to reproduce any considerable portion of the poem was made by Rogers, who only completed the _Inferno_ (1782). The entire poem appeared first in English in the version of Henry Boyd (1802) in six-line stanzas; but the first adequate rendering is the admirable blank verse of H. F. Cary (1814, 2nd ed. 1819), which has remained the standard translation, though others of merit, notably those of Pollock (1854) and Longfellow (1867) in blank verse, Plumptre (1887) and Haselfoot (1887) in _terza rima_; J. A. Carlyle (_Inferno_ only, 1847). C. E. Norton (1891), and H. F. Tozer (1904), in prose, have since appeared. The best in German are those of "Philalethes" (the late King John of Saxony) and Witte, both in blank verse.
_Modern Editions and Commentaries._--The first serious attempt to establish an accurate text in recent times was made by Carl Witte, whose edition (1862) has been subsequently used as the basis for the text of the _Commedia_ in the Oxford edition of Dante's complete works (1896 and later issues). Dr Toynbee's text (1900) follows the Oxford, with some modifications. The notes of Cary, Longfellow, Witte and "Philalethes," appended to their several translations, and Tozer's, in an independent volume, are valuable. Scartazzini's commentary is the most voluminous that has appeared since the 15th century. With a good deal of superfluous, and some superficial, erudition, it cannot be neglected by any one who wishes to study the poem thoroughly. An edition by A.J. Butler contains a prose version and notes. Of modern Italian editions, Bianchi's and Fraticelli's are still as good as any.
_Other Aids._--For beginners no introduction is equal to the essay on Dante by the late Dean Church. Maria Rossetti's _Shadow of Dante_ is also useful. _A Study of Dante_, by J. A. Symonds, is interesting. More advanced students will find Dr Toynbee's _Dante Dictionary_ indispensable, and Dr E. Moore's _Studies in Dante_ of great service in its discussion of difficult places. Two concordances, to the _Commedia_ by Dr Fay (Cambridge, Mass., 1888), and to the minor works by Messrs Sheldon and White (Oxford, 1905), are due to American scholars. Mr W. W. Vernon's _Readings in Dante_ have profited many students. Dante's minor works still lack thorough editing and scholarly elucidation, with the exception of the _De vulgari eloquentia_, which has been well handled by Professor Pio Rajna (1896), and the _Vita Nuova_ by F. Beck (1896) and Barbi (1907). Good translations of the latter by D. G. Rossetti and C. E. Norton, and of the _De monarchia_ by F. C. Church and P. H. Wicksteed are in existence. The best text is that of the Oxford _Dante_, though much confessedly remains to be done. The dates of their original publication have already been given.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--The first attempt at a bibliography of editions of Dante was made in Pasquali's edition of his collected works (Venice, 1739); but the first really adequate work on the subject is that of the viscount Colomb de Batines (1846-1848). A supplement by Dr Guido Biagi appeared in 1888. Julius Petzholdt had already covered some of the same ground in _Bibliographia Dantea_, extending from 1865 to 1880. The period from 1891 to 1900 has been dealt with by SS. Passerini and Mazzi in _Un Decennio di bibliografia Dantesca_ (1905). The catalogues of the two libraries already named, and that of Harvard University, are worth consulting. For the MSS. Dr E. Moore's _Textual Criticism_ (1889) is the most complete guide. (A. J. B.*)
DANTON, GEORGE JACQUES (1759-1794), one of the most conspicuous actors in the decisive episodes of the French Revolution, was born at Arcis-sur-Aube on the 26th of October 1759. His family was of respectable quality, though of very moderate means. They contrived to give him a good education, and he was launched in the career of an advocate at the Paris bar. When the Revolution broke out, it found Danton following his profession with apparent success, leading a cheerful domestic life, and nourishing his intelligence on good books. He first appears in the revolutionary story as president of the popular club or assembly of the district in which he lived. This was the famous club of the Cordeliers, so called from the circumstance that its meetings were held in the old convent of the order of the Cordeliers, just as the Jacobins derived their name from the refectory of the convent of the Jacobin brothers. It is an odd coincidence that the old rivalries of Dominicans and Franciscans in the democratic movement inside the Catholic Church should be recalled by the names of the two factions in the democratic movement of a later century away from the church. The Cordeliers were from the first the centre of the popular principle in the French Revolution carried to its extreme point; they were the earliest to suspect the court of being irreconcilably hostile to freedom; and it was they who most vehemently proclaimed the need for root-and-branch measures. Danton's robust, energetic and impetuous temperament made him the natural leader in such a quarter. We find no traces of his activity in the two great insurrectionary events of 1789--the fall of the Bastille, and the forcible removal of the court from Versailles to the Tuileries. In the spring of 1790 we hear his voice urging the people to prevent the arrest of Marat. In the autumn we find him chosen to be the commander of the battalion of the national guard of his district. In the beginning of 1791 he was elected to the post of administrator of the department of Paris. This interval was for all France a barren period of doubt, fatigue, partial reaction and hoping against hope. It was not until 1792 that Danton came into the prominence of a great revolutionary chief.
In the spring of the previous year (1791) Mirabeau had died, and with him had passed away the only man who was at all likely to prove a wise guide to the court. In June of that year the king and queen made a disastrous attempt to flee from their capital and their people. They were brought back once more to the Tuileries, which from that time forth they rightly looked upon more as a prison than a palace or a home. The popular exasperation was intense, and the constitutional leaders, of whom the foremost was Lafayette, became alarmed and lost their judgment. A bloody dispersion of a popular gathering, known afterwards as the massacre of the Champ-de-Mars (July 1791), kindled a flame of resentment against the court and the constitutional party which was never extinguished. The Constituent Assembly completed its infertile labours in September 1791. Then the elections took place to its successor, the short-lived Legislative Assembly. Danton was not elected to it, and his party was at this time only strong enough to procure for him a very subordinate post in the government of the Parisian municipality. Events, however, rapidly prepared a situation in which his influence became of supreme weight. Between January and August 1792 the want of sympathy between the aims of the popular assembly and the spirit of the king and the queen became daily more flagrant and beyond power of disguise. In April war was declared against Austria, and to the confusion and distraction caused by the immense civil and political changes of the past two years was now added the ferment and agitation of war with an enemy on the frontier. The distrust felt by Paris for the court and its loyalty at length broke out in insurrection. On the memorable morning of the 10th of August 1792 the king and queen took refuge with the Legislative Assembly from the apprehended violence of the popular forces who were marching on the Tuileries. The share which Danton had in inspiring and directing this momentous rising is very obscure. Some look upon him as the head and centre of it. Apart from documents, support is given to this view by the fact that on the morrow of the fall of the monarchy Danton is found in the important post of minister of justice. This sudden rise from the subordinate office which he had held in the commune is a proof of the impression that his character had made on the insurrectionary party. To passionate fervour for the popular cause he added a certain broad steadfastness and an energetic practical judgment which are not always found in company with fervour. Even in those days, when so many men were so astonishing in their eloquence, Danton stands out as a master of commanding phrase. One of his fierce sayings has become a proverb. Against Brunswick and the invaders, "_il nous faut de l'audace, et encore de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace_,"--we must dare, and again dare, and for ever dare. The tones of his voice were loud and vibrant. As for his bodily presence, he had, to use his own account of it, the athletic shape and the stern physiognomy of the Liberty for which he was ready to die. Jove the Thunderer, the rebel Satan, a Titan, Sardanapalus, were names that friends or enemies borrowed to describe his mien and port. He was thought about as a coarser version of the great tribune of the Constituent Assembly; he was called the Mirabeau of the sansculottes, and Mirabeau of the markets.
In the executive government that was formed on the king's dethronement, this strong revolutionary figure found himself the colleague of the virtuous Roland and others of the Girondins. Their strength was speedily put to a terrible test. The alarming successes of the enemy on the frontier, and the surrender of two important fortresses, had engendered a natural panic in the capital. But in the breasts of some of the wild men whom the disorder of the time had brought to prominent place in the Paris commune this panic became murderously heated. Some hundreds of captives were barbarously murdered in the prisons. There has always been much dispute as to Danton's share in this dreadful transaction. At the time, it must be confessed, much odium on account of an imputed direction of the massacres fell to him. On the whole, however, he cannot be fairly convicted of any part in the plan. What he did was to make the best of the misdeed, with a kind of sombre acquiescence. He deserves credit for insisting against his colleagues that they should not flee from Paris, but should remain firm at their posts, doing what they could to rule the fierce storm that was raging around them.
The elections to the National Convention took place in September, when the Legislative Assembly surrendered its authority. The Convention ruled France until October 1795. Danton was a member; resigning the ministry of justice, he took a foremost part in the deliberations and proceedings of the Convention, until his execution in April 1794. This short period of nineteen months was practically the life of Danton, so far as the world is concerned with him.
He took his seat in the high and remote benches which gave the name of the Mountain to the thoroughgoing revolutionists who sat there. He found himself side by side with Marat, whose exaggerations he never countenanced; with Robespierre, whom he did not esteem very highly, but whose immediate aims were in many respects his own; with Camille Desmoulins and Phelippeaux, who were his close friends and constant partisans. The foes of the Mountain were the group of the Girondins,--eloquent, dazzling, patriotic, but unable to apprehend the fearful nature of the crisis, too full of vanity and exclusive party-spirit, and too fastidious to strike hands with the vigorous and stormy Danton. The Girondins dreaded the people who had sent Danton to the Convention; and they insisted on seeing on his hands the blood of the prison massacres of September. Yet in fact Danton saw much more clearly than they saw how urgent it was to soothe the insurrectionary spirit, after it had done the work of abolition which to him, as to them too, seemed necessary and indispensable. Danton discerned what the Girondins lacked the political genius to see, that this control of Paris could only be wisely effected by men who sympathized with the vehemence and energy of Paris, and understood that this vehemence and energy made the only force to which the Convention could look in resisting the Germans on the north-east frontier, and the friends of reaction in the interior. "Paris," he said, "is the natural and constituted centre of free France. It is the centre of light. When Paris shall perish there will no longer be a republic."
Danton was among those who voted for the death of the king (January 1793). He had a conspicuous share in the creation of the famous revolutionary tribunal, his aim being to take the weapons away from that disorderly popular vengeance which had done such terrible work in September. When all executive power was conferred upon a committee of public safety, Danton had been one of the nine members of whom that body was originally composed. He was despatched on frequent missions from the Convention to the republican armies in Belgium, and wherever he went he infused new energy into the work of national liberation. He pressed forward the erection of a system of national education, and he was one of the legislative committee charged with the construction of a new system of government. He vainly tried to compose the furious dissensions between Girondins and Jacobins. The Girondins were irreconcilable, and made Danton the object of deadly attack. He was far too robust in character to lose himself in merely personal enmities, but by the middle of May (1793) he had made up his mind that the political suppression of the Girondins had become indispensable. The position of the country was most alarming. Dumouriez, the victor of Valmy and Jemmappes, had deserted. The French arms were suffering a series of checks and reverses. A royalist rebellion was gaining formidable dimensions in the west. Yet the Convention was wasting time and force in the vindictive recriminations of faction. There is no positive evidence that Danton directly instigated the insurrection of the 31st of May and the 2nd of June, which ended in the purge of the Convention and the proscription of the Girondins. He afterwards spoke of himself as in some sense the author of this revolution, because a little while before, stung by some trait of factious perversity in the Girondins, he had openly cried out in the midst of the Convention, that if he could only find a hundred men, they would resist the oppressive authority of the Girondin commission of twelve. At any rate, he certainly acquiesced in the violence of the commune, and he publicly gloried in the expulsion of the men who stood obstinately in the way of a vigorous and concentrated exertion of national power. Danton, unlike the Girondins, accepted the fury of popular passion as an inevitable incident in the work of deliverance. Unlike Billaud Varenne or Hebert, or any other of the Terrorist party, he had no wish to use this frightful two-edged weapon more freely than was necessary. Danton, in short, had the instinct of the statesman. His object was to reconcile France with herself; to restore a society that, while emancipated and renewed in every part, should yet be stable; and above all to secure the independence of his country, both by a resolute defence against the invader, and by such a mixture of vigour with humanity as should reconcile the offended opinion of the rest of Europe. This, so far as we can make it out, was what was in his mind.
The position of the Mountain had now undergone a complete change. In the Constituent Assembly its members did not number more than 30 out of the 578 of the third estate. In the Legislative Assembly they had not been numerous, and none of their chiefs had a seat. In the Convention for the first nine months they had an incessant struggle for their very lives against the Girondins. They were now (June 1793) for the first time in possession of absolute power. It was not easy, however, for men who had for many months been nourished on the ideas and stirred to the methods of opposition, all at once to develop the instincts of government. Actual power was in the hands of the two committees--that of public safety and of general security. Both were chosen out of the body of the Convention. The drama of the nine months between the expulsion of the Girondins and the execution of Danton turns upon the struggle of the committee to retain power--first, against the insurrectionary commune of Paris, and second, against the Convention, from which the committees derived an authority that was regularly renewed on the expiry of each short term.
Danton, immediately after the fall of the Girondins, had thrown himself with extraordinary energy into the work to be done. The first task in a great city so agitated by anarchical ferment had been to set up a strong central authority. In this genuinely political task Danton was prominent. He was not a member of the committee of public safety when that body was renewed in the shape that speedily made its name so redoubtable all over the world. This was the result of a self-denying ordinance which he imposed upon himself. It was he who proposed that the powers of the committee should be those of a dictator, and that it should have copious funds at its disposal. In order to keep himself clear of any personal suspicion, he announced his resolution not to belong to the body which he had thus done his best to make supreme in the state. His position during the autumn of 1793 was that of a powerful supporter and inspirer, from without, of the government which he had been foremost in setting up. Danton was not a great practical administrator and contriver, like Carnot, for instance. But he had the gift of raising in all who heard him an heroic spirit of patriotism and fiery devotion, and he had a clear eye and a cool judgment in the tempestuous emergencies which arose in such appalling succession. His distinction was that he accepted the insurrectionary forces, instead of blindly denouncing them as the Girondins had done. After these forces had shaken down the throne, and then, by driving away the Girondins, had made room for a vigorous government, Danton perceived the expediency of making all haste to an orderly state. Energetic prosecution of the war, and gradual conciliation of civil hatreds, had been, as we have said, the two marks of his policy ever since the fall of the monarchy. The first of these objects was fulfilled abundantly, partly owing to the energy with which he called for the arming of the whole nation against its enemies. His whole mind was now given to the second of them. But the second of them, alas, was desperate.
It was to no purpose that, both in his own action and in the writings of Camille Desmoulins (_Le Vieux Cordelier_), of whom he was now and always the intimate and inspirer, he worked against the iniquities of the bad men, like Carrier and Collot d'Herbois, in the provinces, and against the severity of the revolutionary tribunal in Paris. The black flood could not at a word or in an hour subside from its storm-lashed fury. The commune of Paris was now composed of men like Hebert and Chaumette, to whom the restoration of any sort of political order was for the time indifferent. They wished to push destruction to limits which even the most ardent sympathizers with the Revolution condemn now, and which Danton condemned then, as extravagant and senseless. Those men were not politicians, they were fanatics; and Danton, who was every inch a politician, though of a vehement type, had as little in common with them as John Calvin of Geneva had with John of Leiden and the Munster Anabaptists. The committee watched Hebert and his followers uneasily for many weeks, less perhaps from disapproval of their excesses than from apprehensions of their hostility to the committee's own power. At length the party of the commune proposed to revolt against the Convention and the committees. Then the blow was struck, and the Hebertists were swiftly flung into prison, and thence under the knife of the guillotine (March 24th, 1794). The execution of the Hebertists was the first victory of the revolutionary government over the extreme insurrectionary party. But the committees had no intention to concede anything to their enemies on the other side. If they refused to follow the lead of the anarchists of the commune, they were none the more inclined to give way to the Dantonian policy of clemency. Indeed, such a course would have been their own instant and utter ruin. The Terror was not a policy that could be easily transformed. A new policy would have to be carried out by new men, and this meant the resumption of power by the Convention, and the death of the Terrorists. In Thermidor 1794 such a revolution did take place, with those very results. But in Germinal feeling was not ripe. The committees were still too strong to be overthrown. And Danton seems to have shown a singular heedlessness. Instead of striking by vigour in the Convention, he waited to be struck. In these later days a certain discouragement seems to have come over his spirit. His wife had died during his absence on one of his expeditions to the armies; he had now married again, and the rumour went that he was allowing domestic happiness to tempt him from the keen incessant vigilance proper to the politician in such a crisis. He must have known that he had enemies. When the Jacobin club was "purified" in the winter, Danton's name would have been struck out as a moderate if Robespierre had not defended him. The committees had deliberated on his arrest soon afterwards, and again it was Robespierre who resisted the proposal. Yet though he had been warned of the lightning that was thus playing round his head, Danton did not move. Either he felt himself powerless, or he rashly despised his enemies. At last Billaud Varenne, the most prominent spirit of the committee after Robespierre, succeeded in gaining Robespierre over to his designs against Danton. Robespierre was probably actuated by the motives of selfish policy which soon proved the greatest blunder of his life. The Convention, aided by Robespierre and the authority of the committee, assented with ignoble unanimity. On the 30th of March Danton, Desmoulins and others of the party were suddenly arrested. Danton displayed such vehemence before the revolutionary tribunal, that his enemies feared lest he should excite the crowd in his favour. The Convention, in one of its worst fits of cowardice, assented to a proposal made by St Just that, if a prisoner showed want of respect for justice, the tribunal might pronounce sentence without further delay. Danton was at once condemned, and led, in company with fourteen others, including Camille Desmoulins, to the guillotine (April 5th, 1794). "I leave it all in a frightful welter," he said; "not a man of them has an idea of government. Robespierre will follow me; he is dragged down by me. Ah, better be a poor fisherman than meddle with the government of men!"
Events went as Danton foresaw. The committees presently came to quarrel with the pretensions of Robespierre. Three months after Danton, Robespierre fell. His assent to the execution of Danton had deprived him of the single great force that might have supported him against the committee. The man who had "saved France from Brunswick" might perhaps have saved her from the White reaction of 1794.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Sources for the life of Danton abound in the national archives and in the columns of the _Moniteur_. His _Oeuvres_ were published by A. Vermorel (Paris, 1866), and his speeches are included in H. Morse Stephens' _Principal Speeches of the Statesmen and Orators of the French Revolution_ (vol. ii., Oxford, 1892); cf. F. V. Aulard, _Les Orateurs de la Legislative et de la Convention_ (Danton and his group; 2 vols., 1885-1886). The charges of corruption freely brought against Danton by contemporaries were accepted by many historians, and he has been persistently accused of instigating or at least abetting, by failure to use the power he possessed, the September massacres. A minute examination of the evidence by F. V. Aulard and J. F. E. Robinet in France, followed by A. H. Beesly in England, has placed his career and his character in a fairer light. The chief books on Danton's life are:--A. Bougeart, _Danton, documents pour servir a l'histoire de la Revolution francaise_ (Brussels, 1861); J. F. E. Robinet, _Danton, memoire sur sa vie privee_ (Paris, 1865), _Le Proces des Dantonistes_ (Paris, 1879), _Danton emigre_ (Paris, 1887), _Danton, homme d'etat_ (Paris, 1889); F. V. Aulard, _Hist. pol. de la Rev. fr._ (Paris, 1901), and _Danton_ (Paris, 1887); A. Dubost, _Danton et la politique contemporaine_ (Paris, 1880); A. H. Beesly, _Life of Danton_ (1899, new ed. 1906); H. Belloc, _Danton_ (1899). There is a short "Life of Danton" in Morse Stephens' _Principal Speeches_, cited above. See also C. F. Warwick, _Danton and the French Revolution_ (1909). (J. Mo.)
DANUBE (Ger. _Donau_, Hungarian _Duna_, Rumanian _Dunarea_, Lat. _Danubius_ or _Danuvius_, and in the lower part of its course _Ister_), the most important river of Europe as regards the volume of its outflow, but inferior to the Volga in length and in the area of its drainage. It originates at Donaueschingen in the Black Forest, where two mountain streams, the Brigach and the Brege, together with a third stream from the Palace Gardens, unite at an elevation of 2187 ft. above the sea to form the Danube so called. From this point it runs in an easterly direction until it falls into the Black Sea some 1750 m. from its source, being the only European river of importance with a course from west to east. Its basin, which comprises a territory of nearly 300,000 sq. m., is bounded by the Black Forest, some of the minor Alpine ranges, the Bohemian Forest and the Carpathian Mountains on the north, and by the Alps and the Balkan range on the south. From the point where the Danube first becomes navigable, i.e. at its junction with the Iller at Ulm (1505 ft. above sea-level), it is fed by at least 300 tributaries, the principal of which on the right bank are the Inn, the Drave and the Save; while on the left bank are the Theiss or Tisza, the Olt, the Sereth and the Pruth. These seven rivers have a total length of 2920 m. and drain one half of the basin of the Danube.
Historical and political associations.
The course of this mighty river is rich in historical and political associations. For a long period it formed the frontier of the Roman empire; near Eining (above Regensburg) was the ancient Abusina, which for nearly five centuries was the chief Roman outpost against the northern barbarians. Traces of Trajan's wall still exist between that point and Wiesbaden, while another line of fortifications bearing the same emperor's name are found in the Dobrudja between Cernavoda (on the lower Danube) and Constantza. At intervening points are still found many notable Roman remains, such as Trajan's road, a marvellous work on the right bank of the river in the rocky Kazan defile (separating the Balkans on the south from the Carpathians on the north), where a contemporary commemorative tablet is still conspicuously visible. At Turnu Severin below the end of this famous gorge are the remains of a solid masonry bridge constructed by the same emperor at the period of his Dacian conquests. But since Roman days the central Danube has never formed the boundary of a state; on the contrary it became the route followed from east to west by successive hordes of barbarians--the Huns, Avars, Slavs, Magyars and Turks; while the Franks under Charlemagne, the Bavarians and the Crusaders all marched in the opposite direction towards the east. In more modern days its banks were the scenes of many bloody battles during the Napoleonic Wars. Still more recently it has become the great highway of commerce for central Europe. It has been pointed out by J. G. Kohl (_Austria and the Danube_, London, 1844) and others that, in consequence of the Danube having been in constant use as the line of passage of migratory hostile tribes, it nowhere forms the boundary between two states from Orsova upwards, and thus it traverses as a central artery Wurttemberg, Bavaria, Austria and Hungary, while on the other hand various tributaries both north and south, which formed serious obstacles to the march of armies, have become lines of separation between different states. Thus Hungary is separated from Austria by the rivers March and Leitha; the river Enns, for a considerable period the extreme western boundary of the Magyar kingdom, still separates Upper and Lower Austria; the Inn and the Salzach divide Austria from Bavaria, and farther west the Iller separates Bavaria from Wurttemberg.
Course.
The Danube after leaving Donaueschingen flows south-east in the direction of Lake Constance, and below Immendingen a considerable quantity of its waters escapes through subterranean fissures to the river Ach in the Rhine basin. At Gutmadingen it turns to the north-east, which general direction, although with many windings, it maintains as far as Linz. At Tuttlingen it contracts and the hills crowd close to the banks, while ruins of castles crown almost every possible summit. The scenery is wild and beautiful until the river passes Sigmaringen. At Ulm, where the river leaves Wurttemberg and enters Bavaria, it is joined by a large tributary, the Iller, and from this point becomes navigable downstream for specially constructed boats carrying 100 tons of merchandise. It is here some 78 yds. in breadth, with an average depth of 3 ft. 6 in. Continuing its north-easterly course it passes through Bavaria, gradually widening its channel first at Steppberg, then at Ingolstadt, but finally narrowing again until it reaches Regensburg (height 949 ft.). At this point it changes its direction to the south-east, and passing along the southern slopes of the Bavarian Forest enters Austria at Passau (height 800 ft.). In its passage through Bavaria it receives several important affluents on both banks, notably on the right the Alpine rivers Lech, Isar and Inn, the last of which at the junction near Passau exceeds in volume the waters of the Danube.
From Passau the Danube flows through Austria for a distance of 233 m. Closed in by mountains it flows past Linz in an unbroken stream--below, it expands and divides into many arms until it reaches the famous whirlpool near Grein where its waters unite and flow on in one channel for 40 m., through mountains and narrow passes. Beyond Krems it again divides, forming arms and islands beyond Vienna. The Danube between Linz and Vienna is renowned not only for its picturesque beauty but for the numerous medieval and modern buildings of historical and archaeological interest which crown its banks. The splendid Benedictine monastery of Melk and the ruins of Durrenstein, the prison of Richard Coeur de Lion, are among the most interesting.
After passing Vienna and the Marchfeld, the Danube (here 316 yds. wide and 429 ft. above sea-level) passes through a defile formed by the lower spurs of the Alps and the Carpathians and enters Hungary at the ruined castle of Theben a little above Pressburg, the old Magyar capital, after leaving which the river passes through the Hungarian plains, receiving several affluents on both sides. It divides into three channels, forming several islands. After passing the fortress of Komarom it loses its easterly course at Vacz (Waitzen), and flows nearly due south for 230 m. down to its junction with the Drave (81 ft. above sea-level), passing in its course Budapest, the capital of Hungary, and farther on Mohacs. Below Mohacs the Franz Josef canal connects the Danube with the Theiss. After its junction with the Save the Danube follows a south-easterly direction for 200 m. until it is joined on the right bank of the Drave at Belgrade, above which it receives on the left bank the Theiss or Tisz., the largest of its Hungarian affluents. From Belgrade the Danube separates Hungary from Servia. It flows eastward until it has passed through the stupendous Kazan defile, in which its waters (at Semlin 1700 yds. wide and 40 ft. deep) are hemmed in by precipitous rocks to a width of only 162 yds., with a depth of 150 ft. and a tremendous current. Emerging, above Orsova, at a height of 42 ft. above sea-level, it opens to nearly a mile in width and, turning south-eastwards, is again narrowed by its last defile, the Iron Gates, where it passes over the Prigrada rock. The course of the river through Hungary, from Pressburg to Orsova, is some 600 m.
The river now flows south, separating Servia from Rumania down to its junction with the Timok, after which as far as Silistria, a distance of 284 m., it separates Rumania from Bulgaria. The north bank is mostly flat and marshy, whereas the Bulgarian bank is almost continuously crowned by low heights on which are built the considerable towns of Vidin (Widdin), Lom Palanka, Rustchuk and Silistria, all memorable names in Turko-Russian wars. From Silistria the river flows through Rumanian territory and after passing Cernavoda, where it is crossed by a modern railway bridge, it reaches (left bank) the important commercial ports of Braila and Galatz. A few miles east of Galatz the Pruth enters on the left bank, which is thenceforward Russian territory. The Danube flows in a single channel from Galatz for 30 m. to the Ismail Chatal (or fork), where it breaks up into the several branches of the delta. The Kilia branch from this point flows to the north-east past the towns of Ismail and Kilia, and 17 m. below the latter breaks up into another delta discharging by seven channels into the Black Sea. The Tulcea branch flows south-east from the Ismail Chatal, and 7 m. below the town of Tulcea separates into two branches. The St George's branch, holding a general, though winding, course to the south-east, discharges by two channels into the sea; and the Sulina branch, taking an easterly direction, emerges into the Black Sea 20 m. south of the Ochakov mouth of the Kilia, and 20 m. north of the Kedrilles mouth of the St George.
In 1857 the proportion of discharge by the three branches of the Danube was Sulina 7%, St George's 30% and Kilia 63%; but in 1905 the relative proportions had altered to Sulina 9%, St George's 24% and Kilia 67%. The average outflow by the three mouths combined is 236,432 cub. ft. per second. The delta enclosed between the Kilia and St George's branches, about 1000 sq. m. in area, mainly consists of one large marsh covered with reeds, and intersected by channels, relieved in places by isolated elevations covered with oak, beech and willows, many of them marking the ancient coast-line. On the eastern side of the Kilia delta the coast-line is constantly advancing and the sea becoming shallower, owing to the enormous amount of solid deposits brought down by the river. In time of ordinary flood the Kilia branch with its numerous mouths pours into the sea some 3000 cub. ft. of sand and mud per minute. Its effects are felt as far south as Sulina, and tend to necessitate the farther extension into the sea of the guiding piers of that port.
Navigation.
In the course of the 19th century, more especially during its latter half, much was done to render the Danube more available as a means of communication. In 1816 Austria and Bavaria made arrangements for the common utilization of the upper portion of the river, and since then both governments have been liberal in expenditure on its improvement. In 1844 the Ludwigs Canal was constructed by King Louis of Bavaria. It is 110 m. in length and 7 ft. in depth, and connects the Danube at Kelheim (half way between Ulm and Passau) with the Rhine at Mainz by means of the rivers Altmuhl, Regnitz and Main. Various other projects exist, one for the connexion of the Danube (near Vienna) with the river Oder at Oderberg, another for a canal from the Danube to the Moldau at Budweis, 125 m. in length, which owing to the regularization of the Moldau is the last uncompleted link of a navigable channel 1875 m. in length between Sulina and Hamburg at the mouths of the Danube and the Elbe respectively. There also exist other schemes for joining the Danube with the rivers Neckar and Theiss, and also for connecting the Oder Canal with the Vistula and the Dniester. Between Ulm and Vienna, a distance of 629 m., works of rectification have been numerous and have greatly improved the navigability of the river. The draining of the Donau-moos between Neuburg and Ingolstadt, commenced in 1791, was successfully completed about 1835; and in 1853 the removal of the rocks which obstructed the river below Grein was finally achieved; while at Vienna itself the whole mass of the Danube was conducted nearer the town for a distance of nearly 2 m. through an artificial channel 10 m. in length and 330 yds. in width, with a depth of about 12 ft., and at a cost with subsidiary works of over three millions sterling. The work, begun in 1866, involved the removal of 12,000,000 cub. metres of sand and gravel, and proved a great success, not only amply realizing its principal object, the protection of Vienna from disastrous inundations, but also improving the navigability of the river in that portion of its course. The Hungarian government also, throughout the latter half of the 19th century, expended vast sums at Budapest for the improvement of navigation and the protection of the town from inundation, and in the regularization of the Danube down to Orsova.
In prehistoric times a great part of the plains of Hungary formed a large inland sea, which ultimately burst its bounds, whereupon the Danube forced its way through the Carpathians at the Kazan defile. Much of what then formed the bottom of this sea consisted until modern times of marshes and waste lands lying in the vicinity of its numerous rivers. The problem of draining and utilizing these lands was not the only difficulty to be surmounted by the Hungarian engineers; the requirements of navigation and the necessity in winter of preventing the formation of large ice-fields, such as caused the disastrous floods at Budapest in 1838, had also to be considered. In carrying out these works the Hungarian government between 1867 and 1895 spent seven millions sterling, and a further expenditure of three and a half millions was provided for up to 1907. At Budapest, where the formation of ice-fields at the upper entrance of the two side arms of the Danube--the Promontor on the north, 20 m. in length, and the Soroksar, 35 m. long,--caused the inundation alluded to, the latter branch has been artificially blocked and the whole of the Danube now flows through Budapest in a single channel. For the first section of 60 m. after entering Hungary, the bed of the river, here surcharged with gravel, was constantly changing its course. It has been regularized throughout, the width of the stream varying from 320 to 400 yds. In the second section from Gonyo to Paks, 164 m. in length, the river had a tendency to form islands and sandbanks--its width now varies uniformly from 455 to 487 yds. The third section of 113 m., from Paks to the mouth of the Drave, differed from the others and made innumerable twists and curves. No fewer than seventeen cuttings have been made, reducing the original course of the river by 75 m. The fourth section, 217 m. in length, from the Drave to Old Moldova, resembles in its characteristics the second section and has been similarly treated. Cuttings have also been made where necessary, and the widths of the channel are 487 yds. to the mouth of the Theiss, 650 between that point and the Save, and lower down 760 yds. In the fifth and last section from Old Moldova to Orsova and the Iron Gates the river is enclosed by mountains and rocky banks, and the obstacles to navigation are rocks and whirlpools.
Article VI. of the treaty of London (1871) authorized the powers which possess the shores of this part of the Danube to come to an understanding with the view of removing these impediments, and to have the right of levying a provisional tax on vessels of every flag which may henceforth benefit thereby until the extinction of the debt contracted for the execution of the works. As the riverain powers could not come to an agreement on the subject, the great powers at the congress of Berlin (1878) entrusted to Austria-Hungary the execution of the works in question. Austria-Hungary subsequently conferred its rights on Hungary, by which country the works were carried out at a cost of about one and a half millions sterling.
The principal obstructions between Old Moldova and Turnu Severin were the Stenka Rapids, the Kozla Dojke Rapids, the Greben section and the Iron Gates. At the first named there was a bank of rocks, some of them dry at low water, extending almost across the river (985 yds. wide). The fall of the river bed is small, but the length of the rapid is 1100 yds. The Kozla Dojke, 9 m. below the Stenka Rapids, extend also for 1100 yds., with a fall of 1 in 1000, where two banks of rocks cause a sudden alternation in the direction of the current. The river is here only 170 to 330 yds. in width. Six miles farther on is the Greben section, the most difficult part of the works of improvement. A spur of the Greben mountains runs out below two shoals where the river suddenly narrows to 300 yds. at low water, but presently widens to 1(1/2) m. Seven miles lower down are the Jucz Rapids, where the river-bed has a fall of 1 in 433. At the Iron Gates, 34 m. below the Greben, the Prigrada rocky bank nearly blocked the river at the point where it widens out after leaving the Kazan defile. The general object of the works was to obtain a navigable depth of water at all seasons of 2 metres (6.56 ft.) on that portion of the river above Orsova, and a depth of 3 metres (9.84 ft.) below that town. To effect this at Stenka, Kozla Dojke, Islaz and Tachtalia, channels 66 yds. wide had to be cut in the solid rock to a depth of 6 ft. 6 in. below low water. The point of the Greben spur had to be entirely removed for a distance of 167 yds. back from its original face. Below the Greben point a training wall 7 to 9 ft. high, 10 ft. at top and nearly 4 m. in length, has been built along the Servian shore in order to confine the river in a narrow channel. At Jucz another similar channel had to be cut and a training wall built. At the Iron Gates a channel 80 yds. wide, nearly 2000 yds. in length and 10 ft. deep (in the immediate vicinity of traces of an old Roman canal) had to be cut on the Servian side of the river through solid rock. Training walls have been built on either side of the channel to confine the water so as to raise its level; that on the right bank having a width of 19 ft. 6 in. at top, and serving as a tow-path; that on the left being 13 ft. in width. These training walls are built of stone with flat revetments to protect them against ice. These formidable and expensive works have not altogether realized the expectations that had been formed of them. One most important result, however, has been attained, i.e. vessels can now navigate the Iron Gates at all seasons of the year when the river is not closed by ice, whereas formerly at extreme low water, lasting generally for about three months in the late summer and autumn, through navigation was always at a standstill, and goods had to be landed and transported considerable distances by land. The canal was opened for traffic on the 1st of October 1898. It was designed of sufficient width, as was supposed, for the simultaneous passage of boats in opposite directions; but on account of the great velocity of the current this has been found to be impracticable.
European commission of the Danube.
From the Iron Gates down to Braila, which is the highest point to which large sea-going ships ascend the river, there have been no important works of improvement. From Braila to Sulina, a distance of about 100 m., the river falls under the jurisdiction of the European commission of the Danube, an institution of such importance as to merit lengthened notice. It was called into existence under Art. XVI. of the treaty of Paris (1856), and in November of that year a commission was constituted in which Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia and Turkey were each represented by one delegate "to designate and cause to be executed the works necessary below Isaktcha[1] to clear the mouths of the Danube as well as the neighbouring parts of the sea, from the sands and other impediments which obstructed them, in order to put that part of the river and the said parts of the sea in the best possible state for navigation."
In Art. XVIII. of the same treaty it was anticipated that the European commission would have finished the works described within the period of two years, when it was to be dissolved and its powers taken over by a Riverain commission to be established under the same treaty; but this commission has never come into existence. Extended by short periods up to 1871, the powers of the European commission were then prolonged under the treaty of London for twelve years. At the congress of Berlin in 1878 its jurisdiction was extended from Isakcea to Galatz (26 m.), and it was decided that the commission, in which Rumania was henceforward to be represented by a delegate, should exercise its powers in complete independence of the territorial authority. By the treaty of London of 1883 the jurisdiction of the commission was extended from Galatz to Braila and its powers were prolonged for twenty-one years (i.e. till the 24th of April 1904), after which its existence was to continue by tacit prolongation for successive terms of three years unless one of the high contracting powers should propose any modification in its constitution or attributes. It was also decided that the European commission should no longer exercise any effective control over that portion of the Kilia branch of which the two banks belonged to one of the riverain powers (Russia and Rumania), while as regards that portion of it which separated the two countries, control was to be exercised by the Russian and Rumanian delegates on the European commission. Russia was also authorized to levy tolls intended to cover the expenses of any works of improvement that might be undertaken by her. Art. VII. of the same treaty declared that the regulations for navigation, river police, and superintendence drawn up on the 2nd of June 1882 by the European commission, assisted by the delegates of Servia and Bulgaria, should be made applicable to that part of the Danube situated between the Iron Gates and Braila. In consequence of Rumania's opposition, the proposed _Commission Mixte_ was never formed, and these regulations have never been put in force. As regards the extension of the powers of the European commission to Braila, 11 m. above Galatz, and at the head of the maritime navigation, a tacit understanding has been arrived at, under which questions concerning navigation proper come under the jurisdiction of the commission, while the police of the ports remains in the hands of the Rumanian authorities.
Sir Charles Hartley, who was chief engineer of the commission from 1856 to 1907,[2] in a paper contributed to the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1873 (vol. xxxvi.), gave the following graphic description of the state of the Sulina mouth when the commission entered on its labours in 1856:--
"The entrance to the Sulina branch was a wild open seaboard strewn with wrecks, the hulls and masts of which, sticking out of the submerged sandbanks, gave to mariners the only guide where the deepest channel was to be found. The depth of the channel varied from 7 to 11 ft., and was rarely more than 9 ft.
"The site now occupied by wide quays extending several miles in length was then entirely covered with water when the sea rose a few inches above ordinary level, and that even in a perfect calm; the banks of the river near the mouth were only indicated by clusters of wretched hovels built on piles and by narrow patches of sand skirted by tall weeds, the only vegetable product of the vast swamps beyond.
"For some years before the improvements, an average of 2000 vessels of an aggregate capacity of 400,000 tons visited the Danube, and of this number more than three-fourths loaded either the whole or part of their cargoes from lighters in the Sulina roadstead, where, lying off a lee shore, they were frequently exposed to the greatest danger. Shipwrecks were of common occurrence, and occasionally the number of disasters was appalling. One dark winter night in 1855, during a terrific gale, 24 sailing ships and 60 lighters went ashore off the mouth and upwards of 300 persons perished."
The state of affairs in the river was not much better than at the Sulina mouth. Of the three arms of the Danube, the Kilia, the Sulina and the St George, the central or Sulina branch, owing to its greater depth of water over the bar, had from time immemorial been the principal waterway for sea-going vessels; its average depth throughout its course, which could not always be counted on, was 8 ft., but it contained numerous shoals where vessels had to lighten, so that cargo had often to be shifted several times in the voyage down the river. It also contained numerous bends and sharp curves, sources of the greatest difficulty to navigation.
The commission fixed its seat at Galatz. Provisional works of improvement were begun almost immediately at the mouth of the Sulina branch of the Danube, but two years were spent in discussing the relative claims to adoption of the Kilia, the Sulina and the St George's mouths. Unable to agree, the delegates referred the question to their respective governments, and a technical commission appointed by France, England, Prussia and Sardinia met at Paris and decided unanimously in favour of St George's; but recommended, instead of the embankment of the natural channel, the formation of an artificial canal 17 ft. in depth closed by sluices at its junction with the river, and reaching the sea at some distance from the natural embouchure. The choice of St George's made by this commission was adopted at Galatz in December 1858, and six of the seven representatives voted for its canalization; but owing to various political and financial considerations, it was ultimately decided to do nothing more in the meantime than render permanent and effective the provisional works already in progress at the Sulina mouth. These consisted of two piers forming a seaward prolongation of the fluvial channel, begun in 1858 and completed in 1861. The northern pier had a length of 4631 ft., the southern of 3000, and the depth of the water in which they were built varied from 6 to 20 ft. At the commencement of the works the depth of the channel was only 9 ft. but by their completion it had increased to 19 ft. The works designed and constructed by Sir Charles Hartley had in fact proved so successful that nothing more was ever heard of the St George's project. In 1865 a new lighthouse was erected at the end of the north pier. The value of these early works of the commission is shown by the fact that of 2928 vessels navigating the lower Danube in 1855, 36 were wrecked, while of 2676 in 1865 only 7 were wrecked. In 1871 it was found expedient to lengthen the piers seaward, and in 1876 the south jetty was prolonged, so as to bring its end exactly opposite the lighthouse on the north pier. This resulted in an increase of the depth to 20(1/2) ft., and for fifteen years, from 1879 to 1895, this depth remained constant without the aid of dredging. In 1894, owing to the constantly increasing size of vessels frequenting the Danube, it was found necessary to deepen the entrance still further, and to construct two parallel piers between the main jetties, reducing the breadth of the river to 500 ft., and thereby increasing the scour. There is now a continuous channel 24 ft. in depth, 5200 ft. in length, and 300 ft. in width between the piers, and 600 ft. outside the extremities of the piers, until deep water is reached in the open sea. This depth is only maintained by constant dredging. The engineers of the commission have been equally successful in dealing with the Sulina branch of the river. Its original length of 45 m. from St George's Chatal to the sea was impeded at the commencement of the improvement works by eleven bends, each with a radius of less than 1000 ft., besides numerous others of somewhat larger radius, and its bed was encumbered by ten shifting shoals, varying from 8 to 13 ft. in depth at low water. By means of a series of training walls, by groynes thrown out from the banks, by revetments of the banks, and by dredging, all done with the view of narrowing the river, a minimum depth of 11 ft. was attained in 1865, and 13 ft. in 1871. In 1880 the needs of commerce and the increased size of steamers frequenting the river necessitated the construction of a new entrance from the St George's branch. This work, designed in 1857, but unexecuted during a quarter of a century, owing to insufficiency of funds, was completed in 1882; and in 1886, after other comparatively short cuttings had been made to get rid of difficult bends and further to deepen the channel without having to resort to dredgers, the desired minimum depth of 15 ft. was attained. Since that date a series of new cuttings has been made. These have shortened the length of the Sulina canal by 11 nautical m., eliminated all the difficult bends and shoals, and provided an almost straight waterway 34 m. in length from Sulina to St George's Chatal, with a minimum depth of 20 ft. when the river is at its lowest.
In the early days of the commission, i.e. from 1857 to 1860, the money spent on the works of improvement, amounting to about L150,000, was advanced as a loan by the then territorial power, Turkey; but in 1860 the commission began to levy taxes on vessels frequenting the river, and since then has repaid its debt to the Turkish government, as well as various loans for short periods, and a larger one of L120,000 guaranteed by the powers, and raised in 1868, mainly through the energy of the British commissioner, Sir John Stokes. This last loan was paid off in 1882 and the commission became free from debt in 1887. It has now an average annual income of about L80,000 derived from taxes paid by ships when[3] leaving the river. The normal annual expenditure amounts to about L56,000, while L24,000 is generally allotted to extraordinary works, such as new cuttings, &c. Between 1857 and 1905 a sum of about one and three quarter millions sterling was spent on engineering works, including the construction of quays, lighthouses, workshops and buildings, &c. Sulina from being a collection of mud hovels has developed into a town with 5000 inhabitants; a well-found hospital has been established where all merchant sailors receive gratuitous treatment; lighthouses, quays, floating elevators and an efficient pilot service all combine to make it a first-class port.
The result of all the combined works for the rectification of the Danube is that from Sulina up to Braila the river is navigable for sea-going vessels up to 4000 tons register, from Braila to Turnu Severin it is open for sea-going vessels up to 600 tons, and for flat barges of from 1500 to 2000 tons capacity. From Turnu Severin to Orsova navigation is confined to river steamers, tugs and barges drawing 6 ft. of water. Thence to Vienna the draught is limited to 5 ft., and from Vienna to Regensburg to a somewhat lower figure. Barges of 600 tons register can be towed from the lower Danube to Regensburg. Here petroleum tanks have been constructed for the storage of Rumanian petroleum, the first consignment of which in 1898, conveyed in tank boats, took six weeks on the voyage up from Giurgevo. The principal navigation company on the upper Danube is the Societe Imperiale et Royale Autrichienne of Vienna, which started operations in 1830. This company also owns the Funfkirchen mines, producing annually 500,000 tons of coal. The society transports goods and passengers between Galatz and Regensburg. A less important society is the Rumanian State Navigation Company, possessing a large flotilla of tugs and barges, which run to Budapest, where they have established a combined service with the South Danube German Company for the transport of goods from Pest to Regensburg. A Hungarian Navigation Company, subsidized by the state, has also been formed, and the Hungarian railways, the Servian government and private owners own a large number of tugs and barges.
But it is the trade of the lower Danube that has principally benefited. Freights from Galatz and Braila to North Sea ports have fallen from 50s. to about 12s. or even 10s. per ton. Sailing ships of 200 tons register have given way to steamers up to 4000 tons register carrying a deadweight of nearly 8000 tons; and good order has succeeded chaos. From 1847 to 1860 an average of 203 British ships entered the Danube averaging 193 tons each; from 1861 to 1889, 486 ships averaging 796 tons; in 1893, 905 vessels of 1,287,762 tons, or 68% of the total traffic, and rather more than two and a half times the total amount of British tonnage visiting the Danube in the fourteen years between 1847 and 1860. The average amount of cereals (principally wheat) annually exported from the Danube during the period 1901-1905 was 13,000,000 quarters, i.e. about five times the average annual exportation during the period 1861-1867. It has been calculated that between 1861 and 1902 the total tonnage of ships frequenting the Danube increased five-fold, while the mean size of individual ships increased ten-fold.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Marsiglius, _Danubius Pannonico-Mysicus_ (the Hague, 1726); Schulte, _Donaufahrten_ (1819-1829); Planche, _Descent of the Danube_ (1828); Szechenyi, _Uber die Donauschiffahrt_ (1836); A. Muller, _Die Donau vom Ursprunge bis zu den Mundungen_ (1839-1841); J. G. Kohl, _Die Donau_ (Trieste, 1853-1854); G. B. Rennie, _Suggestions for the Improvement of the Danube_ (1856); Sir C. A. Hartley, _Description of the Delta of the Danube_ (1862 and 1874); _Memoire sur le regime administratif etabli aux embouchures du Danube_ (Galatz, 1867); Desjardins, _Rhone et Danube_, a defence of the canalization scheme (Paris, 1870); _Carte du Danube entre Braila et la mer_, published by the European Commission (Leipzig, 1874); Peters, _Die Donau und ihr Gebiet, eine geologische Studie_ (1876); A. F. Heksch, _Guide illustre sur le Danube_ (Vienna, 1883); F. D. Millet, _The Danube_ (New York, 1893); Schweiger-Lerchenfeld, _Die Donau als Volkerweg, Schiffahrtsstrasse, und Reiseroute_ (Vienna, 1895); D. A. Sturza, _La Question des Portes de Fer et des cataractes du Danube_ (Berlin, 1899); A. de Saint Clair, _Le Danube: etude de droit international_ (Paris, 1899); D. A. Sturdza, _Recueil de documents relatifs a la liberte de navigation du Danube_, pp. 933 (Berlin, 1904); A. Schroth-Ukmar, _Donausagen von Passau bis Wien_ (Vienna, 1904). (H. Tr.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Isakcea was 66 nautical m. from the sea measured by the Sulina arm of the Danube, 37 m. below Braila and 26 m. below Galatz.
[2] Sir Charles Hartley became consulting engineer in 1872, when he was succeeded as resident engineer by Mr Charles Kuhl, C.E., C.M.G. To those two gentlemen is mainly due the conspicuous success of the engineering works.
[3] Ships pay no taxes to the commission on entering the river, but on leaving it every ship of over 1500 tons register pays 1s. 5d. per registered ton if loaded at Galatz or Braila, or 11d. per ton if loaded at Sulina. This includes pilotage and light dues. Smaller vessels pay less and ships of less than 300 tons are exempt.
DANVERS, a township of Essex county, on the coast of Massachusetts, U.S.A., about 19 m. N. by E. of Boston. Pop. (1890) 7454; (1900) 8542, of whom 1873 were foreign-born; (1910 census) 9407. Danvers includes an area of 14 sq. m. of level country diversified by hills. There are several villages or business centres, the largest of which, bearing the same name as the township, is served by the Boston & Maine railway. In the township are a state insane asylum, with accommodation for 1000 patients; St John's Preparatory College (Roman Catholic), conducted by the Xavierian Brothers; and, in Peabody Park, the Peabody Institute, with a good public library and museum, the gift (1867) of George Peabody. The Danvers historical society has a valuable collection. Although chiefly a residential town, Danvers has various manufactures, the most important of which are leather, boots and shoes, bricks, boxes and electric lamps. The total value of the factory product in 1905 was $2,017,908, of which more than one half was the value of leather. Danvers owns its water-works and its electric lighting and power plant. A part of what is now Danvers was included in the grant made by the court of assistants to Governor John Endecott and the Rev. Samuel Skelton of the Salem church in 1632. Danvers was set off from Salem as a district in 1752 and was incorporated as a township in 1757, but the act of incorporation was disallowed in 1759 by the privy council on the recommendation of the board of trade, in view of George II.'s disapproval of the incorporation of new townships at that time,--hence the significance of the words on the seal of Danvers, "The King Unwilling"; in 1775 the district was again incorporated. Salem Village, a part of the present township, was the centre of the famous witchcraft delusion in 1692. In 1885 South Danvers was set off as a separate township, and in 1868 was named Peabody in honour of George Peabody, who was born and is buried there. In 1857 part of Beverly was annexed to Danvers. Among distinguished natives of Danvers are Samuel Holton (1738-1816), a member (1778-1780 and 1782-1787) of the Continental Congress and (1793-1795) of the Federal Congress; Israel Putnam; Moses Porter (1755-1822), who served through the War of Independence and the War of 1812; and Grenville Mellen Dodge (b. 1831), a prominent railway engineer, who fought in the Union army in the Civil War, reaching the rank of major-general of volunteers, was a Republican member of the national House of Representatives in 1867-1869, and in 1898 president of the commission which investigated the management of the war with Spain.
See J. W. Hanson, _History of the Town of Danvers_ (Danvers, 1848); Ezra D. Hines, _Historic Danvers_ (Danvers, 1894) and _Historical Address_ (Boston, 1907), in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the first incorporation; and A. P. White, "History of Danvers" in _History of Essex County, Mass._ (Philadelphia, 1888).
DANVILLE, a city and the county-seat of Vermilion county, Illinois, U.S.A., in the E. part of the state, near the Big Vermilion river, 120 m. S. of Chicago. Pop. (1890) 11,491; (1900) 16,354, of whom 1435 were foreign-born; (1910) 27,871. Danville is served by the Chicago & Eastern Illinois (whose shops are here), the Wabash, the Chicago, Indiana & Southern, and the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St Louis railways, and by three interurban lines. There are three public parks (Lincoln, Douglas and Ellsworth), a Carnegie library (1883), and a national home for disabled volunteer soldiers (opened in 1898). Situated in the vicinity of an extensive coalfield (the Grape Creek district), Danville has a large trade in coal; it has also several manufacturing establishments engaged principally in the construction and repair of railway cars, and in the manufacture of bricks, foundry products, glass, carriages, flour and hominy. The value of the factory products of the city in 1905 was $3,304,120, an increase of 72.7% since 1900. Danville was first settled about 1830 and was first incorporated in 1839; in 1874 it was chartered as a city under the general state law of 1872 for the incorporation of municipalities. It annexed Vermilion Heights in 1905, South Danville (pop. in 1900, 898) in 1906, and Germantown (pop. in 1900, 1782) and Roselawn in 1907.
DANVILLE, a city and the county-seat of Boyle county, Kentucky, U.S.A., 113 m. S. by W. of Cincinnati. Pop. (1890) 3766; (1900) 4285 (1913 negroes) (1910) 5420. The city is served by the Southern and the Cincinnati Southern railways, the latter connecting at Junction City (4 m. S.) with the Louisville & Nashville railway. Danville is an attractive city, situated in the S.E. part of the fertile "Blue Grass region" of Kentucky. In McDowell Park there is a monument to the memory of Dr Ephraim McDowell (1771-1830), who after 1795 lived in Danville, and is famous for having performed in 1809 the first entirely successful operation for the removal of an ovarian tumour. Danville is the seat of several educational institutions, the most important of which is the Central University of Kentucky (Presbyterian), founded in 1901 by the consolidation of Centre College (opened at Danville in 1823), and the Central University (opened at Richmond, Ky., in 1874). The law school also is in Danville. The classical, scientific and literary department of the present university is still known as Centre College; the medical and dental departments are in Louisville, and the university maintains a preparatory school, the Centre College academy, at Danville. In 1908 the university had 87 instructors and 696 students. Other institutions at Danville are Caldwell College for women (1860; Presbyterian), and the Kentucky state institution for deaf mutes (1823). The Transylvania seminary was opened here in 1785, but four years later was removed to Lexington (q.v.), and a Presbyterian theological seminary was founded here in 1853, but was merged with the Louisville theological seminary (known after 1902 as the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of Kentucky) in 1901. The municipality owns and operates its water-works and power plant. From its first settlement in 1781 until the admission of Kentucky into the Union in 1792 Danville was an important political centre. There was an influential political club here from 1786 to 1790, and here, too, sat the several conventions--nine in all--which asked for a separation from Virginia, discussed the proposed conditions of separation from that commonwealth, framed the first state constitution, and chose Frankfort as the capital. Danville was incorporated in 1789. It was the birthplace of James G. Birney and of Theodore O'Hara.
DANVILLE, a borough and the county-seat of Montour county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., on the N. branch of the Susquehanna river, about 65 m. N. by E. of Harrisburg. Pop. (1890) 7998; (1900) 8042, of whom 771 were foreign-born; (1910 census) 7517. It is served by the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, and the Philadelphia & Reading railways, and by electric railway to Bloomsburg. The borough is built on an elevated bank of the river at the base of Montour Ridge, where the narrow valley appears to be shut in on every side by hills; the river is spanned by a steel bridge, built in 1905. Iron, coal and limestone abound in the vicinity, and the borough has large manufactories of stoves and furnaces, and of iron and steel, in one of which in 1845 a "T"-rail, probably the first in America, was rolled. It is the seat of a state hospital for the insane (established in 1868). The water-works and electric light plant are owned and operated by the municipality. A settlement was founded here about 1776 by Captain William Montgomery and his son Daniel; and a town was laid out in 1792 and called Dan's Town until the present name was adopted a few years later. Growth was slow until the discovery of iron ore on Montour Ridge, followed in 1832 by the completion of the N. branch of the Pennsylvania Canal, which runs through the centre of the borough. Danville was incorporated in 1849.
DANVILLE, a city in Pittsylvania county, Virginia, U.S.A., on the Dan river about 140 m. (by rail) S.W. of Richmond. Pop. (1890) 10,305; (1900) 16,520 (6515 negroes); (1910) 19,020. It is on the main line of the Southern railway, and is the terminus of branches to Richmond and Norfolk; it is also served by the Danville & Western railway, a road (75 m. long) connecting with Stuart, Va., and controlled by the Southern, though operated independently. The city is built on high ground above the river. It has a city hall, a general hospital, a Masonic temple, and a number of educational institutions, including the Roanoke College (1860; Baptist), for young women; the Randolph-Macon Institute (1897; Methodist Episcopal, South), for girls; and a commercial college. The river furnishes valuable water-power, which is utilized by the city's manufactories (value of product in 1900, third in rank in the state, $8,103,484, of which only $3,693,792 was "factory" product; in 1905 the "factory" product was valued at $4,774,818), including cotton mills--in 1905 Danville ranked first among the cities of the state in the value of cotton goods produced--a number of tobacco factories, furniture and overall factories, and flour and knitting mills. The city is a jobbing centre and wholesale market for a considerable area in southern Virginia and northern North Carolina, and is probably the largest loose-leaf tobacco market in the country, selling about 40,000,000 lb. annually. In the industrial suburb of Schoolfield, which in 1908 had a population of about 3000, there is a large textile mill. The city owns and operates its water-supply system (with an excellent filtration plant installed in 1904) and its gas and electric lighting plants. Danville was settled about 1770, was first incorporated as a town in 1792, and became a city in 1833; it is politically independent of Pittsylvania county. To Danville, after the evacuation of Richmond on the 2nd of April 1865, the archives of the Confederacy were carried, and here President Jefferson Davis paused for a few days in his flight southward.
DANZIG, or DANTSIC (Polish _Gdansk_), a strong maritime fortress and seaport of Germany, capital of the province of West Prussia, on the left bank of the western arm of the Vistula, 4 m. S. of its entrance, at Neufahrwasser, into the Baltic, 253 m. N.E. from Berlin by rail. Pop. (1885) 114,805; (1905) 159,088. The city is traversed by two branches of the Mottlau, a small tributary of the Vistula, dredged to a depth of 15 ft., thus enabling large vessels to reach the wharves of the inner town. The strong fortifications which, with ramparts, bastions and wet ditches, formerly entirely surrounded the city, were removed on the north and west sides in 1895-1896, the trenches filled in, and the area thus freed laid out on a spacious plan. One portion, acquired by the municipality, has been turned into promenades and gardens, the Steffens Park, outside the Olivaer Tor, fifty acres in extent, occupying the north-western corner. The remainder of the massive defences remain, with twenty bastions, in the hands of the military authorities; the works for laying the surrounding country under water on the eastern side have been modernized, and the western side defended by a cordon of forts crowning the hills and extending down to the port of Neufahrwasser.
Danzig almost alone of larger German cities still preserves its picturesque medieval aspect. The grand old patrician houses of the days of its Hanseatic glory, with their lofty and often elaborately ornamented gables and their balconied windows, are the delight of the visitor to the town. Only one ancient feature is rapidly disappearing--owing to the exigencies of street traffic--the stone terraces close to the entrance doors and abutting on the street. Of its old gates the Hohe Tor, modelled after a Roman triumphal arch, is a remarkable monumental erection of the 16th century. From it runs the Lange Gasse, the main street, to the Lange Markt. On this square stands the Artus- or Junker-hof (the merchant princes of the middle ages were in Germany styled _Junker_, squire), containing a hall richly decorated with wood carving and pictures, once used as a banqueting-room and now serving as the exchange. There are twelve Protestant and seven Roman Catholic churches and two synagogues. Of these the most important is St Mary's, begun in 1343 and completed in 1503, one of the largest Protestant churches in existence. It possesses a famous painting of the Last Judgment, formerly attributed to Jan van Eyck, but probably by Memlinc. Among other ancient buildings of note are the beautiful Gothic town hall, surmounted by a graceful spire, the armoury (Zeughaus) and the Franciscan monastery, restored in 1871, and now housing the municipal picture gallery and a collection of antiquities. Of modern structures, the government offices, the house of the provincial diet, the post office and the palace of the commander of the 17th army corps, which has its headquarters in Danzig, are the most noteworthy.
The manufacture of arms and artillery is carried on to a great extent, and the imperial and private docks and shipbuilding establishments, notably the Schichau yard, turn out ships of the largest size. The town is famous for its amber, beer, brandy and liqueurs, and its transit trade makes it one of the most important commercial cities of northern Europe. Danzig originally owed its commercial importance to the fact that it was the shipping port for the corn grown in Poland and the adjacent regions of Russia and Prussia; but for some few years past this trade has been slipping away from her. On the other hand, her trade in timber and sugar has grown proportionally. Nevertheless energetic efforts are being made to check any loss of importance--first, in 1898, by a determined attempt to make Danzig an industrial centre, manufacturing on a large scale; and secondly, by the construction and opening in 1899 of a free harbour at Neufahrwasser at the mouth of the Vistula. The industries which it has been the principal aim to foster and further develop are shipbuilding (naval and marine), steel foundries and rolling mills, sugar refineries, flour and oil mills, and distilleries.
_History._--The origin of Danzig is unknown, but it is mentioned in 997 as an important town. At different times it was held by Pomerania, Poland, Brandenburg and Denmark, and in 1308 it fell into the hands of the Teutonic knights, under whose rule it long prospered. It was one of the four chief towns of the Hanseatic League. In 1455, when the Teutonic Order had become thoroughly corrupt, Danzig shook off its yoke and submitted to the king of Poland, to whom it was formally ceded, along with the whole of West Prussia, at the peace of Thorn. Although nominally subject to Poland, and represented in the Polish diets and at the election of Polish kings, it enjoyed the rights of a free city, and governed a considerable territory with more than thirty villages. It suffered severely through various wars of the 17th and 18th centuries, and in 1734, having declared in favour of Stanislus Leszczynski, was besieged and taken by the Russians and Saxons. At the first partition of Poland, in 1772, Danzig was separated from that kingdom; and in 1793 it came into the possession of Prussia. In 1807, during the war between France and Prussia, it was bombarded and captured by Marshal Lefebvre, who was rewarded with the title of duke of Danzig; and at the peace of Tilsit Napoleon declared it a free town, under the protection of France, Prussia and Saxony, restoring to it its ancient territory. A French governor, however, remained in it, and by compelling it to submit to the continental system almost ruined its trade. It was given back to Prussia in 1814.
See J. C. Schultz, _Danzig und seine Bauwerke_ (Berlin, 1873); Wistulanus, _Geschichte der Stadt Danzig_ (Danzig, 1891); _Defense de Dantzig en 1813; documents militaires du lieutenant-general Campredon_, pub. by Auriel (Paris, 1888); Daniel, _Deutschland_ (Leipzig, 1895).
DAPHLA (or DAFLA) HILLS, a tract of hilly country on the border of Eastern Bengal and Assam, occupied by an independent tribe called Daphla. It lies to the north of the Tezpur and North Lakhimpur subdivisions, and is bounded on the west by the Aka Hills and on the east by the Abor range. Colonel Dalton in _The Ethnology of Bengal_ considers the Daphlas to be closely allied to the hill Miris, and they are akin to and intermarry with the Abors. They have a reputation for cowardice, and as politically they are disunited, they are at the mercy of the Akas, their less numerous but more warlike neighbours on the west. Their clothing is scanty, and its most distinguishing feature is a cane cap with a fringe of bearskin or feathers, which gives them a very curious appearance. The men wear their hair in a plait, which is coiled into a ball on the forehead, to which they fasten their caps with a long skewer. In 1872 a party of independent Daphlas suddenly attacked a colony of their own tribesmen, who had settled at Amtola in British territory, and carried away forty-four captives to the hills. This led to the Daphla expedition of 1874, when a force of 1000 troops released the prisoners and reduced the tribe to submission. According to the census of 1901 the Daphlas in British territory numbered 954, the tribal country not being enumerated.
DAPHNAE (Tahpanhes, Taphne; mod. _Defenneh_), an ancient fortress near the Syrian frontier of Egypt, on the Pelusian arm of the Nile. Here King Psammetichus established a garrison of foreign mercenaries, mostly Carians and Ionian Greeks (Herodotus ii. 154). After the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar in 588 B.C., the Jewish fugitives, of whom Jeremiah was one, came to Tahpanhes. When Naucratis was given by Amasis II. the monopoly of Greek traffic, the Greeks were all removed from Daphnae, and the place never recovered its prosperity; in Herodotus's time the deserted remains of the docks and buildings were visible. The site was discovered by Prof. W. M. Flinders Petrie in 1886; the name "Castle of the Jew's Daughter" seems to preserve the tradition of the Jewish refugees. There is a massive fort and enclosure; the chief discovery was a large number of fragments of pottery, which are of great importance for the chronology of vase-painting, since they must belong to the time between Psammetichus and Amasis, i.e. the end of the 7th or the beginning of the 6th century B.C. They show the characteristics of Ionian art, but their shapes and other details testify to their local manufacture.
See W. M. F. Petrie, _Tanis II., Nebesheh, and Defenneh_ (4th Memoir of the Egypt Exploration Fund, 1888). (E. Gr.)
DAPHNE (Gr. for a laurel tree), in Greek mythology, the daughter of the Arcadian river-god Ladon or the Thessalian Peneus, or of the Laconian Amyclas. She was beloved by Apollo, and when pursued by him was changed by her mother Gaea into a laurel tree sacred to the god (Ovid, _Metam._ i. 452-567). In the Peloponnesian legends, another suitor of Daphne, Leucippus, son of Oenomaus of Pisa, disguised himself as a girl and joined her companions. His sex was discovered while bathing, and he was slain by the nymphs (Pausanias viii. 20; Parthenius, _Erotica_, 15).
DAPHNE, in botany, a genus of shrubs, belonging to the natural order Thymelaeaceae, and containing about forty species, natives of Europe and temperate Asia. _D. Laureola_, spurge laurel, a small evergreen shrub with green flowers in the leaf axils towards the ends of the branches and ovoid black very poisonous berries, is found in England in copses and on hedge-banks in stiff soils. _D. Mezereum_, mezereon, a rather larger shrub, 2 to 4 ft. high, has deciduous leaves, and bears fragrant pink flowers in clusters in the axils of last season's leaves, in early spring before the foliage. The bright red ovoid berries are cathartic, the whole plant is acrid and poisonous, and the bark is used medicinally. It is a native of Europe and north Asia, and found apparently wild in copses and woods in Britain. It is a well-known garden plant, and several other species of the genus are cultivated in the open air and as greenhouse plants. _D. Cneorum_ (Europe) is a hardy evergreen trailing shrub, with bright pink sweet-scented flowers. _D. pontica_ (Eastern Europe) is a hardy spreading evergreen with greenish-yellow fragrant flowers. _D. indica_ (China) and _D. japonica_ (Japan) are greenhouse evergreens with respectively red or white and pinkish-purple flowers.
DAPHNEPHORIA, a festival held every ninth year at Thebes in Boeotia in honour of Apollo Ismenius or Galaxius. It consisted of a procession in which the chief figure was a boy of good family and noble appearance, whose father and mother must be alive. Immediately in front of this boy, who was called Daphnephoros (laurel bearer), walked one of his nearest relatives, carrying an olive branch hung with laurel and flowers and having on the upper end a bronze ball from which hung several smaller balls. Another smaller ball was placed on the middle of the branch or pole (called [Greek: kopo]), which was then twined round with purple ribbons, and at the lower end with saffron ribbons. These balls were said to indicate the sun, stars and moon, while the ribbons referred to the days of the year, being 365 in number. The Daphnephoros, wearing a golden crown, or a wreath of laurel, richly dressed and partly holding the pole, was followed by a chorus of maidens carrying suppliant branches and singing a hymn to the god. The Daphnephoros dedicated a bronze tripod in the temple of Apollo, and Pausanias (ix. 10. 4) mentions the tripod dedicated there by Amphitryon when his son Heracles had been Daphnephoros. The festival is described by Proclus (in Photius _cod._ 239).
See also A. Mommsen, _Feste der Stadt Athen_ (1898); C. O. Muller, _Orchomenos_ (1844); article in Daremberg and Saglio's _Dictionnaire des antiquites_.
DAPHNIS, the legendary hero of the shepherds of Sicily, and reputed inventor of bucolic poetry. The chief authorities for his story are Diodorus Siculus, Aelian and Theocritus. According to his countryman Diodorus (iv. 84), and Aelian (_Var. Hist._, x. 18), Daphnis was the son of Hermes (in his character of the shepherd-god) and a Sicilian nymph, and was born or exposed and found by shepherds in a grove of laurels (whence his name.) He was brought up by the nymphs, or by shepherds, and became the owner of flocks and herds, which he tended while playing on the syrinx. When in the first bloom of youth, he won the affection of a nymph, who made him promise to love none but her, threatening that, if he proved unfaithful, he would lose his eyesight. He failed to keep his promise and was smitten with blindness. Daphnis, who endeavoured to console himself by playing the flute and singing shepherds' songs, soon afterwards died. He fell from a cliff, or was changed into a rock, or was taken up to heaven by his father Hermes, who caused a spring of water to gush out from the spot where his son had been carried off. Ever afterwards the Sicilians offered sacrifices at this spring as an expiatory offering for the youth's early death. There is little doubt that Aelian in his account follows Stesichorus (q.v.) of Himera, who in like manner had been blinded by the vengeance of a woman (Helen) and probably sang of the sufferings of Daphnis in his recantation. Nothing is said of Daphnis's blindness by Theocritus, who dwells on his amour with Nais; his victory over Menalcas in a poetical competition; his love for Xenea brought about by the wrath of Aphrodite; his wanderings through the woods while suffering the torments of unrequited love; his death just at the moment when Aphrodite, moved by compassion, endeavours (but too late) to save him; the deep sorrow, shared by nature and all created things, for his untimely end (Theocritus i. vii. viii.). A later form of the legend identifies Daphnis with a Phrygian hero, and makes him the teacher of Marsyas. The legend of Daphnis and his early death may be compared with those of Narcissus, Linus and Adonis--all beautiful youths cut off in their prime, typical of the luxuriant growth of vegetation in the spring, and its sudden withering away beneath the scorching summer sun.
See F. G. Welcker, _Kleine Schriften zur griechischen Litteraturgeschichte_, i. (1844); C. F. Hermann, _De Daphnide Theocriti_ (1853); R. H. Klausen, _Aeneas und die Penaten_, i. (1840); R. Reitzenstein, _Epigramm und Skolion_ (1893); H. W. Prescott in _Harvard Studies_, x. (1899); H. W. Stoll in Roscher's _Lexikon der Mythologie_; and G. Knaack in Pauly-Wissowa's _Realencyclopadie_.
DARAB (originally DARABGERD), a district of the province of Fars in Persia. It has sixty-two villages, and possesses a hot climate, snow being rarely seen there in winter. It produces a great quantity of dates and much tobacco, which is considered the best in Persia. The town Darab, the capital of the district, is situated in a very fertile plain, 140 m. S.E. of Shiraz. It has a population of about 5000, and extensive orchards of orange and lemon trees and immense plantations of date-palms. Legend ascribes the foundation of the city to Darius, hence its name Darab-gerd (Darius-town). In the neighbourhood there are various remains of antiquity, the most important of which 3(1/2) m. S., is known as the Kalah i Darab, or citadel of Darius, and consists of a series of earthworks arranged in a circle round an isolated rock. Nothing, however, remains to fix the date or explain the history of the fortification. Another monument in the vicinity is a gigantic bas-relief, carved on the vertical face of a rock, representing the victory of the Sassanian Shapur I. (Sapor) of Persia over the Roman emperor Valerian, A.D. 260.
DARBHANGA, a town and district of British India, in the Patna division of Bengal. The town is on the left bank of the Little Baghmati river, and has a railway station. Pop. (1901) 66,244. The town is really a collection of villages that have grown up round the residence of the raja. This is a magnificent palace, with gardens, a menagerie and a good library. There are a first-class hospital, with a Lady Dufferin hospital attached; a handsome market-place, and an Anglo-vernacular school. The district of Darbhanga extends from the Nepal frontier to the Ganges. It was constituted in 1875 out of the unwieldy district of Tirhoot. Its area is 3348 sq. m. In 1901 the population was 2,912,611, showing an increase of 4% in the decade. The district consists entirely of an alluvial plain, in which the principal rivers are the Ganges, Buri Gandak, Baghmati and Little Baghmati, Balan and Little Balan, and Tiljuga. The land is especially fertile in the more elevated part of the district S.W. of the Buri Gandak; rice is the staple crop, and it may be noted that the cultivator in Darbhanga is especially dependent on the winter harvest. The chief exports are rice, indigo, linseed and other seeds, saltpetre and tobacco. There are several indigo factories and saltpetre refineries, and a tobacco factory. The district is traversed by the main line of the Bengal & North-Western railway and by branch lines, part of which were begun as a famine relief work in 1874.
The maharaja bahadur of Darbhanga, a Rajput, whose ancestor Mahesh Thakor received the Darbhanga raj (which includes large parts of the modern districts of Darbhanga, Muzaffarpur, Monghyr, Purnea and Bhagalpur) from the emperor Akbar early in the 16th century, is not only the premier territorial noble of Behar but one of the greatest noblemen of all India. Maharaja Lachhmeswar Singh Bahadur, who succeeded to the raj in 1860 and died in 1898, was distinguished for his public services, and especially as one of the most munificent of living philanthropists. Under his supervision his raj came to be regarded as the model for good and benevolent management; he constructed hundreds of miles of roads planted with trees, bridged all the rivers, and constructed irrigation works on a great scale. His charities were without limit; thus he contributed L300,000 for the relief of the sufferers from the Bengal famine of 1873-1874, and it is computed that during his possession of the raj he expended at least L2,000,000 on charities, works of public utility, and charitable remissions of rent. For many years he served as a member of the legislative council of the viceroy with conspicuous ability and moderation of view. As representative of the landowners of Berar and Bengal he took an important part in the discussion on the Bengal Tenancy Bill. He was succeeded by his brother, Maharaja Rameshwar Singh Bahadur, who was born on the 16th of January 1860, and on attaining his majority in 1878 was appointed to the Indian Civil Service, serving as assistant magistrate successively at Darbhanga, Chhapra and Bhagalpur. In 1886 he was created a raja bahadur, exempted from attendance at the civil courts, and appointed a member of the legislative council of Bengal. He was created a maharaja bahadur on his succession to the raj in 1898. Like his brother, he was educated by an English tutor, and his administration carried on the enlightened traditions of his predecessor.
See Sir Roper Lethbridge, _The Golden Book of India_.
D'ARBLAY, FRANCES (1752-1840), English novelist and diarist, better known as FANNY BURNEY, daughter of Dr Charles Burney (q.v.), was born at King's Lynn, Norfolk, on the 13th of June 1752. Her mother was Esther Sleepe, granddaughter of a French refugee named Dubois. Fanny was the fourth child in a family of six. Of her brothers, James (1750-1821) became an admiral and sailed with Captain Cook on his second and third voyages, and Charles Burney (1757-1817) was a well-known classical scholar. In 1760 the family removed to London, and Dr Burney, who was now a fashionable music master, took a house in Poland Street. Mrs Burney died in 1761, when Fanny was only nine years old. Her sisters Esther (Hetty), afterwards Mrs Charles Rousseau Burney, and Susanna, afterwards Mrs Phillips, were sent to school in Paris, but Fanny was left to educate herself. Early in 1766 she paid her first visit to Dr Burney's friend Samuel Crisp at Chessington Hall, near Epsom. Dr Burney had first made Samuel Crisp's acquaintance about 1745 at the house of Fulke Greville, grandfather of the diarists, and the two studied music while the rest of the guests hunted. Crisp wrote a play, _Virginia_, which was staged by David Garrick in 1754 at the request of the beautiful countess of Coventry (nee Maria Gunning). The play had no great success, and in 1764 Crisp established himself in retirement at Chessington Hall, where he frequently entertained his sister, Mrs Sophia Gast, of Burford, Oxfordshire, and Dr Burney and his family, to whom he was familiarly known as "daddy" Crisp.[1] It was to her "daddy" Crisp and her sister Susan that Fanny Burney addressed large portions of her diary and many of her letters. After his wife's death in 1767, Dr Burney married Elizabeth Allen, widow of a King's Lynn wine-merchant.
From her fifteenth year Fanny lived in the midst of an exceptionally brilliant social circle, gathered round her father in Poland Street, and later in his new home in St Martin's Street, Leicester Fields. Garrick was a constant visitor, and would arrive before eight o'clock in the morning. Of the various "lyons" they entertained she leaves a graphic account, notably of Omai, the Otaheitan native, and of Alexis Orlov, the favourite of Catherine II. of Russia. Dr Johnson she first met at her father's home in March 1777. Her father's drawing-room, where she met many of the chief musicians, actors and authors of the day, was in fact Fanny's only school. Her reading, however, was by no means limited. Macaulay stated that in the whole of Dr Burney's library there was but one novel, Fielding's _Amelia_; but Austin Dobson points out that she was acquainted with the abbe Prevost's _Doyen de Killerine_, and with Marivaux's _Vie de Marianne_, besides _Clarissa Harlowe_ and the books of Mrs Elizabeth Griffith and Mrs Frances Brooke. Her diary also contains the record of much more strenuous reading. Her stepmother, a woman of some cultivation, did not encourage habits of scribbling. Fanny, therefore, made a bonfire of her MSS., among them a _History of Caroline Evelyn_, a story containing an account of Evelina's mother. Luckily her journal did not meet with the same fate. The first entry in it was made on the 30th of May 1768, and it extended over seventy-two years. The earlier portions of it underwent wholesale editing in later days, and much of it was entirely obliterated. She planned out _Evelina_, or _A Young Lady's Entrance into the World_, long before it was written down. _Evelina_ was published by Thomas Lowndes in the end of January 1778, but it was not until June that Dr Burney learned its authorship, when the book had been reviewed and praised everywhere. Fanny proudly told Mrs Thrale the secret. Mrs Thrale wrote to Dr Burney on the 22nd of July: "Mr Johnson returned home full of the Prayes of the _Book_ I had lent him, and protesting that there were passages in it which might do _honour_ to Richardson: we talk of it for ever, and he feels ardent after the denouement; he could not get _rid_ of the Rogue, he said." Miss Burney soon visited the Thrales at Streatham, "the most consequential day I have spent since my birth" she calls the occasion. It was the prelude to much longer visits there. Dr Johnson's best compliments were made for her benefit, and eagerly transcribed in her diary. His affectionate friendship for "little Burney" only ceased with his death.
_Evelina_ was a continued success. Sir Joshua Reynolds sat up all night to read it, as did Edmund Burke, who came next to Johnson in Miss Burney's esteem. She was introduced to Elizabeth Montagu and the other bluestocking ladies, to Richard Brinsley Sheridan, and to the gay Mrs Mary Cholmondeley, the sister of Peg Woffington, whose manners, as described in the diary, explain much of _Evelina_. At the suggestion of Mrs Thrale, and with offers of help from Arthur Murphy, and encouragement from Sheridan, Fanny began to write a comedy. Crisp, realizing the limitations of her powers, tried to dissuade her, and the piece, _The Witlings_, was suppressed in deference to what she called a "hissing, groaning, catcalling epistle" from her two "daddies." Meanwhile her intercourse with Mrs Thrale proved very exacting, and left her little time for writing. She went with her to Bath in 1780, and was at Streatham again in 1781. Her next book was written partly at Chessington and after much discussion with Mr Crisp. _Cecilia; or, Memoirs of an Heiress_, by the author of _Evelina_, was published in 5 vols. in 1782 by Messrs Payne & Cadell (who paid the author L250--not L2000 as stated by Macaulay). If _Cecilia_ has not quite the freshness and charm of _Evelina_, it is more carefully constructed, and contains many happy examples of what Johnson called Miss Burney's gift of "character-mongering." Burke sent her a letter full of high praise. But some of her friends found the writing too often modelled on Johnson's, and Horace Walpole thought the personages spoke too uniformly in character.
On the 24th of April 1783, Fanny Burney's "most judicious adviser and stimulating critic," "daddy" Crisp, died. He was her devoted friend, as she was to him, "the dearest thing on earth." The next year she was to lose two more friends. Mrs Thrale married Piozzi, and Johnson died. Fanny had met the celebrated Mrs Delany in 1783, and she now attached herself to her. Mrs Delany, who was living (1785) in a house near Windsor Castle presented to her by George III., was on the friendliest terms with both the king and queen, and Fanny was honoured with more than one royal interview. Queen Charlotte, soon afterwards, offered Miss Burney the post of second keeper of the robes, with a salary of L200 a year, which after some hesitation was accepted. Much has been said against Dr Burney for allowing the authoress of _Evelina_ and _Cecilia_ to undertake an office which meant separation from all her friends and a wearisome round of court ceremonial. On the other hand, it may be fairly urged that Fanny's literary gifts were really limited. She had written nothing for four years, and apparently felt she had used her best material. "What my daddy Crisp says," she wrote as early as 1779, "'that it would be the best policy, but for pecuniary advantages, for me to write no more,' is exactly what I have always thought since _Evelina_ was published" (_Diary_, i. 258). Her misgivings as to her unfitness for court life were quite justified. From Queen Charlotte she received unvarying kindness, though she was not very clever with her waiting-maid's duties. She had to attend the queen's toilet, to take care of her lap-dog and her snuff-box, and to help her senior, Mrs Schwellenberg, in entertaining the king's equerries and visitors at tea. The constant association with Mrs Schwellenberg, who has been described as "a peevish old person of uncertain temper and impaired health, swaddled in the buckram of backstairs etiquette," proved to be the worst part of Fanny's duties. Her diary is full of amusing court gossip, and sometimes deals with graver matters, notably in the account of Warren Hastings' trial, and in the story of the beginning of George III.'s madness, as seen by a member of his household. But the strain told on her health, and after pressure both from Fanny and her numerous friends, Dr Burney prepared with her a joint memorial asking the queen's leave to resign. She left the royal service in July 1791 with a retiring pension of L100 a year, granted from the queen's private purse, and returned to her father's house at Chelsea. Dr Burney had been appointed organist at Chelsea Hospital in 1783, through Burke's influence.
In 1792 she became acquainted with a group of French exiles, who had taken a house, Juniper Hall, near Mickleham, where Fanny's sister, Mrs Phillips, lived. On the 31st of July 1793 she married one of the exiles, Alexandre D'Arblay, an artillery officer, who had been adjutant-general to La Fayette. They took a cottage at Bookham on the strength, it appears, of Miss Burney's pension. In 1793 she produced her _Brief Reflections relative to the Emigrant French Clergy_. Her son Alexandre was born on the 18th of December 1794. In the following spring Sheridan produced at Drury Lane her _Edwy and Elgiva_, a tragedy which was not saved even by the acting of the Kembles and Mrs Siddons. The play was never printed. Money was now a serious object, and Madame D'Arblay was therefore persuaded to issue her next novel, _Camilla: or A Picture of Youth_ (5 vols., 1796), by subscription. A month after publication Dr Burney told Horace Walpole that his daughter had made L2000 by the book, and this sum was almost certainly augmented later. It is interesting to note that Jane Austen was among the subscribers. Unfortunately its literary success was not as great. "How I like _Camilla_?" wrote Horace Walpole to Miss Hannah More (August 29th, 1796), "I do not care to say how little. Alas! she has reversed experience ... this author knew the world and penetrated characters before she had stepped over the threshold; and, now she has seen so much of it, she has little or no insight at all: perhaps she apprehended having seen too much, and kept the bags of foul air that she brought from the Cave of Tempests too closely tied." Nevertheless _Camilla_ has found judicious persons to admire it, notably Jane Austen in _Northanger Abbey_. A second play, _Love and Fashion_, was actually put in rehearsal in 1799, but was withdrawn in the next year. In 1801 Madame D'Arblay accompanied her husband to Paris, where General D'Arblay eventually obtained a place in the civil service. In 1812 she returned to England, bringing with her her son Alexandre to escape the conscription. In 1814 she published _The Wanderer; or Female Difficulties_. Possibly because readers expected to find a description of her impressions of revolutionary France, it had a large sale, from which the author realized L7000. Nobody, it has been said, ever read _The Wanderer_. In the end of the year General D'Arblay came to England and took his wife back to France. During the Hundred Days of 1815 she was in Belgium, and the vivid account in her Diary of Brussels during Waterloo may have been used by Thackeray in _Vanity Fair_. General D'Arblay now received permission to settle in England. After his death, which took place at Bath on the 3rd of May 1818, his wife lived in Bolton Street, Piccadilly. There she was visited in 1826 by Sir Walter Scott, who describes her (_Journal_, November 18th, 1826) as an elderly lady with no remains of personal beauty, but with a gentle manner and a pleasing countenance. The later years of her life were occupied with the editing of the _Memoirs of Dr Burney, arranged from his own Manuscripts, from family papers and from personal recollections_ (3 vols., 1832). Her style had, as time went on, altered for the worse, and this book is full of extraordinary affectations. Madame D'Arblay died in London on the 6th of January 1840 and was buried at Walcot, Bath, near her son and husband.
Madame D'Arblay is still read in _Evelina_, but her best title to the affections of modern readers is the _Diary and Letters_. The small egotisms of the writer do not alienate other readers as they did John Wilson Croker. Dr Johnson lives in its pages almost as vividly as in those of Boswell, and King George and his wife in a friendlier light than in most of their contemporary portraits. Croker, in _The Quarterly Review_, April 1833 and June 1842, made two attacks on Madame D'Arblay. The first is an unfriendly but largely justifiable criticism on the _Memoirs of Dr Burney_. In the second, a review of the first three volumes of the _Diary and Letters_, Croker abused the writer's innocent vanity, and declared that, considering their bulk and pretensions, the _Diary and Letters_ were "nearly the most worthless we have ever waded through." These pronouncements drew forth the eloquent defence by Lord Macaulay, first printed in _The Edinburgh Review_, January 1843, which, in spite of some inaccuracies and considerable exaggeration, has perhaps done more than anything else to maintain Madame D'Arblay's constant popularity.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--The _Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay_ was edited by her niece, Charlotte Frances Barrett, in 7 vols. (1842-1846). The text, covering the years 1778-1840, was edited with preface, notes and reproductions of contemporary portraits and other illustrations, by Mr Austin Dobson in 6 vols. (1904-1905). This _Diary_, which begins with the publication of _Evelina_, was supplemented in 1889 by _The Early Diary of Frances Burney_ (1768-1778), which was in the first instance suppressed as being of purely private interest, edited by Mrs Annie Raine Ellis, with an introduction giving many particulars of the Burney family. Mrs Ellis also edited _Evelina_ for "Bohn's Novelist's Library" in 1881, and _Cecilia_ in 1882. See also Austin Dobson's _Fanny Burney_ (_Madame D'Arblay_) (1903), in the "English Men of Letters Series."
FOOTNOTE:
[1] His letters to Mrs Gast and another sister, Anne, were edited with the title of _Burford Papers_ (1906), by W. H. Hutton.
DARBOY, GEORGES (1813-1871), archbishop of Paris, was born at Fayl-Billot in Haute Marne on the 16th of January 1813. He studied with distinction at the seminary at Langres, and was ordained priest in 1836. Transferred to Paris as almoner of the college of Henry IV., and honorary canon of Notre Dame, he became the close friend of Archbishop Affre and of his successor Archbishop Sibour. He was appointed bishop of Nancy in 1859, and in January 1863 was raised to the archbishopric of Paris. The archbishop was a strenuous upholder of episcopal independence in the Gallican sense, and involved himself in a controversy with Rome by his endeavours to suppress the jurisdiction of the Jesuits and other religious orders within his diocese. Pius IX. refused him the cardinal's hat, and rebuked him for his liberalism in a letter which was probably not intended for publication. At the Vatican council he vigorously maintained the rights of the bishops, and strongly opposed the dogma of papal infallibility, against which he voted as inopportune. When the dogma had been finally adopted, however, he was one of the first to set the example of submission. Immediately after his return to Paris the war with Prussia broke out, and his conduct during the disastrous year that followed was marked by a devoted heroism which has secured for him an enduring fame. He was active in organizing relief for the wounded at the commencement of the war, remained bravely at his post during the siege, and refused to seek safety by flight during the brief triumph of the Commune. On the 4th of April 1871 he was arrested by the communists as a hostage, and confined in the prison at Mazas, from which he was transferred to La Roquette on the advance of the army of Versailles. On the 27th of May he was shot within the prison along with several other distinguished hostages. He died in the attitude of blessing and uttering words of forgiveness. His body was recovered with difficulty, and, having been embalmed, was buried with imposing ceremony at the public expense on the 7th of June. It is a noteworthy fact that Darboy was the third archbishop of Paris who perished by violence in the period between 1848 and 1871. Darboy was the author of a number of works, of which the most important are a _Vie de St Thomas Becket_ (1859), a translation of the works of St Denis the Areopagite, and a translation of the _Imitation of Christ_.
See J. A. Foulon, _Histoire de la vie et des oeuvres de Mgr. Darboy_ (Paris, 1889), and J. Guillermin, _Vie de Mgr. Darboy_ (Paris, 1888), biographies written from the clerical standpoint, which have called forth a number of pamphlets in reply.
DARCY, THOMAS DARCY, BARON (1467-1537), English soldier, was a son of Sir William Darcy (d. 1488), and belonged to a family which was seated at Templehurst in Yorkshire. In early life he served, both as a soldier and a diplomatist, in Scotland and on the Scottish borders, where he was captain of Berwick; and in 1505, having been created Baron Darcy, he was made warden of the east marches towards Scotland. In 1511 Darcy led some troops to Spain to help Ferdinand and Isabella against the Moors, but he returned almost at once to England, and was with Henry VIII. on his French campaign two years later. One of the most influential noblemen in the north of England, where he held several important offices, Darcy was also a member of the royal council, dividing his time between state duties in London and a more active life in the north. He showed great zeal in preparing accusations against his former friend, Cardinal Wolsey; however, after the cardinal's fall his words and actions caused him to be suspected by Henry VIII. Disliking the separation from Rome, Darcy asserted that matrimonial cases were matters for the decision of the spiritual power, and he was soon communicating with Eustace Chapuys, the ambassador of the emperor Charles V., about an invasion of England in the interests of the Roman Catholics. Detained in London against his will by the king, he was not allowed to return to Yorkshire until late in 1535, and about a year after his arrival in the north the rising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out. For a short time Darcy defended Pontefract Castle against the rebels, but soon he surrendered to them this stronghold, which he could certainly have held a little longer, and was with them at Doncaster, being regarded as one of their leaders. Upon the dispersal of the insurgents Darcy was pardoned, but he pleaded illness when Henry requested him to proceed to London. He may have assisted to suppress the rising which was renewed under Sir Francis Bigod early in 1537, but the king believed, probably with good reason, that he was guilty of fresh treasons, and he was seized and hurried to London. During his imprisonment he uttered his famous remark about Thomas Cromwell:--"Cromwell, it is thou that art the very original and chief causer of all this rebellion and mischief, ... and I trust that or thou die, though thou wouldst procure all the noblemen's heads within the realm to be stricken off, yet shall there one head remain that shall strike off thy head." Tried by his peers, Darcy was found guilty of treason, and was beheaded on the 20th of June 1537. In 1548 his barony was revived in favour of his son George (d. 1557), but it became extinct on the death of George's descendant John in 1635.
DARDANELLES (Turk. _Bahr-Sefed Boghazi_), the strait, in ancient times called the Hellespont (q.v.), uniting the Sea of Marmora with the Aegean, so called from the two castles which protect the narrowest part and preserve the name of the city of Dardanus in the Troad, famous for the treaty between Sulla and Mithradates in 84 B.C. The shores of the strait are formed by the peninsula of Gallipoli on the N.W. and by the mainland of Asia Minor on the S.E.; it extends for a distance of about 47 m. with an average breadth of 3 or 4 m. At the Aegean extremity stand the castles of Sedil Bahr and Kum Kaleh respectively in Europe and Asia; and near the Marmora extremity are situated the important town of Gallipoli (Callipolis) on the northern side, and the less important though equally famous Lamsaki or Lapsaki (Lampsacus) on the southern. The two castles of the Dardanelles _par excellence_ are Chanak-Kalehsi, Sultanieh-Kalehsi, or the Old Castle of Anatolia, and Kilid-Bahr, or the Old Castle of Rumelia, which were long but erroneously identified with Sestos and Abydos now located farther to the north. The strait of the Dardanelles is famous in history for the passage of Xerxes by means of a bridge of boats, and for the similar exploit on the part of Alexander. It is famous also from the story of Hero and Leander, and from Lord Byron's successful attempt (repeated by others) to rival the ancient swimmer. Strategically the Dardanelles is a point of great importance, since it commands the approach to Constantinople from the Mediterranean. The passage of the strait is easily defended, but in 1807 the English admiral (Sir) J. T. Duckworth made his way past all the fortresses into the Sea of Marmora. The treaty of July 1841, confirmed by the Paris peace of 1856, prescribed that no foreign ship of war might enter the strait except by Turkish permission, and even merchant vessels are only allowed to pass the castle of Chanak-Kalehsi during the day.
See Choiseul-Gouffier, _Voyage pittoresque_ (Paris, 1842); Murray's _Handbook for Constantinople_ (London, 1900).
DARDANELLES (Turk. _Sultanieh Kalehsi_, or _Chanak Kalehsi_), the chief town and seat of government of the lesser Turkish province of Bigha, Asia Minor. It is situated at the mouth of the Rhodius, and at the narrowest part of the strait of the Dardanelles, where its span is but a mile across. Its recent growth has been rapid, and it possesses a lyceum, a military hospital, a public garden, a theatre, quays and water-works. Exclusive of the garrison, the population is estimated at 13,000, of whom one-half are Turkish, and the remainder Greek, Jewish, Armenian and European. The town contains many mosques, Greek, Armenian and Catholic churches, and a synagogue. There is a resident Greek bishop. The civil governor, and the military commandants of the numerous fortresses on each side of the strait, are stationed here. Many important works have been added to the defences. The Ottoman fleet is stationed at Nagara (anc. _Abydos_). The average annual number of merchant vessels passing the strait is 12,000 and the regular commercial vessels calling at the port of Dardanelles are represented by numerous foreign agencies. Besides the Turkish telegraph service, the Eastern Telegraph Company has a station at Dardanelles, and there are Turkish, Austrian, French and Russian post offices. The import trade consists of manufactures, sugar, flour, coffee, rice, leather and iron. The export trade consists of valonia (largely produced in the province), wheat, barley, beans, chickpeas, canary seed, liquorice root, pine and oak timber, wine and pottery. Excepting in the items of wine and pottery, the export trade shows steady increase. Every year sees a larger area of land brought under cultivation by immigrants, and adds to the number of mature (i.e. fruit-bearing) valonia trees. Vine-growers are discouraged by heavy fiscal charges, and by the low price of wine; many have uprooted their vineyards. The pottery trade is affected by change of fashion, and the factories are losing their importance. The lower quarters of the town were heavily damaged in the winter of 1900-1901 by repeated inundations caused by the overflow of the Rhodius.
See V. Cuinet, _Turquie d'Asie_ (Paris, 1890-1900).
DARDANUS, in Greek legend, son of Zeus and Electra, the mythical founder of Dardanus on the Hellespont and ancestor of the Dardans of the Troad and, through Aeneas, of the Romans. His original home was supposed to have been Arcadia, where he married Chryse, who brought him as dowry the Palladium or image of Pallas, presented to her by the goddess herself. Having slain his brother Iasius or Iasion (according to others, Iasius was struck by lightning), Dardanus fled across the sea. He first stopped at Samothrace, and when the island was visited by a flood, crossed over to the Troad. Being hospitably received by Teucer, he married his daughter Batea and became the founder of the royal house of Troy.
See Apollodorus iii. 12; Diod. Sic. v. 48-75; Virgil, _Aeneid_, iii. 163 ff.; articles in Pauly-Wissowa's _Realencyclopadie_ and Roscher's _Lexikon der Mythologie_.
DARDISTAN, a purely conventional name given by scientists to a tract of country on the north-west frontier of India. There is no modern race called Dards, and no country so named by its inhabitants, but the inhabitants of the right bank of the Indus, from the Kandia river to Batera, apply it to the dwellers on the left bank. In the scientific use of the appellation, Dardistan comprises the whole of Chitral, Yasin, Panyal, the Gilgit valley, Hunza and Nagar, the Astor valley, the Indus valley from Bunji to Batera, the Kohistan-Malazai, i.e. the upper reaches of the Panjkora river, and the Kohistan of Swat. The so-called Dard races are referred to by Pliny and Ptolemy, and are supposed to be a people of Aryan origin who ascended the Indus valley from the plains of the Punjab, reaching as far north as Chitral, where they dispossessed the Khos. They have left their traces in the different dialects, Khoswar, Burishki and Shina, spoken in the Gilgit agency.
The question of Dardistan is debated at length in Leitner's _Dardistan_ (1877); Drew's _Jummoo and Kashmir Territories_ (1875); Biddulph's _Tribes of the Hindu-Kush_ (1880) and Durand's _The Making of a Frontier_ (1899). For further details see GILGIT.
DARES PHRYGIUS, according to Homer (_Iliad_, v. 9) a Trojan priest of Hephaestus. He was supposed to have been the author of an account of the destruction of Troy, and to have lived before Homer (Aelian, _Var. Hist._ xi. 2). A work in Latin, purporting to be a translation of this, and entitled _Daretis Phrygii de excidio Trojae historia_, was much read in the middle ages, and was then ascribed to Cornelius Nepos, who is made to dedicate it to Sallust; but the language is extremely corrupt, and the work belongs to a period much later than the time of Nepos (probably the 5th century A.D.). It is doubtful whether the work as we have it is an abridgment of a larger Latin work or an adaptation of a Greek original. Together with the similar work of Dictys Cretensis (with which it is generally printed) the _De excidio_ forms the chief source for the numerous middle age accounts of the Trojan legend. (See DICTYS; and O. S. von Fleschenberg, _Daresstudien_, 1908.)
DAR-ES-SALAAM ("The harbour of peace"), a seaport of East Africa, in 6 deg. 50' S. 39 deg. 20' E., capital of German East Africa. Pop. (1909) estimated at 24,000, including some 500 Europeans. The entrance to the harbor, which is perfectly sheltered (hence its name), is through a narrow opening in the palm-covered shore. The harbour is provided with a floating dock, completed in 1902. The town is built on the northern sweep of the harbour and is European in character. The streets are wide and regularly laid out. The public buildings, which are large and handsome, include the government and customs offices on the quay opposite the spot where the mail boats anchor, the governor's house, state hospital, post office, and the Boma or barracks. Adjoining the governor's residence are the botanical gardens, where many European plants are tested with a view to acclimatization. There are various churches, and government and mission schools. In the town are the head offices of the Deutsch-Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft, the largest trading company in German East Africa. The mangrove swamps at the north-west end of the harbour have been drained and partially built over.
Until the German occupation nothing but an insignificant village existed at Dar-es-Salaam. In 1862 Said Majid, sultan of Zanzibar, decided to build a town on the shores of the bay, and began the erection of a palace, which was never finished, and of which but scanty ruins remain. In 1871 Said Majid died, and his scheme was abandoned. In 1876 Mr (afterwards Sir) William McKinnon began the construction of a road from Dar-es-Salaam to Victoria Nyanza, intending to make of Dar-es-Salaam an important seaport. This project however failed. In 1887 Dr Carl Peters occupied the bay in the name of the German East Africa Company. Fighting with the Arabs followed, and in 1889 the company handed over their settlement to the German imperial government. In 1891 the town was made the administrative capital of the colony. It is the starting point of a railway to Mrogoro, and is connected by overland telegraph via Ujiji with South Africa. A submarine cable connects the town with Zanzibar. Dar-es-Salaam was laid out by the Germans on an ambitious scale in the expectation that it would prove an important centre of commerce, but trade developed very slowly. Ivory, rubber and copal are the chief exports. The trade returns are included in those of German East Africa (q.v.).
DARESTE DE LA CHAVANNE, ANTOINE ELISABETH CLEOPHAS (1820-1882), French historian, was born in Paris on the 28th of October 1820, of an old Lyons family. Educated at the Ecole des Chartes, he became professor in the faculty of letters at Grenoble in 1844, and in 1849 at Lyons, where he remained nearly thirty years. He died on the 6th of August 1882. His works comprise: _Histoire de l'administration en France depuis Philippe-Auguste_ (2 vols., 1848); _Histoire des classes agricoles en France depuis saint Louis jusqu'a Louis XVI_ (2 vols., 1853 and 1858), now quite obsolete; and a _Histoire de France_ (8 vols., 1865-1873), completed by a _Histoire de la Restauration_ (2 vols., 1880), a good summary of the work of Veil-Castel, and by a _Histoire du Gouvernement de Juillet_, a dry enumeration of dates and facts. Before the publication of Lavisse's great work, Dareste's general history of France was the best of its kind; it surpassed in accuracy the work of Henri Martin, especially in the ancient periods, just as Martin's in its turn was an improvement upon that of Sismondi.
DARESTE DE LA CHAVANNE, RODOLPHE MADELEINE CLEOPHAS (1824- ), French jurist, was born in Paris on the 25th of December 1824. He studied at the Ecole des Chartes and the Ecole de Droit, and starting early on a legal career he rose to be counsellor to the court of cassation (1877 to 1900). His first publication was an _Essai sur Francois Hotman_ (1850), completed later by his publication of Hotman's correspondence in the _Revue historique_ (1876), and he devoted the whole of his leisure to legal history. Of his writings may be mentioned _Les Anciennes Lois de l'Islande_ (1881); _Memoire sur les anciens monuments du droit de la Hongrie_ (1885), and _Etudes d'histoire du droit_ (1889). On Greek law he wrote some notable works: _Du pret a la grosse chez les Atheniens_ (1867); _Les Inscriptions hypothecaires en Grece_ (1885), _La Science du droit en Grece: Platon, Aristote, Theophraste_ (1893), and _Etude sur la loi de Gortyne_ (1885). He collaborated with Theodore Reinach and B. Haussoullier in their _Recueil des inscriptions juridiques grecques_ (1905), and his name is worthily associated with the edition of Philippe de Beaumanoir's _Coutumes de Beauvaisis_, published by Salmon (2 vols., 1899, 1900).
DARFUR, a country of east central Africa, the westernmost state of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. It extends from about 10 deg. N. to 16 deg. N. and from 21 deg. E. to 27 deg. 30' E., has an area of some 150,000 sq. m., and an estimated population of 750,000. It is bounded N. by the Libyan desert, W. by Wadai (French Congo), S. by the Bahr-el-Ghazal and E. by Kordofan. The two last-named districts are _mudirias_ (provinces) of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. The greater part of the country is a plateau from 2000 to 3000 ft. above sea-level. A range of mountains of volcanic origin, the Jebel Marra, runs N. and S. about the line of the 24 deg. E. for a distance of over 100 m., its highest points attaining from 5000 to 6000 ft. East to west this chain extends about 80 m. Eastward the mountains fall gradually into sandy, bush-covered steppes. North-east of Jebel Marra lies the Jebel Medob (3500 ft. high), a range much distorted by volcanic action, and Bir-el-Melh, an extinct volcano with a crater 150 ft. deep. South of Jebel Marra are the plains of Dar Dima and Dar Uma; S.W. of the Marra the plain is 4000 ft. above the sea. The watershed separating the basins of the Nile and Lake Chad runs north and south through the centre of the country. The mountains are scored by numerous _khors_, whose lower courses can be traced across the tableland. The khors formerly contained large rivers which flowed N.E. and E. to the Nile, W. and S.W. to Lake Chad, S. and S.E. to the Bahr-el-Ghazal. The streams going N.E. drain to the Wadi Melh, a dry river-bed which joins the Nile near Debba, but on reaching the plain the waters sink into the sandy soil and disappear. The torrents flowing directly east towards the Nile also disappear in the sandy deserts. The khors in the W., S.W. and S.,--the most fertile part of Darfur--contain turbulent torrents in the rainy season, when much of the southern district is flooded. Not one of the streams is perennial, but in times of heavy rainfall the waters of some khors reach the Bahr-el-Homr tributary of the Bahr-el-Ghazal. (For some 200 m. the Bahr-el-Homr marks the southern frontier of the country.) In the W. and S. water can always be obtained in the dry season by digging 5 or 6 ft. below the surface of the khors.
The climate, except in the south, where the rains are heavy and the soil is a damp clay, is healthy except after the rains. The rainy season lasts for three months, from the middle of June to the middle of September. In the neighbourhood of the khors the vegetation is fairly rich. The chief trees are the acacias whence gum is obtained, and baobab (_Adansonia digitata_); while the sycamore and, in the Marra mountains, the _Euphorbia candelabrum_ are also found. In the S.W. are densely forested regions. Cotton and tobacco are indigenous. The most fertile land is found on the slopes of the mountains, where wheat, durra, _dukhn_ (a kind of millet and the staple food of the people) and other grains are grown. Other products are sesame, cotton, cucumbers, water-melons and onions.
Copper is obtained from Hofrat-el-Nahas in the S.E., iron is wrought in the S.W.; and there are deposits of rock-salt in various places. The copper mines (in 9 deg. 48' N. 24 deg. 5' E.) are across the Darfur frontier in the Bahr-el-Ghazal province. The vein runs N.W. and S.E. and in places rises in ridges 2 ft. above the general level of ground. There is an immense quantity of ore, (silicate and carbonate) specimens containing 14% of metal. Camels and cattle are both numerous and of excellent breeds. Some of the Arab tribes, such as the Baggara, breed only cattle, those in the north and east confine themselves to rearing camels. Horses are comparatively rare; they are a small but sturdy breed. Sheep and goats are numerous. The ostrich, common in the eastern steppes, is bred by various Arab tribes, its feathers forming a valuable article of trade.
_Inhabitants._--The population of Darfur consists of negroes and Arabs. The negro _For_, forming quite half the inhabitants, occupy the central highlands and part of the Dar Dima and Dar Uma districts; they speak a special language, and are subdivided into numerous tribes, of which the most influential are the Masabat, the Kunjara and the Kera. They are of middle height, and have rather irregular features. The _For_ are described as clean and industrious, somewhat fanatical, but generally amenable to civilization, and freedom-loving. The _Massalit_ are a negro tribe which, breaking off from the For some centuries back, have now much Arab blood, and speak Arabic; while the _Tunjur_ are an Arab tribe which must have arrived in the Sudan at a very early date, as they have incorporated a large For element, and no longer profess Mahommedanism. The _Dago_ (_Tago_) formerly inhabited Jebel Marra, but they have been driven to the south and west, where they maintain a certain independence in Dar Sula, but are treated as inferiors by the For. The Zaghawa, who inhabit the northern borders, are on the contrary regarded by the For as their equals, and have all the prestige of a race that at one time made its influence felt as far as Bornu. Among other tribes may be mentioned the Berti and Takruri, the Birgirid, the Beraunas, and immigrants from Wadai and Bagirmi, and Fula from west of Lake Chad. Genuine Arab tribes, e.g. the Baggara and Homr, are numerous, and they are partly nomadic and partly settled. The Arabs have not, generally speaking, mixed with the negro tribes. They are great hunters, making expeditions into the desert for five or six days at a time in search of ostriches.
Slaves, ostrich feathers, gum and ivory used to be the chief articles of trade, a caravan going annually by the Arbain ("Forty Days") road to Assiut in Egypt and taking back cloth, fire-arms and other articles. The slave trade has ceased, but feathers, gum and ivory still constitute the chief exports of the country. The principal imports are cotton goods, sugar and tea. There is also an active trade in camels and cattle.
The internal administration of the country is in the hands of the sultan, who is officially recognized as the agent of the Sudan government. The administrative system resembles that of other Mahommedan countries.
_Towns._--The capital is El-Fasher, pop. about 10,000, on the western bank of the Wadi Tendelty in an angle formed by the junction of that wadi with the Wadi-el-Kho, one of the streams which flow towards the Bahr-el-Homr. Fasher is the residence of the sultan. There are a few fine buildings, but the town consists mainly of tukls and box-shaped straw sheds. It is 500 m. W.S.W. of Khartum. Dara, a small market town, is 110 m. S. of El-Fasher. Shakka is in the S.E. of the country near the Bahr-el-Homr, and was formerly the headquarters of the slave dealers.
_History._--The Dago or Tago negroes, inhabitants of Jebel Marra, appear to have been the dominant race in Darfur in the earliest period to which the history of the country goes back. How long they ruled is uncertain, little being known of them save a list of kings. According to tradition the Tago dynasty was displaced, and Mahommedanism introduced, about the 14th century, by Tunjur Arabs, who reached Darfur by way of Bornu and Wadai. The first Tunjur king was Ahmed-el-Makur, who married the daughter of the last Tago monarch. Ahmed reduced many unruly chiefs to submission, and under him the country prospered. His great-grandson, the sultan Dali, a celebrated figure in Darfur histories, was on his mother's side a For, and thus was effected a union between the negro and Arab races. Dali divided the country into provinces, and established a penal code, which, under the title of _Kitab Dali_ or Dali's Book, is still preserved, and shows principles essentially different from those of the Koran. His grandson Soleiman (usually distinguished by the Forian epithet _Solon_, the Arab or the Red) reigned from 1596 to 1637, and was a great warrior and a devoted Mahommedan. Soleiman's grandson, Ahmed Bahr (1682-1722), made Islam the religion of the state, and increased the prosperity of the country by encouraging immigration from Bornu and Bagirmi. His rule extended east of the Nile as far as the banks of the Atbara. Under succeeding monarchs the country, involved in wars with Sennar and Wadai, declined in importance. Towards the end of the 18th century a sultan named Mahommed Terab led an army against the Funj, but got no further than Omdurman. Here he was stopped by the Nile, and found no means of getting his army across the river. Unwilling to give up his project, Terab remained at Omdurman for months. He was poisoned by his wife at the instigation of disaffected chiefs, and the army returned to Darfur. The next monarch was Abd-er-Rahman, surnamed el-Raschid or the Just. It was during his reign that Napoleon Bonaparte was campaigning in Egypt; and in 1799 Abd-er-Rahman wrote to congratulate the French general on his defeat of the Mamelukes. To this Bonaparte replied by asking the sultan to send him by the next caravan 2000 black slaves upwards of sixteen years old, strong and vigorous. To Abd-er-Rahman likewise is due the present situation of the _Fasher_, or royal township. The capital had formerly been at a place called Kobbe. Mahommed-el-Fadhl, his son, was for some time under the control of an energetic eunuch, Mahommed Kurra, but he ultimately made himself independent, and his reign lasted till 1839, when he died of leprosy. He devoted himself largely to the subjection of the semi-independent Arab tribes who lived in the country, notably the Rizighat, thousands of whom he slew. In 1821 he lost the province of Kordofan, which in that year was conquered by the Egyptians. Of his forty sons, the third, Mahommed Hassin, was appointed his successor. Hassin is described as a religious but avaricious man. In the later part of his reign he became involved in trouble with the Arab slave raiders who had seized the Bahr-el-Ghazal, looked upon by the Darfurians as their especial "slave preserve." The negroes of Bahr-el-Ghazal paid tribute of ivory and slaves to Darfur, and these were the chief articles of merchandise sold by the Darfurians to the Egyptian traders along the Arbain road to Assiut. The loss of the Bahr-el-Ghazal caused therefore much annoyance to the people of Darfur. Hassin died in 1873, blind and advanced in years, and the succession passed to his youngest son Ibrahim, who soon found himself engaged in a conflict with Zobeir (q.v.), the chief of the Bahr-el-Ghazal slave traders, and with an Egyptian force from Khartum. The war resulted in the destruction of the kingdom. Ibrahim was slain in battle in the autumn of 1874, and his uncle Hassab Alla, who sought to maintain the independence of his country, was captured in 1875 by the troops of the khedive, and removed to Cairo with his family. The Darfurians were restive under Egyptian rule. Various revolts were suppressed, but in 1879 General Gordon (then governor-general of the Sudan) suggested the reinstatement of the ancient royal family. This was not done, and in 1881 Slatin Bey (Sir Rudolf von Slatin) was made governor of the province. Slatin defended the province against the forces of the Mahdi, who were led by a Rizighat sheik named Madibbo, but was obliged to surrender (December 1883), and Darfur was incorporated in the Mahdi's dominions. The Darfurians found Dervish rule as irksome as that of the Egyptians had been, and a state of almost constant warfare ended in the gradual retirement of the Dervishes from Darfur. Following the overthrow of the khalifa at Omdurman in 1898 the new (Anglo-Egyptian) Sudan government recognized (1899) Ali Dinar, a grandson of Mahommed-el-Fadhl, as sultan of Darfur, on the payment by that chief of an annual tribute of L500. Under Ali Dinar, who during the _Mahdia_ had been kept a prisoner in Omdurman, Darfur enjoyed a period of peace.
The first European traveller known to have visited Darfur was William George Browne (q.v.), who spent two years (1793-1795) at Kobbe. Sheik Mahommed-el-Tounsi travelled in 1803 through various regions of Africa, including Darfur, in search of Omar, his father, and afterwards gave to the world an account of his wanderings, which was translated into French in 1845 by M. Perron. Gustav Nachtigal in 1873 spent some months in Darfur, and since that time the country has become well known through the journeys of Gordon, Slatin and others.
AUTHORITIES.--Browne's account of Darfur will be found in his _Travels in Africa, Egypt and Syria_ (London, 1799); Nachtigal's _Sahara und Sudan_ gives the results of that traveller's observations. The first ten chapters of Slatin Pasha's book _Fire and Sword in the Sudan_ (English edition, London, 1896) contain much information concerning the country, its history, and a full account of the overthrow of Egyptian authority by the Mahdi. See also _The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan_ (London, 1905), edited by Count Gleichen, and the bibliography given under SUDAN.
DARGAI, the name of a mountain peak and a frontier station in the north-west Frontier Province of India. The mountain peak is situated on the Samana Range, and the Kohat border, and is famous for the stand made there by the Afridis and Orakzais in the Tirah Campaign. (See TIRAH CAMPAIGN.) Dargai station is situated on the Peshawar border, and is the terminus of the frontier railway running from Nowshera to the Malakand Pass.
DARGOMIJSKY, ALEXANDER SERGEIVICH (1813-1869), Russian composer, was born in 1813, and educated in St Petersburg. He was already known as a talented musical amateur when in 1833 he met Glinka and was encouraged to devote himself to composition. His light opera _Esmeralda_ was written in 1839, and his _Roussalka_ was performed in 1856, but he had but small success or recognition either at home or abroad, except in Belgium, till the 'sixties, when he became one of Balakirev's circle. His opera _The Stone Guest_ then became famous among the progressive Russian school, though it was not performed till 1872. Dargomijsky died in January 1869. His compositions include a number of songs, and some orchestral pieces.
DARIAL, a gorge in the Caucasus, at the east foot of Mt. Kasbek, pierced by the river Terek for a distance of 8 m. between vertical walls of rock (5900 ft.). It is mentioned in the Georgian annals under the names of Ralani, Dargani, Darialani; the Persians and Arabs knew it as the Gate of the Alans; Strabo calls it _Porta Caucasica_ and _Porta Cumana_; Ptolemy, _Porta Sarmatica_; it was sometimes known as _Portae Caspiae_ (a name bestowed also on the "gate" or pass beside the Caspian at Derbent); and the Tatars call it _Darioly_. Being the only available passage across the Caucasus, it has been fortified since a remote period--at least since 150 B.C. In Russian poetry it has been immortalized by Lermontov. The present Russian fort, Darial, which guards this section of the Georgian military road, is at the northern issue of the gorge, at an altitude of 4746 ft.
DARIEN, a district covering the eastern part of the isthmus joining Central and South America. It is mainly within the republic of Panama, and gives its name to a gulf of the Carribbean Sea. Darien is of great interest in the history of geographical discovery. It was reconnoitred in the first year of the 16th century by Rodrigo Bastidas of Seville; and the first settlement was Santa Maria la Antigua, situated on the small Darien river, north-west of the mouth of the Atrato. In 1513 Vasco Nunez de Balboa stood "silent upon a peak in Darien,"[1] and saw the Pacific at his feet stretching inland in the Gulf of San Miguel; and for long this narrow neck of land seemed alternately to proffer and refuse a means of transit between the two oceans. The first serious attempt to turn the isthmus to permanent account as a trade route dates from the beginning of the 18th century, and forms an interesting chapter in Scottish history. In 1695 an act was passed by the Scottish parliament giving extensive powers to a company trading to Africa and the Indies; and this company, under the advice of one of the most remarkable economists of the period, William Paterson (q.v.), determined to establish a colony on the isthmus of Darien as a general emporium for the commerce of all the nations of the world. Regarded with disfavour both in England and Holland, the project was taken up in Scotland with the enthusiasm of national rivalry towards England, and the "subscriptions sucked up all the money in the country." On the 26th of July 1698 the pioneers set sail from Leith amid the cheers of an almost envious multitude; and on the 4th of November, with the loss of only fifteen out of 1200 men, they arrived at Darien, and took up their quarters in a well-defended spot, with a good harbour and excellent outlook. The country they named New Caledonia, and two sites selected for future cities were designated respectively New Edinburgh and New St Andrews. At first all seemed to go well; but by and by lack of provisions, sickness and anarchy reduced the settlers to the most miserable plight; and in June 1699 they re-embarked in three vessels, a weak and hopeless company, to sail whithersoever Providence might direct. Meanwhile a supplementary expedition had been prepared in Scotland; two vessels were despatched in May, and four others followed in August. But this venture proved even more unfortunate than the former. The colonists arrived broken in health; their spirits were crushed by the fate of their predecessors, and embittered by the harsh fanaticism of the four ministers whom the general assembly of the Church of Scotland had sent out to establish a regular presbyterial organization. The last addition to the settlement was the company of Captain Alexander Campbell of Fonab, who arrived only to learn that a Spanish force of 1500 or 1600 men lay encamped at Tubacanti, on the river Santa Maria, waiting for the appearance of a Spanish squadron in order to make a combined attack on the fort. Captain Campbell, on the second day after his arrival, marched with 200 men across the isthmus to Tubacanti, stormed the camp in the night-time, and dispersed the Spanish force. On his return to the fort on the fifth day he found it besieged by the Spaniards from the men-of-war; and, after a vain attempt to maintain its defence, he succeeded with a few companions in making his escape in a small vessel. A capitulation followed, and the Darien colony was no more. Of those who had taken part in the enterprise only a miserable handful ever reached their native land.
See J. H. Burton, _The Darien Papers_ (Bannatyne Club, 1849); Macaulay, _History of England_ (London, 1866); and A. Lang, _History of Scotland_, vol. iv. (Edinburgh, 1907).
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Keats, in his famous sonnet beginning:--"Much have I travelled in the realms of gold," of which this is the concluding line, inaccurately substitutes Cortez for Balboa.
DARIUS (Pers. _Darayavaush_; Old Test. _Daryavesh_), the name of three Persian kings.
1. DARIUS THE GREAT, the son of Hystaspes (q.v.). The principal source for his history is his own inscriptions, especially the great inscription of Behistun (q.v.), in which he relates how he gained the crown and put down the rebellions. In modern times his veracity has often been doubted, but without any sufficient reason; the whole tenor of his words shows that we can rely upon his account. The accounts given by Herodotus and Ctesias of his accession are in many points evidently dependent on this official version, with many legendary stories interwoven, e.g. that Darius and his allies left the question as to which of them should become king to the decision of their horses, and that Darius won the crown by a trick of his groom.
Darius belonged to a younger branch of the royal family of the Achaemenidae. When, after the suicide of Cambyses (March 521), the usurper Gaumata ruled undisturbed over the whole empire under the name of Bardiya (Smerdis), son of Cyrus, and no one dared to gainsay him, Darius, "with the help of Ahura-mazda," attempted to regain the kingdom for the royal race. His father Hystaspes was still alive, but evidently had not the courage to urge his claims. Assisted by six noble Persians, whose names he proclaims at the end of the Behistun inscription, he surprised and killed the usurper in a Median fortress (October 521; for the chronology of these times cf. E. Meyer, _Forschungen zur alten Geschichte_, ii. 472 ff.), and gained the crown. But this sudden change was the signal for an attempt on the part of all the eastern provinces to regain their independence. In Susiana, Babylon, Media, Sagartia, Margiana, usurpers arose, pretending to be of the old royal race, and gathered large armies around them; in Persia itself Vahyazdata imitated the example of Gaumata and was acknowledged by the majority of the people as the true Bardiya. Darius with only a small army of Persians and Medes and some trustworthy generals overcame all difficulties, and in 520 and 519 all the rebellions were put down (Babylon rebelled twice, Susiana even three times), and the authority of Darius was established throughout the empire.
Darius in his inscriptions appears as a fervent believer in the true religion of Zoroaster. But he was also a great statesman and organizer. The time of conquests had come to an end; the wars which Darius undertook, like those of Augustus, only served the purpose of gaining strong natural frontiers for the empire and keeping down the barbarous tribes on its borders. Thus Darius subjugated the wild nations of the Pontic and Armenian mountains, and extended the Persian dominion to the Caucasus; for the same reasons he fought against the Sacae and other Turanian tribes. But by the organization which he gave to the empire he became the true successor of the great Cyrus. His organization of the provinces and the fixing of the tributes is described by Herodotus iii. 90 ff., evidently from good official sources. He fixed the coinage and introduced the gold coinage of the Daric (which is not named after him, as the Greeks believed, but derived from a Persian word meaning "gold"; in Middle Persian it is called _zarig_). He tried to develop the commerce of the empire, and sent an expedition down the Kabul and the Indus, led by the Carian captain Scylax of Caryanda, who explored the Indian Ocean from the mouth of the Indus to Suez. He dug a canal from the Nile to Suez, and, as the fragments of a hieroglyphic inscription found there show, his ships sailed from the Nile through the Red Sea by Saba to Persia. He had connexions with Carthage (i.e. the _Karka_ of the Nakshi Rustam inscr.), and explored the shores of Sicily and Italy. At the same time he attempted to gain the good-will of the subject nations, and for this purpose promoted the aims of their priests. He allowed the Jews to build the Temple of Jerusalem. In Egypt his name appears on the temples which he built in Memphis, Edfu and the Great Oasis. He called the high-priest of Sais, Uzahor, to Susa (as we learn from his inscription in the Vatican), and gave him full powers to reorganize the "house of life," the great medical school of the temple of Sais. In the Egyptian traditions he is considered as one of the great benefactors and lawgivers of the country (Herod. ii. 110, Diod. i. 95). In similar relations he stood to the Greek sanctuaries (cf. his rescript to "his slave" Godatas, the inspector of a royal park near Magnesia, on the Maeander, in which he grants freedom of taxes and forced labour to the sacred territory of Apollo. See Cousin and Deschamps, _Bulletin de corresp. hellen._, xiii. (1889), 529, and Dittenberger, _Sylloge inscr. graec._, 2); all the Greek oracles in Asia Minor and Europe therefore stood on the side of Persia in the Persian wars and admonished the Greeks to attempt no resistance.
About 512 Darius undertook a war against the Scythians. A great army crossed the Bosporus, subjugated eastern Thrace, and crossed the Danube. The purpose of this war can only have been to attack the nomadic Turanian tribes in the rear and thus to secure peace on the northern frontier of the empire. It was based upon a wrong geographical conception; even Alexander and his Macedonians believed that on the Hindu Kush (which they called Caucasus) and on the shores of the Jaxartes (which they called Tanais, i.e. Don) they were quite near to the Black Sea. Of course the expedition undertaken on these grounds could not but prove a failure; having advanced for some weeks into the Russian steppes, Darius was forced to return. The details given by Herodotus (according to him Darius had reached the Volga!) are quite fantastical; and the account which Darius himself had given on a tablet, which was added to his great inscription in Behistun, is destroyed with the exception of a few words. (See R. W. Macan, _Herodotus_, vol. ii. appendix 3; G. B. Grundy, _Great Persian War_, pp. 48-64; J. B. Bury in _Classical Review_, July 1897.)
Although European Greece was intimately connected with the coasts of Asia Minor, and the opposing parties in the Greek towns were continually soliciting his intervention, Darius did not meddle with their affairs. The Persian wars were begun by the Greeks themselves. The support which Athens and Eretria gave to the rebellious Ionians and Carians made their punishment inevitable as soon as the rebellion had been put down. But the first expedition, that of Mardonius, failed on the cliffs of Mt. Athos (492), and the army which was led into Attica by Datis in 490 was beaten at Marathon. Before Darius had finished his preparations for a third expedition an insurrection broke out in Egypt (486). In the next year Darius died, probably in October 485, after a reign of thirty-six years. He is one of the greatest rulers the east has produced.
2. DARIUS II., OCHUS. Artaxerxes I., who died in the beginning of 424, was followed by his son Xerxes II. But after a month and a half he was murdered by his brother Secydianus, or Sogdianus (the form of the name is uncertain). Against him rose a bastard brother, Ochus, satrap of Hyrcania, and after a short fight killed him, and suppressed by treachery the attempt of his own brother Arsites to imitate his example (Ctesias _ap._ Phot. 44; Diod. xii. 71, 108; Pausan. vi. 5, 7). Ochus adopted the name Darius (in the chronicles called _Nothos_, the bastard). Neither Xerxes II. nor Secydianus occurs in the dates of the numerous Babylonian tablets from Nippur; here the dates of Darius II. follow immediately on those of Artaxerxes I. Of Darius II.'s reign we know very little (a rebellion of the Medes in 409 is mentioned in Xenophon, _Hellen._ i. 2. 19), except that he was quite dependent on his wife Parysatis. In the excerpts from Ctesias some harem intrigues are recorded, in which he played a disreputable part. As long as the power of Athens remained intact he did not meddle in Greek affairs; even the support which the Athenians in 413 gave to the rebel Amorges in Caria would not have roused him (Andoc. iii. 29; Thuc. viii. 28, 54; Ctesias wrongly names his father Pissuthnes in his stead; an account of these wars is contained in the great Lycian stele from Xanthus in the British Museum), had not the Athenian power broken down in the same year before Syracuse. He gave orders to his satraps in Asia Minor, Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus, to send in the overdue tribute of the Greek towns, and to begin war with Athens; for this purpose they entered into an alliance with Sparta. In 408 he sent his son Cyrus to Asia Minor, to carry on the war with greater energy. In 404 he died after a reign of nineteen years, and was followed by Artaxerxes II.
3. DARIUS III., CODOMANNUS. The eunuch Bagoas (q.v.), having murdered Artaxerxes III. in 338 and his son Arses in 336, raised to the throne a distant relative of the royal house, whose name, according to Justin x. 3, was Codomannus, and who had excelled in a war against the Cadusians (cf. Diod. xvii. 5 ff., where his father is called Arsames, son of Ostanes, a brother of Artaxerxes). The new king, who adopted the name of Darius, took warning by the fate of his predecessors, and saved himself from it by forcing Bagoas to drink the cup himself. Already in 336 Philip II. of Macedon had sent an army into Asia Minor, and in the spring of 334 the campaign of Alexander began. In the following year Darius himself took the field against the Macedonian king, but was beaten at Issus and in 331 at Arbela. In his flight to the east he was deposed and killed by Bessus (July 330).
The name Darius was also borne by many later dynasts of Persian origin, among them kings of Persis (q.v.), Darius of Media Atropatene who was defeated by Pompeius, and Darius, king of Pontus in the time of Antony. (Ed. M.)
DARJEELING, a hill station and district of British India, in the Bhagalpur division of Bengal. The sanatorium is situated 367 m. by rail north of Calcutta. In 1901 it had a population of 16,924. It is the summer quarters of the Bengal government and has a most agreeable climate, which neither exceeds 80 deg. F. in summer, nor falls below 30 deg. in winter. The great attraction of Darjeeling is its scenery, which is unspeakably grand. The view across the hills to Kinchinjunga discloses a glittering white wall of perpetual snow, surrounded by towering masses of granite. There are several schools of considerable size for European boys and girls, and a government boarding school at Kurseong. The buildings and the roads suffered severely from the earthquake of the 12th of June 1897. But a more terrible disaster occurred in October 1899, when a series of landslips carried away houses and broke up the hill railway. The total value of the property destroyed was returned at L160,000.
The district of Darjeeling comprises an area of 1164 sq. m. It consists of two well-defined tracts, _viz._ the lower Himalayas to the south of Sikkim, and the _tarai_, or plains, which extend from the south of these ranges as far as the northern borders of Purnea district. The plains from which the hills take their rise are only 300 ft. above sea-level; the mountains ascend abruptly in spurs of 6000 to 10,000 ft. in height. The scenery throughout the hills is picturesque, and in many parts magnificent. The two highest mountains in the world, Kinchinjunga in Sikkim (28,156 ft.) and Everest in Nepal (29,002 ft.), are visible from the town of Darjeeling. The principal peaks within the district are--Phalut (11,811 ft.), Subargum (11,636), Tanglu (10,084), Situng and Sinchal Pahai (8163). The chief rivers are the Tista, Great and Little Ranjit, Ramman, Mahananda, Balasan and Jaldhaka. None of them is navigable in the mountain valleys; but the Tista, after it debouches on the plains, can be navigated by cargo boats of considerable burthen. Bears, leopards and musk deer are found on the higher mountains, deer on the lower ranges, and a few elephants and tigers on the slopes nearest to the plains. In the lowlands, tigers, rhinoceroses, deer and wild hogs are abundant. A few wolves are also found. Of small game, hares, jungle fowl, peacocks, partridges, snipe, woodcock, wild ducks and geese, and green pigeons are numerous in the _tarai_, and jungle fowl and pheasants in the hills. The mahseer fish is found in the Tista.
In 1901 the population was 249,117, showing an increase of 12% since 1891, compared with an increase of 43% in the previous decade. The inhabitants of the hilly tract consist to a large extent of Nepali immigrants and of aboriginal highland races; in the _tarai_ the people are chiefly Hindus and Mahommedans. The Lepchas are considered to be the aboriginal inhabitants of the hilly portion of the district. They are a fine, frank race, naturally open-hearted and free-handed, fond of change and given to an out-door life; but they do not seem to improve on being brought into contact with civilization. It is thought that they are now being gradually driven out of the district, owing to the increase of regular cultivation, and to the government conservation of the forests. They have no word for plough in their language, and they still follow the nomadic form of tillage known as _jum_ cultivation. This consists in selecting a spot of virgin soil, clearing it of forest and jungle by burning, and scraping the surface with the rudest agricultural implements. The productive powers of the land become exhausted in a few years, when the clearing is abandoned, a new site is chosen, and the same operations are carried on _de novo_. The Lepchas are also the ordinary out-door labourers on the hills. They have no caste distinctions but speak of themselves as belonging to one of nine septs or clans, who all eat together and intermarry with each other. In the upper or northern _tarai_, along the base of the hills, the Mechs form the principal ethnical feature. This tribe inhabits the deadly jungle with impunity, and cultivates cotton, rice and other ordinary crops, by the _jum_ process described above. The cultivation of tea was introduced in 1856, and is now a large industry. Cinchona cultivation was introduced by the government in 1862, and has since been taken up by private enterprise. There is a coal mine at Daling. The Darjeeling Himalayan railway of 2 ft. gauge, opened in 1880, runs for 50 m. from Siliguri in the plains on the Eastern Bengal line.
The British connexion with Darjeeling dates from 1816, when, at the close of the war with Nepali, the British made over to the Sikkim raja the _tarai_ tract, which had been wrested from him and annexed by Nepal. In 1835 the nucleus of the present district of British Sikkim or Darjeeling was created by a cession of a portion of the hills by the raja of Sikkim to the British as a sanatorium. A military expedition against Sikkim, rendered necessary in 1850 by the imprisonment of Dr A. Campbell, the superintendent of Darjeeling, and Sir Joseph Hooker, resulted in the stoppage of the allowance granted to the raja for the cession of the hill station of Darjeeling, and in the annexation of the Sikkim _tarai_ at the foot of the hills and of a portion of the hills beyond. In August 1866 the hill territory east of the Tista, acquired as the result of the Bhutan campaign of 1864, was added to the jurisdiction of Darjeeling.
DARLEY, GEORGE (1795-1846), Irish poet, was born in Dublin in 1795. His parents, who were gentle folks of independent means, emigrated to America, leaving the boy in charge of his grandfather at Springfield, Co. Dublin. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, graduating in 1820; but an unfortunate stammer prevented him from going into the church or to the bar, and he established himself in London, where he published his first volume of poems, the _Errors of Ecstasie_, in 1822, and became a regular contributor to _The London Magazine_. He was intimate with Cary, the translator of Dante, and with Charles Lamb. In 1826 he published under the name of "Grey Penseval" a volume of prose tales and sketches, _Labour in Idleness_ (1826), one of which, "The Enchanted Lyre," is plainly autobiographical. _Sylvia, or the May Queen_ (1827, reprint 1892), a fairy opera, met with no success, but about 1830 he became dramatic and art critic to the _Athenaeum_. His other works are: _Nepenthe_ (1835, reprint 1897), his most considerable poem; introduction to the works of Beaumont and Fletcher (1840); with two plays, _Thomas a Becket_ (1840), and _Ethelstan_ (1841). He died in London on the 23rd of November 1846.
_Selections from the Poems of George Darley_, with an introduction by R. A. Streatfield, appeared in 1904. See also the edition by Ramsay Colles in the "Muses' Library" (1906).
DARLING, GRACE HORSLEY (1815-1842), British heroine, was born at Bamborough, Northumberland, on the 24th of November 1815. Her father, William Darling, was the keeper of the Longstone (Farne Islands) lighthouse. On the morning of the 7th of September 1838, the "Forfarshire," bound from Hull to Dundee, with sixty-three persons on board, struck on the Farne Islands, forty-three being drowned. The wreck was observed from the lighthouse, and Darling and his daughter determined to try and reach the survivors. They recognized that though they might be able to get to the wreck, they would be unable to return without the assistance of the shipwrecked crew, but they took this risk without hesitation. By a combination of daring, strength and skill, the father and daughter reached the wreck in their coble and brought back four men and a woman to the lighthouse. Darling and two of the rescued men then returned to the wreck and brought off the four remaining survivors. This gallant exploit made Grace Darling and her father famous. The Humane Society at once voted them its gold medal, the treasury made a grant, and a public subscription was organized. Grace Darling, who had always been delicate, died of consumption on the 20th of October 1842.
See _Grace Darling, her true story_ (London, 1880).
DARLING, a river of Australia. It rises in Queensland and flows into New South Wales, forming for a considerable distance the boundary of the two colonies; in its upper reaches it is known as the Barwon, but from Bourke to its junction on the Victorian border with the river Murray, it is called the Darling. Its length is 1160 m., and with its affluents it drains an area of about 200,000 sq. m. During the dry season its course is marked by a series of shallow pools, but during the winter, when it is subject to sudden floods, it is navigable as far as Bourke for steamers of light draft. Excepting a narrow strip on the banks of the river, the country through which it passes is, for the most part, an arid plain.
DARLINGTON, a market town and municipal and parliamentary borough of Durham, England, 232 m. N. by W. of London, on the North-Eastern railway. Pop. (1891) 38,060; (1901) 44,511. It lies in a slightly undulating plain on the small river Skerne, a tributary of the Tees, not far from the main river. Its appearance is almost wholly modern, but there is a fine old parish church dedicated to St Cuthbert. It is cruciform, and in style mainly transitional Norman. It has a central tower surmounted by a spire of the 14th century, which necessitated the building of a massive stone screen across the chancel arch to support the piers. Traces of an earlier church were discovered in the course of restoration. Educational establishments include an Elizabethan grammar school, a training college for school-mistresses (British and Foreign School Society), and a technical school. There is a park of forty-four acres. The industries of Darlington are large and varied. They include worsted spinning mills; collieries, ironstone mines, quarries and brickworks; the manufacture of iron and steel, both in the rough and in the form of finished articles, as locomotives, bridge castings, ships' engines, gun castings and shells, &c. The parliamentary borough returns one member. The town was incorporated in 1867, and the corporation consists of a mayor, six aldermen and eighteen councillors. Area, 3956 acres.
Not long after the bishop and monks of Lindisfarne had settled at Durham in 995, Styr the son of Ulf gave them the vill of Darlington (Dearthington, Darnington), which by 1083 had grown into importance, probably owing to its situation on the road from Watling Street to the mouth of the Tees. Bishop William of St Carileph in that year changed the church to a collegiate church, and placed there certain canons whom he removed from Durham. Bishop Hugh de Puiset rebuilt the church and built a manor house which was for many years the occasional residence of the bishops of Durham. Boldon Book, dated 1183, contains the first mention of Darlington as a borough, rated at L5, while half a mark was due from the dyers of cloth. The next account of the town is in Bishop Hatfield's Survey (c. 1380), which states that "Ingelram Gentill and his partners hold the borough of Derlyngton with the profits of the mills and dye houses and other profits pertaining to the borough rendering yearly four score and thirteen pounds and six shillings." Darlington possesses no early charter, but claimed its privileges as a borough by a prescriptive right. Until the 19th century it was governed by a bailiff appointed by the bishop. The mention of dyers in the Boldon Book and Hatfield's Survey probably indicates the existence of woollen manufacture. Before the 19th century Darlington was noted for the manufacture of linen, worsted and flax, but it owes its modern importance to the opening of the railway between Darlington and Stockton on the 27th of September 1825. "Locomotive No. 1," the first that ever ran on a public railway, stands in Bank Top station, a remarkable relic of the enterprise. As part of the palatinate of Durham, Darlington sent no members to parliament until 1862, when it was allowed to return one member. The fairs and markets in Darlington were formerly held by the bishop and were in existence as early as the 11th century. According to Leland, Darlington was in his time the best market town in the bishopric with the exception of Durham. In 1664 the bishop, finding that the inhabitants of the town had set up a market "in the season of the year unaccustomed," i.e. from the fortnight before Christmas to Whit Monday, prohibited them from continuing it. The markets and fairs were finally in 1854 purchased by the local authority, and now belong to the corporation.
DARLINGTONIA (called after William Darlington, an American botanist), a Californian pitcher-plant, belonging to the order Sarraceniaceae. There is only one species, _D. californica_, which is found at 5000 ft. altitude on the Sierra Nevadas of California, growing in sphagnum-bogs along with sundews and rushes. The pitcher-like leaves form a cluster, and are 1 to 2 ft. high, slender, erect, and end in a rounded hooded top, from which hangs a blade shaped like a fish-tail which guards the entrance to the pitcher. Insects are attracted to the leaves by the bright colouring, especially of the upper part; entering they pass down the narrow funnel guided by downward pointing hairs which also prevent their ascent. They form a putrefying mass in the bottom of the pitcher, and the products of their decomposition are presumably absorbed by the leaf for food.
DARLY, MATTHIAS, 18th-century English caricaturist, designer and engraver. This extremely versatile artist not only issued political caricatures, but designed ceilings, chimney-pieces, mirror frames, girandoles, decorative panels and other mobiliary accessories, made many engravings for Thomas Chippendale, and sold his own productions over the counter. He was apparently an architect by profession. The first publication which can be attributed to him with certainty is a coloured caricature, "The Cricket Players of Europe" (1741). In 1754 he issued _A new Book of Chinese Designs_, which was intended to minister to the passing craze for furniture and household decorations in the Chinese style. It was in this year that he engraved many of the plates for the _Director_ of Thomas Chippendale. He published from many addresses, most of them in the Strand or its immediate neighbourhood, and his shop was for a long period perhaps the most important of its kind in London. In his book _Nollekens and his Times_, J. T. Smith, writing of Richard Cosway, says:--"So ridiculously foppish did he become that Matth. Darly, the famous caricature print seller, introduced an etching of him in his window in the Strand as the 'Macaroni Miniature Painter.'" Darly was for many years in partnership with a man named Edwards, and together they published many political prints, which were originally issued separately and collected annually into volumes under the title of _Political and Satirical History_. Darly was a member both of the Incorporated Society of Artists and the Free Society of Artists, forerunners of the Royal Academy, and to their exhibitions he contributed many architectural drawings, together with a profile etching of himself (1775). Upon one of these etchings, published from 39 Strand, he is described as "Professor of Ornament to the Academy of Great Britain." Darly's most important publication was _The Ornamental Architect or Young Artists' Instructor_ (1770-1771), a title which was changed in the edition of 1773 to _A Compleat Body of Architecture, embellished with a great Variety of Ornaments_. He also issued _Sixty Vases by English, French and Italian Masters_ (1767). In addition to his immense mass of other productions Darly executed many book plates, illustrated various books and cabinet-makers' catalogues, and gave lessons in etching. His skill as a caricaturist brought him into close personal relations with the politicians of his time, and in 1763 he was instrumental in saving John Wilkes, whose partisan he was, from death at the hands of James Dunn, who had determined to kill him. Darly, who described himself as "Liveryman and block maker," issued his last caricature in October 1780, and as his shop, No. 39 Strand, was let to a new tenant in the following year, it is to be presumed that he had by that time died, or become incapable of further work. As a designer of furniture Darly travelled in a dozen years or so from the extremes of pseudo-Chinese affectation to classical severity of the type popularized by the brothers Adam.
DARMESTETER, JAMES (1849-1894), French author and antiquarian, was born of Jewish parents on the 28th of March 1849 at Chateau Salins, in Alsace. The family name had originated in their earlier home of Darmstadt. He was educated in Paris, where, under the guidance of Michel Breal and Abel Bergaigne, he imbibed a love for Oriental studies, to which for a time he entirely devoted himself. He was a man of vast intellectual range. In 1875 he published a thesis on the mythology of the _Zend Avesta_, and in 1877 became teacher of Zend at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes. He followed up his researches with his _Etudes iraniennes_ (1883), and ten years later published a complete translation of the _Zend Avesta_, with historical and philological commentary (3 vols., 1892-1893), in the _Annales du musee Guimet_. He also edited the Zend Avesta for Max Muller's _Sacred Books of the East_. Darmesteter regarded the extant texts as far more recent than was commonly believed, placing the earliest in the 1st century B.C., and the bulk in the 3rd century A.D. In 1885 he was appointed professor in the College de France, and was sent to India in 1886 on a mission to collect the popular songs of the Afghans, a translation of which, with a valuable essay on the Afghan language and literature, he published on his return. His impressions of English dominion in India were conveyed in _Lettres sur l'Inde_ (1888). England interested him deeply; and his attachment to the gifted English writer, A. Mary F. Robinson, whom he shortly afterwards married (and who in 1901 became the wife of Professor E. Duclaux, director of the Pasteur Institute at Paris), led him to translate her poems into French in 1888. Two years after his death a collection of excellent essays on English subjects was published in English. He also wrote _Le Mahdi depuis les origines de l'Islam jusqu'a nos jours_ (1885); _Les Origines de la poesie persane_ (1888); _Prophetes d'Israel_ (1892), and other books on topics connected with the east, and from 1883 onwards drew up the annual reports of the _Societe Asiatique_. He had just become connected with the _Revue de Paris_, when his delicate constitution succumbed to a slight attack of illness on the 19th of October 1894.
His elder brother, ARSENE DARMESTETER (1846-1888), was a distinguished philologist and man of letters. He studied under Gaston Paris at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes, and became professor of Old French language and literature at the Sorbonne. His _Life of Words_ appeared in English in 1888. He also collaborated with Adolphe Hatzfeld in a _Dictionnaire general de la langue francaise_ (2 vols., 1895-1900). Among his most important work was the elucidation of Old French by means of the many glosses in the medieval writings of Rashi and other French Jews. His scattered papers on romance and Jewish philology were collected by James Darmesteter as _Arsene Darmesteter, reliques scientifiques_ (2 vols., 1890). His valuable _Cours de grammaire historique de la langue francaise_ was edited after his death by E. Muret and L. Sudre (1891-1895; English edition, 1902).
There is an _eloge_ of James Darmesteter in the _Journal asiatique_ (1894, vol. iv. pp. 519-534), and a notice by Henri Cordier, with a list of his writings, in _The Royal Asiatic Society's Journal_ (January 1895); see also Gaston Paris, "James Darmesteter," in _Penseurs et poetes_ (1896, pp. 1-61).
DARMSTADT, a city of Germany, capital of the grand-duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt, on a plain gently sloping from the Odenwald to the Rhine, 21 m. by rail S.E. from Mainz and 17 m. S. from Frankfort-on-Main. Pop. (1905) 83,000. It is the residence of the grand-duke and the seat of government of the duchy. Darmstadt consists of an old and a new town, the streets of the former being narrow and gloomy and presenting no attractive features. The new town, however, which includes the greater part of the city, contains broad streets and several fine squares. Among the latter is the stately Luisenplatz, on which are the house of parliament, the old palace and the post office, and in the centre of which is a column surmounted by the statue of the grand-duke Louis I., the founder of the new town. The square is crossed by the Rhein-strasse, the most important thoroughfare in the city, leading directly from the railway station to the ducal palace. This last, a complex of buildings, dating from various centuries, but possessing few points of special interest, is surrounded by grounds occupying the site of the old moat. Opposite to it, on the north side, and adjoining the pretty palace gardens, are the court theatre and the armoury, and a little farther west the handsome buildings of the new museum, erected in 1905 and containing the valuable scientific and art collections of the state, which were formerly housed in the palace: a library of 600,000 volumes and 4000 MSS., a museum of Egyptian and German antiquities, a picture gallery with masterpieces of old German and Dutch schools, a natural history collection and the state archives. To the right of the entrance to the palace gardens is the tomb of the "great landgravine," Caroline Henrietta, wife of the landgrave Louis IX., surmounted by a marble urn, the gift of Frederick the Great of Prussia, bearing the inscription _femina sexu, ingenio vir_. To the south of the castle lies the old town, with the market square, the town hall (lately restored and enlarged) and the town church. Of the eight churches (seven Evangelical) only the Roman Catholic is in any way imposing. There are two synagogues. The town possesses a technical high school, having (since 1900) power to confer the degree of doctor of engineering, and attended by about 2000 students, two gymnasia, a school of agriculture, an artisans' school and a botanical garden. The chemist, Justus von Liebig, was born in Darmstadt in 1803. Among the chief manufactures are the production of machinery, carpets, playing cards, chemicals, tobacco, hats, wine and beer.
The surroundings of Darmstadt are attractive and contain many features of interest. To the east of the town lies the Mathildenhohe, formerly a park and now converted into villa residences. Here are the Alice hospital and the pretty Russian church, built (1898-1899) by the emperor Nicholas II. of Russia in memory of the empress Maria, wife of Alexander II. In the vicinity is the Rosenhohe, with the mausoleum of the ducal house, with the tomb of the grand-duchess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England.
Darmstadt is mentioned in the 11th century, but in the 14th century it was still a village, held by the counts of Katzenelnbogen. It came by marriage into the possession of the house of Hesse in 1479, the male line of the house of Katzenelnbogen having in that year become extinct. The imperial army took it in the Schmalkaldic War, and destroyed the old castle. In 1567, after the death of Philip the Magnanimous, his youngest son George received Darmstadt and chose it as his residence. He was the founder of the line of Hesse-Darmstadt. Its most brilliant days were those of the reign of Louis X. (1790-1830), the first grand-duke, under whom the new town was built.
See Walther, _Darmstadt wie es war und wie es geworden_ (Darms. 1865); and Zernin und Worner, _Darmstadt und seine Umgebung_ (Zurich, 1890).
DARNLEY, HENRY STEWART or STUART, LORD (1545-1567), earl of Ross and duke of Albany, second husband of Mary, queen of Scots, was the eldest son of Matthew Stewart, earl of Lennox (1516-1571), and through his mother Lady Margaret Douglas (1515-1578) was a great-grandson of the English king Henry VII. Born at Temple Newsam in Yorkshire on the 7th of December 1545, he was educated in England, and his lack of intellectual ability was compensated for by exceptional skill in military exercises. After the death of Francis II. of France in 1560 Darnley was sent into that country by his mother, who hoped that he would become king of England on Elizabeth's death, and who already entertained the idea of his marriage with Mary, queen of Scots, the widow of Francis, as a means to this end. Consequently in 1561 both Lady Margaret and her son, who were English subjects, were imprisoned by Elizabeth; but they were soon released, and Darnley spent some time at the English court before proceeding to Scotland in February 1565. The marriage of Mary and Darnley was now a question of practical politics, and the queen, having nursed her new suitor through an attack of measles, soon made up her mind to wed him, saying he "was the properest and best proportioned long man that ever she had seen." The attitude of Elizabeth towards this marriage is difficult to understand. She had permitted Darnley to journey to Scotland, and it has been asserted that she entangled Mary into this union; but on the other hand she and her council declared their dislike of the proposed marriage, and ordered Darnley and his father to repair to London, a command which was disobeyed. In March 1565 there were rumours that the marriage had already taken place, but it was actually celebrated at Holyrood on the 29th of July 1565.
Although Mary had doubtless a short infatuation for Darnley, the union was mainly due to political motives, and in view of the characters of bride and bridegroom it is not surprising that trouble soon arose between them. Contrary to his expectations Darnley did not receive the crown matrimonial, and his foolish and haughty behaviour, his vicious habits, and his boisterous companions did not improve matters. He was on bad terms with the regent Murray and other powerful nobles, who disliked the marriage and were intriguing with Elizabeth. Scotland was filled with rumours of plot and assassination, and civil war was only narrowly avoided. Unable to take any serious part in affairs of state, Darnley soon became estranged from his wife. He believed that Mary's relations with David Rizzio injured him as a husband, and was easily persuaded to assent to the murder of the Italian, a crime in which he took part. Immediately afterwards, however, flattered and cajoled by the queen, he betrayed his associates to her, and assisted her to escape from Holyrood to Dunbar. Owing to these revelations he was deserted and distrusted by his companions in the murder, and soon lost the queen's favour. In these circumstances he decided to leave Scotland, but a variety of causes prevented his departure; and meanwhile at Craigmillar a band of nobles undertook to free Mary from her husband, who refused to be present at the baptism of his son, James, at Stirling in December 1566. The details of the conspiracy at Craigmillar are not clear, nor is it certain what part, if any, Mary took in these proceedings. The first intention may have been to obtain a divorce for the queen, but it was soon decided that Darnley must be killed. Rumours of the plot came to his ears, and he fled from Stirling to Glasgow, where he fell ill, possibly by poisoning, and where Mary came to visit him. Another reconciliation took place between husband and wife, and Darnley was persuaded to journey with Mary by easy stages to Edinburgh. Apartments were prepared for the pair at Kirk o' Field, a house just inside the city walls, and here they remained for a few days. On the evening of the 9th of February 1567 Mary took an affectionate farewell of her husband, and went to attend some gaieties in Edinburgh. A few hours later, on the morning of the 10th, Kirk o' Field was blown up with gunpowder. Darnley's body was found at some distance from the house, and it is supposed that he was strangled whilst making his escape. The remains were afterwards buried in the chapel at Holyrood.
Much discussion has taken place about this crime, and the guilt or innocence of Mary is still a question of doubt and debate. It seems highly probable, however, that the queen was accessory to the murder, which was organized by her lover and third husband, Bothwell (q.v.). As the father of King James I., Darnley is the direct ancestor of all the sovereigns of England since 1603. Personally he was a very insignificant character and his sole title to fame is his connexion with Mary, queen of Scots.
For further information, and also for a list of the works bearing on his life, see the article MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS.
DARRANG, a district of British India, in the province of Eastern Bengal and Assam. It lies between the Bhutan and Daphla Hills and the Brahmaputra, including many islands in the river. The administrative headquarters are at Tezpur. Its area is 3418 sq. m. It is for the most part a level plain watered by many tributaries of the Brahmaputra. The two subdivisions of Tezpur Mangaldai differ greatly in character. Tezpur is part of Upper Assam and shares in the prosperity which tea cultivation has brought to that part of the valley. In this portion of the district there are still large areas of excellent land awaiting settlement, and the cultivator finds a market for his produce in the flourishing tea-gardens, to which large quantities of coolies are imported every year. In Mangaldai, on the other hand, most of the good rice land was settled about 1880-1890 when the subdivision had a population of 146 to the square mile, as against 42 for Tezpur; the soil is not favourable for tea, and the population is stationary or receding. In 1901 the population of the whole district was 337,313, showing an increase of 10% in the decade. The principal grain-crop is rice. The principal means of communication is by river. A steam tramway of 2(1/2) ft. gauge has been opened from Tezpur to Balipara, a distance of 20 m.
Darrang originally formed, according to tradition, part of the dominions of Bana Raja, who was defeated by Krishna in a battle near Tezpur ("the town of blood"). The massive granite ruins found near by prove that the place must have been the seat of powerful and civilized rulers. In the 16th century Darrang was subject to the Koch king of Kamarupa, Nar Narayan, and on the division of his dominions among his heirs passed to an independent line of rajas. Early in the 17th century the raja Bali Narayan invoked the aid of the Ahoms of Upper Assam against the Mussulman invaders; after his defeat and death in 1637 the Ahoms dominated the whole district, and the Darrang rajas sank into petty feudatories. About 1785 they took advantage of the decay of the Ahom kingdom to try and re-establish their independence, but they were defeated by a British expedition in 1792, and in 1826 Darrang, with the rest of Assam, passed under British control.
DARTFORD, a market town in the Dartford parliamentary division of Kent, England, on the Darent, 17 m. E.S.E. of London by the South-Eastern & Chatham railway. Pop. of urban district (1891), 11,962; (1901) 18,644. The town lies low, flanked by two chalky eminences, called East and West Hills. It possesses a town hall, a grammar school (1576), and a Martyr's Memorial Hall. The most noteworthy building, however, is the parish church, restored in 1863, which contains a curious old fresco and several interesting brasses, and has a Norman tower. The prosperity of the town depends on the important works in its vicinity, including powder works, paper mills, and engineering, iron, chemical and cement works. One of the first attempts at the manufacture of paper in England was made here by Sir John Spielman (d. 1607), jeweller to Queen Elizabeth. Dartford was the scene, in 1235, of the marriage, celebrated by proxy, between Isabella, sister of Henry III., and the Emperor Frederick II.; and in 1331 a famous tournament was held in the place by Edward III. The same monarch established an Augustinian nunnery on West Hill in 1355, of which, however, few remains exist. After the Dissolution it was used as a private residence by Henry VIII., Anne of Cleves and Elizabeth. The chantry of St Edmund the Martyr which stood on the opposite side of the town was a part of Edward III.'s endowment to the priory, and became so famous as a place of pilgrimage, especially for those on their way to Canterbury, that the part of Watling Street which crossed there towards London was sometimes called "St Edmund's Way." It was here also that Wat Tyler's insurrection began in 1377, and the house in which he resided is shown. On Dartford Heath is a lunatic asylum of the London County Council, and, at Long Reach, the infectious diseases hospital of the Metropolitan Asylums Board. Stone church, 2 m. E. of Dartford, mainly late Early English (1251-1274), and carefully restored by G. E. Street in 1860, is remarkable; the richness of the work within increases from west to east, culminating in a choir arcade decorated with work among the finest of its period extant; the period is that of the choir of Westminster Abbey, and from a comparison of building materials, choir arcades and sculpture of foliage, a common architect has been suggested. Greenhithe, on the banks of the Thames, has large chalk quarries in its neighbourhood, from which lime and cement are manufactured.
DARTMOOR, a high plateau in the south-west of Devonshire, England. Its length is about 23 m. from N. to S. and its extreme breadth 20 m., the mean altitude being about 1500 ft. The area exceeding 1000 ft. in elevation is about 200 sq. m. It is the highest and easternmost in a broken chain of granitic elevations which extends through Cornwall to the Scilly Isles. The higher parts are open, bleak and wild, strongly contrasting with the more gentle scenery of the well-wooded lowlands surrounding it. Sloping heights rise from the main tableland in all directions, crested with broken masses of granite, locally named _tors_, and often singularly fantastic in outline. The highest of these are Yes Tor and High Willhays in the north-west, reaching altitudes of 2028 and 2039 ft. Large parts of the moor, especially in the centre, are covered with morasses; and head-waters of all the principal streams of Devonshire (q.v.) are found here. Two main roads cross the moor, one between Exeter and Plymouth, and the other between Ashburton and Tavistock, intersecting at Two Bridges. Both avoid the higher part of the moor, which, for the rest, is traversed only in part by a few rough tracks. The central part of Dartmoor was a royal forest from a date unknown, but apparently anterior to the Conquest. Its woods were formerly more extensive than now, but a few small tracts in which dwarf oaks are characteristic remain in the lower parts. Previous to 1337, the forest had been granted to Richard, earl of Cornwall, by Henry III., and from that time onward it has belonged to the duchy of Cornwall. The districts immediately surrounding the moor are called the Venville or Fenfield districts. The origin of this name is not clear. The holders of land by Venville tenure under the duchy have rights of pasture, fishing, &c. in the forest, and their main duty is to "drive" the moor at certain times in order to ascertain what head of cattle are pastured thereon, and to prevent trespassing. The antiquarian remains of Dartmoor are considered among those of Devonshire.
Dartmoor convict prison, near Princetown, was adapted to its present purpose in 1850; but the original buildings were erected in 1809 for the accommodation of French prisoners. A tract of moorland adjacent to the prison has been brought under cultivation by the inmates.
See S. Rowe, _Perambulation of the ... forest of Dartmoor_ (Plymouth, 1848); J. L. W. Page, _Exploration of Dartmoor_ (London, 1889); S. Baring-Gould, _Book of Dartmoor_ (London, 1900).
DARTMOUTH, a town in Halifax county, Nova Scotia, Canada, on the north-eastern side of Halifax harbour, connected by a steam ferry with Halifax, of which it is practically a suburb. Pop. (1901) 4806. It contains a large sugar refinery, foundries, machine shops, saw mills, skate, rope, nail, soap and sash factories.
DARTMOUTH, a seaport, market town, and municipal borough in the Torquay parliamentary division of Devonshire, England, 27 m. E. of Plymouth. Pop. (1901) 6579. It is beautifully situated on the west bank and near the mouth of the river Dart, which here forms an almost land-locked estuary. The town is connected by a steam ferry with Kingswear on the opposite bank, which is served by a branch of the Great Western railway. The houses of Dartmouth, many of which are ancient, rise in tiers from the shore, beneath a range of steep hills. An embankment planted with trees fronts the river. The cruciform church of St Saviour is of the 14th and 15th centuries, and contains a graceful rood-screen of the 16th century, an ancient stone pulpit and interesting monuments. Dartmouth Castle, in part of Tudor date, commands the river a little below the town. Portions of the cottage of Thomas Newcomen, one of the inventors of the steam-engine, are preserved. Dartmouth is a favourite yachting centre, and shipbuilding, brewing, engineering and paint-making are carried on. Coal is imported, and resold to ships calling at the harbour. The borough is under a mayor, four aldermen and twelve councillors. Area, 1924 acres.
_History._--Probably owing its origin to Saxon invaders, Dartmouth (_Darentamuthan_, _Dertemue_) was a seaport of importance when Earl Beorn was buried in its church in 1049. From its sheltered harbour William II. embarked for the relief of Mans, and the crusading squadron set sail in 1190, while John landed here in 1214. The borough, first claimed as such in the reign of Henry I., was in existence by the middle of the 13th century, since a deed of Gilbert Fitz-Stephen, lord of the manor, mentions the services due from "his burgesses of Dertemue," and a borough seal of 1280 is extant. The king in 1224 required the bailiffs and good men of Dartmouth to keep all ships in readiness for his service, and in 1302 they were to furnish two ships for the Scottish expedition, an obligation maintained throughout the century. The men of the vill were made quit of toll in 1337, and in 1342 the town was incorporated by a charter frequently confirmed by later sovereigns. Edward III. in 1372 granted that the burgesses should be sued only before the mayor and bailiffs, and Richard II. in 1393 granted extended jurisdiction and a coroner; further charters were obtained in 1604 and 1684. A French attack on the town was repulsed in 1404, and in 1485 the burgesses received a royal grant of L40 for walling the town and stretching a chain across the river mouth. Dartmouth fitted out two ships against the Armada, and was captured by both the royalists and parliamentarians in the Civil War. It returned two representatives to parliament in 1298, and from 1350 to 1832. In the latter year the representation was reduced to one, and was merged in that of the county in 1868. Manorial markets were granted for Dartmouth in 1231 and 1301. These were important since as early as 1225 the fleet resorted there for provisions. During the 14th and 15th centuries there was a regular trade with Bordeaux and Brittany, and complaints of piracies by Dartmouth men were frequent.
DARTMOUTH COLLEGE, an American institution of higher education, in Hanover, New Hampshire. It is Congregational in its affiliations, but is actually non-sectarian. The college is open only to men except during the summer session, when women also are admitted. Dartmouth embraces, in addition to the original college, incorporated in 1769, a medical school, dating from the establishment of a professorship of medicine in the college in 1798; the Thayer school of civil engineering, established in 1867 by the bequest of Gen. Sylvanus Thayer; and the Amos Tuck school of administration and finance, established in 1900 by Edward Tuck--a remarkable feature, as it was the first, and, until the establishment at Harvard of a similar graduate school, the only commercial school in the country whose work is largely post-graduate. The Chandler school of science and the arts was founded by Abiel Chandler in 1851, in connexion with Dartmouth, and was incorporated into the collegiate department in 1893 as the Chandler scientific course in the college. From 1866 to 1893 the New Hampshire college of agriculture and the mechanic arts, now at Durham, was connected with Dartmouth. The medical school offers a four years' course, and each of the other two professional schools a two years' course, the first year of which may, under certain conditions, be counted as the senior year of the undergraduate department. The college has a beautiful campus or "yard"; a library of more than 100,000 volumes, housed in Wilson Hall (1885); instruction halls, residence halls--Thornton and Wentworth (1828), Hallgarten (1874), Richardson (1897), and Fayerweather (1900); a gymnasium (Bissell Hall, built in 1867); an athletic field, known as Alumni Oval; Bartlett Hall (1890-1891), the house of the College Young Men's Christian Association; Rollins Chapel (1885); College Hall (1901), a social headquarters; an astronomical and meteorological observatory (Shattuck Observatory, 1854); the Mary Hitchcock hospital (1893), associated with the medical college; museums (especially the Butterfield Museum); Culver Hall (1871), the chemical laboratory; and Wilder Hall (1899), the physical laboratory. The college in 1908 had 100 officers of administration and instruction and 1219 students. It is maintained chiefly by the proceeds of a productive endowment fund amounting to $2,700,000 and by tuition fees ($125 a year for each student). The government is entrusted to a board of twelve trustees, five of whom are elected upon the nomination of the alumni.
Dartmouth is the outgrowth of Moor's Indian charity school, founded by Eleazer Wheelock (1711-1779) about 1750 at Lebanon, Connecticut; this school was named in 1755 in honour of Joshua Moor, who in this year gave to it lands and buildings. In 1765 Samson Occom (c. 1723-1792), an Indian preacher and former student of the school, visited England and Scotland in its behalf and raised L10,000, whereupon plans were made for enlargement and for a change of site to Hanover. In 1769 the school was incorporated by a charter granted by George III. as Dartmouth College, being named after the earl of Dartmouth, president of the trustees of the funds raised in Great Britain. The first college building, Dartmouth Hall (closely resembling Nassau Hall at Princetown and the University Hall of Brown University), was built in 1784-1791 and is still standing, as are the typical college church, built in 1796 and enlarged in 1877 and 1889, and Moor Hall, the second building for Moor's charity school, since 1852 called the Chandler building. During the War of Independence the support from Great Britain was mostly withdrawn. In 1815 President John Wheelock (1754-1817), who had succeeded his father in 1779, and was a Presbyterian and a Republican, was removed by the majority of the board of trustees, who were Congregationalists and Federalists, and Francis Brown was chosen in his place. Wheelock, upon his appeal to the legislature, was reinstated at the head of a new corporation, called Dartmouth University. The state courts upheld the legislature and the "University," but in 1819 after the famous argument of Daniel Webster (q.v.) in behalf of the "College" board of trustees as against the "University" board before the United States Supreme Court, that body decided that the private trust created by the charter of 1769 was inviolable, and Dr Francis Brown and the old "College" board took possession of the institution's property. This was one of the most important decisions ever made by the United States Supreme Court.
See Frederick Chase, _A History of Dartmouth College and the Town of Hanover_ (Cambridge, 1891). For the Dartmouth College Case see Shirley, _The Dartmouth College Causes_ (St Louis, Missouri, 1879); Kent, _Commentaries on American Law_ (vol. i. Boston, 1884); and Joseph Story, _Commentaries on the Constitution_ (vol. ii., Boston, 1891).
DARTMOUTH, EARL OF, an English title borne by the family of Legge from 1710 to the present day.
WILLIAM LEGGE (c. 1609-1670), the eldest son of Edward Legge (d. 1616), vice-president of Munster, gained some military experience on the continent of Europe and then returning to England assisted Charles I. in his war against the Scots in 1638. He was also very useful to the king during the months which preceded the outbreak of the Civil War, although his attempt to seize Hull in January 1642 failed. During the war Legge distinguished himself at Chalgrove and at the first battle of Newbury, and in 1645 he became governor of Oxford. However, he only held this position for a few months, as he shared the disgrace of Prince Rupert, to whom he was very devoted; but he was largely instrumental in putting an end to the quarrel between the king and the prince. Legge helped Charles to escape from Hampton Court in 1647, and after attending upon him he was arrested in May 1648. He was soon released, but was again captured in the following year while proceeding to Ireland in the interests of Charles II. Regaining his freedom in 1653, he spent some years abroad, but in 1659 he was once more in England inciting the royalists to rise. Legge enjoyed the favour of Charles II., who offered to make him an earl. The old royalist died on the 13th of October 1670.
Legge's eldest son, GEORGE, BARON DARTMOUTH (1647-1691), served as a volunteer in the navy during the Dutch war of 1665-1667, and quickly won his way to high rank. He was also a member of the household of the duke of York, afterwards James II.; was governor of Portsmouth and master-general of the army; in 1678 he commanded as colonel the troop at Nieuport, and in 1682 he was created Baron Dartmouth. In 1683 as "admiral of a fleet" he sailed to Tangiers, dismantled the fortifications and brought back the English troops, a duty which he discharged very satisfactorily. Under James II. Dartmouth was master of the horse and governor of the Tower of London; and in 1688, when William of Orange was expected, James II. made him commander-in-chief of his fleet. Although himself loyal to James, the same cannot be said of many of his officers, and an engagement with the Dutch fleet was purposely avoided. Dartmouth, however, refused to assist in getting James Edward, prince of Wales, out of the country, and even reproved the king for attempting this proceeding. He then left the fleet and took the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, but in July 1691 he was arrested for treason, and was charged with offering to hand over Portsmouth to France and to command a French fleet. Macaulay believed that this accusation was true, but there are those who hold that Dartmouth spoke the truth when he protested his innocence. Further proceedings against him were prevented by his death, which took place in the Tower of London on the 25th of October 1691.
Lord Dartmouth's only son, WILLIAM, 1st EARL OF DARTMOUTH (1672-1750), succeeded to his father's barony in 1691. In 1702 he was appointed a member of the board of trade and foreign plantations, and eight years later he became secretary of state for the southern department and joint keeper of the signet for Scotland. In 1711 he was created viscount Lewisham and earl of Dartmouth; in 1713 he exchanged his offices for that of keeper of the privy seal, which he held until the end of 1714. After a long period of retirement from public life he died on the 15th of December 1750. Dartmouth's eldest son George, viscount Lewisham (c. 1703-1732), predeceased his father. Other sons were: Heneage Legge (1704-1759), judge of the court of exchequer; Henry Legge (q.v.), afterwards Bilson-Legge; and Edward Legge (1710-1747), who served for some time in the navy and died on the 19th of September 1747.
WILLIAM, 2nd EARL OF DARTMOUTH (1731-1801), was a son of George, viscount Lewisham, and a grandson of the 1st earl, whom he succeeded in 1750. For a few months in 1765 and 1766 he was president of the board of trade and foreign plantations; in 1772 he returned to the same office holding also that of secretary for the colonies; and in 1775 he became lord privy seal. With regard to the American colonies Dartmouth advised them in 1777 to accept the conciliatory proposals put forward by Lord North, but in 1776 he opposed similar proposals and advocated the employment of force. In March 1782 he resigned his office as lord privy seal and in 1783 he was lord steward of the household; he died on the 15th of July 1801. Dartmouth was a friend of Selina, countess of Huntingdon, and his piety and his intimacy with the early Methodists won for him the epithet of the _Psalm-singer_. Dartmouth College was named after him, and among his papers preserved at Patshull House, Wolverhampton, are many letters from America relating to the struggle for independence. His sixth son, Sir Arthur Kaye Legge (d. 1835), was an admiral of the blue, and his seventh son, Edward Legge (d. 1827), was bishop of Oxford.
GEORGE, 3rd EARL OF DARTMOUTH (1755-1810), the eldest son of the 2nd earl, was lord warden of the stannaries and president of the board of control; later he was lord steward and then lord chamberlain of the royal household. He died on the 1st of November 1810, when his eldest son, William (1784-1853), became 4th earl. William's son, William Walter (1823-1891), became 5th earl in 1853 and was succeeded in 1891 by his son William Heneage Legge (b. 1851) as 6th earl of Dartmouth. As Lord Lewisham this nobleman was a member of parliament from 1878 to 1891, and was vice-chamberlain of the household in 1885-1886, and again from 1886 to 1892.
DARU, PIERRE ANTOINE NOEL BRUNO, COUNT (1767-1829), French soldier and statesman, was born at Montpellier on the 12th of January 1767. He was educated at the military school of Tournon, conducted by the Oratorians, and entered the artillery at an early age. His fondness for literature, however, soon made itself felt, and he published several slight pieces, until the outbreak of the French Revolution called him to a sterner occupation. In 1793 he became commissary to the army, protecting the coasts of Brittany from projected descents of the British, or of French royalists. Thrown into prison on a frivolous charge of friendliness to the royalists and England, he was released after the fall of Robespierre in the summer of 1794, and rose in the service until, in 1799, he became chief commissary to the French army serving under Massena in the north of Switzerland. In that position he won repute for his organizing capacity, great power of work and unswerving probity--the last of which qualities was none too common in the French armies at that time. These exacting tasks did not absorb all his energies. He found time, even during the campaign, to translate part of Horace and to compose two poems, the _Poeme des Alpes_ and the _Chant de guerre_. The latter celebrated in indignant strains the murder of the French envoys to the congress of Rastadt.
The accession of Napoleon Bonaparte to power in November 1799 led to the employment of Daru as chief commissary to the Army of Reserve intended for North Italy, and commanded nominally by Berthier, but really by the First Consul. Conjointly with Berthier and Dejean, he signed the armistice with the Austrians which closed the campaign in North Italy in June 1800. Daru now returned, for a time, mainly to civil life, and entered the tribunate, where he ably maintained the principles of democratic liberty. On the renewal of war with England, in May 1803, he again resumed his duties as chief commissary for the army on the northern coasts. It was afterwards asserted that, on Napoleon's resolve to turn the army of England against Austria, Daru had set down at the emperor's dictation all the details of the campaign which culminated at Ulm. The story is apocryphal; but Napoleon's confidence in him was evinced by his being appointed to similar duties in the Grand Army, which in the autumn of 1805 overthrew the armies of Austria and Russia. After the battle of Austerlitz, he took part in the drafting of the treaty of Presburg. At this time, too, he became intendant-general of the military household of Napoleon. In the campaigns of 1806-1807 he served, in his usual capacity, in the army which overthrew the forces of Russia and Prussia; and he had a share in drawing up the treaty of Tilsit (7th of July 1807). After this he supervised the administrative and financial duties in connexion with the French army which occupied the principal fortresses of Prussia, and was one of the chief agents through whom Napoleon pressed hard on that land. At the congress of Erfurt, Daru had the privilege of being present at the interview between Goethe and Napoleon, and interposed tactful references to the works of the great poet. Daru fulfilled his usual duties in the campaign of 1809 against Austria. Afterwards, when the subject of the divorce of Josephine and the choice of a Russian or of an Austrian princess came to be discussed, Daru, on being consulted by Napoleon, is said boldly to have counselled his marriage with a French lady; and Napoleon, who admired his frankness and honesty, took the reply in good part.
In 1811 he became secretary of state in succession to Maret, duc de Bassano, and showed his usual ability in the administration of the vast and complex affairs of the French empire, including the arrangements connected with the civil list and the imperial domains. But neither his devotion to civic duty nor to the administration of the affairs of the Grand Army could ward off disaster. Late in the year 1813 he took up the portfolio of military affairs. After the first abdication of Napoleon in 1814, Daru retired into private life, but aided Napoleon during the Hundred Days. After the second Restoration he became a member of the Chamber of Peers, in which he ably defended the cause of popular liberty against the attacks of the ultra-royalists. He died at Meulan on the 5th of September 1829.
Few men of the Napoleonic empire have been more generally admired and respected than Daru. On one occasion when he expressed a fear that he lacked all the gifts of a courtier, Napoleon replied, "Courtiers! They are common enough about me; I shall never be in want of them. What I want is an enlightened, firm and vigilant administrator; and that is why I have chosen you." At another time Napoleon said, "Daru is good on all sides; he has good judgment, a good intellect, a great power for work, and a body and mind of iron." The only occasion on which he is known to have sunk beneath the weight of his duties was in the course of writing letters at the emperor's dictation for the third night in succession.
Of Daru's literary works may be mentioned his _Histoire de Venise_, published at Paris in 7 vols. in 1819; the _Histoire de Bretagne_, in 3 vols. (Paris, 1826); a poetical translation of Horace (of which Le Brun remarked: "Je ne lis point Daru, j'aime trop mon Horace"); _Discours en vers sur les facultes de l'homme_ (Paris, 1825), and _Astronomie_, a didactic poem in six cantos (Paris, 1820).
See the "Notice" by Viennet prefixed to the fourth edition of Daru's _Histoire de la republique de Venise_ (9 vols., 1853), and three articles by Sainte-Beuve in _Causeries du lundi_, vol. ix. For the many letters of Napoleon to Daru see the _Correspondance de Napoleon I^er_ (32 vols., Paris, 1858-1870). (J. Hl. R.)
DARWEN, a municipal borough in the Darwen parliamentary division of Lancashire, England, 20 m. N.W. from Manchester by the Lancashire & Yorkshire railway. Pop. (1891) 34,192; (1901) 38,212. It lies on the river Darwen, which traverses a densely populated manufacturing district, and is surrounded by high-lying moors. Darwen is a centre of the cotton trade and has also blast furnaces, and paper-making, paper-staining and fire-clay works. In the neighbourhood are collieries and stone quarries. The market hall is the chief public building; there are technical schools, a free library, and two public parks. Darwen was incorporated in 1788. The corporation consists of a mayor, six aldermen and eighteen councillors.
DARWIN, CHARLES ROBERT (1809-1882), English naturalist, author of the _Origin of Species_, was born at Shrewsbury on the 12th of February 1809. He was the younger of the two sons and the fourth child of Dr Robert Waring Darwin, son of Dr Erasmus Darwin (q.v.). His mother, a daughter of Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795), died when Charles Darwin was eight years old. Charles Darwin's elder brother, Erasmus Alvey (1804-1881), was interested in literature and art rather than science: on the subject of the wide difference between the brothers Charles wrote that he was "inclined to agree with Francis Galton in believing that education and environment produce only a small effect on the mind of anyone, and that most of our qualities are innate" (_Life and Letters_, London, 1887, p. 22). Darwin considered that his own success was chiefly due to "the love of science, unbounded patience in long reflecting over any subject, industry in observing and collecting facts, and a fair share of invention as well as of common sense" (_l.c._ p. 107). He also says: "I have steadily endeavoured to keep my mind free so as to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved (and I cannot resist forming one on every subject), as soon as facts are shown to be opposed to it" (_l.c._ p. 103). The essential causes of his success are to be found in this latter sentence, the creative genius ever inspired by existing knowledge to build hypotheses by whose aid further knowledge could be won, the calm unbiassed mind, the transparent honesty and love of truth which enabled him to abandon or to modify his own creations when they ceased to be supported by observation. The even balance between these powers was as important as their remarkable development. The great naturalist appeared in the ripeness of time, when the world was ready for his splendid generalizations. Indeed naturalists were already everywhere considering and discussing the problem of evolution, although Alfred Russel Wallace was the only one who, independently of Darwin, saw his way clearly to the solution. It is true that hypotheses essentially the same as natural selection were suggested much earlier by W. C. Wells (_Phil. Trans._, 1813), and Patrick Matthew (_Naval Timber and Arboriculture_, 1831), but their views were lost sight of and produced no effect upon the great body of naturalists. In the preparation for Darwin Sir Charles Lyell's _Principles of Geology_ played an important part, accustoming men's minds to the vast changes brought about by natural processes, and leading them, by its lucid and temperate discussion of Lamarck's and other views, to reflect upon evolution.
Darwin's early education was conducted at Shrewsbury, first for a year at a day-school, then for seven years at Shrewsbury School under Dr Samuel Butler (1774-1839). He gained but little from the narrow system which was then universal. In 1825 he went to Edinburgh to prepare for the medical profession, for which he was unfitted by nature. After two sessions his father realized this, and in 1828 sent him to Cambridge with the idea that he should become a clergyman. He matriculated at Christ's College, and took his degree in 1831, tenth in the list of those who do not seek honours. Up to this time he had been keenly interested in sport, and in entomology, especially the collecting of beetles. Both at Edinburgh, where in 1826 he read his first scientific paper, and at Cambridge he gained the friendship of much older scientific men--Robert Edmond Grant and William Macgillivray at the former, John Stevens Henslow and Adam Sedgwick at the latter. He had two terms' residence to keep after passing his last examination, and studied geology with Sedgwick. Returning from their geological excursion together in North Wales (August 1831), he found a letter from Henslow urging him to apply for the position of naturalist on the "Beagle," about to start on a surveying expedition. His father at first disliked the idea, but his uncle, the second Josiah Wedgwood, pleaded with success, and Darwin started on the 27th of December 1831, the voyage lasting until the 2nd of October 1836. It is practically certain that he never left Great Britain after this latter date. After visiting the Cape de Verde and other islands of the Atlantic, the expedition surveyed on the South American coasts and adjacent islands (including the Galapagos), afterwards visiting Tahiti, New Zealand, Australia, Tasmania, Keeling Island, Maldives, Mauritius, St Helena, Ascension; and Brazil, de Verdes and Azores on the way home. His work on the geology of the countries visited, and that on coral islands, became the subject of volumes which he published after his return, as well as his _Journal of a Naturalist_, and his other contributions to the official narrative. The voyage must be regarded as the real preparation for his life-work. His observations on the relation between animals in islands and those of the nearest continental areas, near akin and yet not the same, and between living animals and those most recently extinct and found fossil in the same country, here again related but not the same, led him even then to reflect deeply upon the modification of species. He had also been much impressed by "the manner in which closely allied animals replace one another in proceeding southwards" in South America. On his return home Darwin worked at his collections, first at Cambridge for three months and then in London. His pocket-book for 1837 contains the words: "In July opened first note-book on Transmutation of Species. Had been greatly struck from about the month of previous March [while still on the voyage and just over twenty-eight years old] on character of South American fossils, and species on Galapagos Archipelago. These facts (especially latter) origin of all my views." From 1838 to 1841 he was secretary of the Geological Society, and saw a great deal of Sir Charles Lyell, to whom he dedicated the second edition of his _Journal_. On the 29th of January 1839 he married his cousin, Emma Wedgwood, the daughter of Josiah Wedgwood of Maer. They lived in London until September 1842, when they moved to Down, which was Darwin's home for the rest of his life. His health broke down many times in London, and remained precarious during the whole of his life. The immense amount of work which he got through was only made possible by the loving care of his wife. For eight years (1846 to 1854) he was chiefly engaged upon four monographs on the recent and fossil Cirripede Crustacea (_Roy. Soc._, 1851 and 1854; _Palaeontograph. Soc._, 1851 and 1854). Towards the close of this work Darwin became very wearied of it, especially of the synonymy. For a time he hoped to start a movement which should discourage the habit of appending the name of the describer to the name of the species, a custom which he thought led to bad and superficial work. From this time he was engaged upon the numerous lines of inquiry which led to the great work of his life, the _Origin of Species_, published in November 1859.
Soon after opening his note-book in July 1837 he began to collect facts bearing upon the formation of the breeds of domestic animals and plants, and quickly saw "that selection was the keystone of man's success. But how selection could be applied to organisms living in a state of nature remained for some time a mystery to me." Various ideas as to the causes of evolution occurred to him, only to be successively abandoned. He had the idea of "laws of change" which affected species and finally led to their extinction, to some extent analogous to the causes which bring about the development, maturity and finally death of an individual. He also had the conception that species must give rise to other species or else die out, just as an individual dies unrepresented if it bears no offspring. These and other ideas, of which traces exist in his Diary, arose in his mind, together with perhaps some general conception of natural selection, during the fifteen months after the opening of his note-book. In October 1838 he read _Malthus on Population_, and his observations having long since convinced him of the struggle for existence, it at once struck him "that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species. Here, then, I had a theory by which to work." In June 1842 he wrote out a sketch, which two years later he expanded to an essay occupying 231 pages folio. The idea of progressive divergence as an advantage in itself, because the competition is most severe between organisms most closely related, did not occur to him until long after he had come to Down. During the growth of the _Origin_ Sir Joseph Hooker was his most intimate friend, and on the 11th of January 1844 he wrote: "At last gleams of light have come, and I am almost convinced (quite contrary to the opinion I started with) that species are not (it is like confessing a murder) immutable" (_l.c._ ii. 13). In 1855 he began a correspondence with the great American botanist Asa Gray, and in 1857 explained his views in a letter which afterwards became classical. In 1856, urged by Lyell, he began the preparation of a third and far more expanded treatise, and had completed about half of it when, on the 18th of June 1858, he received a manuscript essay from A. R. Wallace, who was then at Ternate in the Moluccas. Wallace wanted Darwin's opinion on the essay, which he asked should be forwarded to Lyell. Darwin was much startled to find in the essay a complete abstract of his own theory of natural selection. He forwarded it the same day, writing to Lyell, "your words have come true with a vengeance--that I should be forestalled." He placed himself in the hands of Lyell and Hooker, who decided to send Wallace's essay to the Linnean Society, together with an abstract of Darwin's work, which they asked him to prepare, the joint essay being accompanied by a preface in the form of an explanatory letter written by them to the secretary. The title of the joint communication was "On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection." It was read on the 1st of July 1858, and appears in the _Linn. Soc. Journal_ (Zoology) for that year. In this statement of the theory of natural selection, Darwin's part consisted of two sections, the first being extracts from his 1844 essay, including a brief account of sexual selection, and the second an abstract of his letter to Asa Gray dated the 5th of September 1857. This latter, probably his first attempt to expound natural selection, cannot be surpassed as a clear statement of the theory. Darwin explained at the outset, what he insisted on elsewhere, that the facts of adaptation or contrivance in nature are the real difficulty to be explained by a theory of evolution, the stumbling-block of every previous suggestion. Until he could explain "the mistletoe, with its pollen carried by insects, and seed by birds--the woodpecker, with its feet and tail, beak and tongue, to climb the tree and secure insects," he was "scientifically orthodox." Nevertheless he was led to believe in evolution, apart from any possible motive-cause, by "general facts in the affinities, embryology, rudimentary organs, geological history, and geographical distribution of organic beings." He then proceeds to describe the manner in which he met the difficulty of adaptation by "his notions on the means by which Nature makes her species." The essentials of the statement are as follows:--I. Man has made his domestic breeds of animals and plants by selection, conscious or unconscious, of very slight or greater variations. II. The material for selection exists in nature, namely, slight variations of all parts of the organism. III. The "unerring power" which sifts these variations is "_natural selection_ ... which selects exclusively for the good of each organic being." The rate of increase is such that only a few in each generation can live: hence the never sufficiently appreciated struggle for life. "What a trifling difference must often determine which shall survive and which perish!" The remaining heads explain the complex nature of the struggle, the reasons for deficient direct evidence, the advantage of divergence, &c. In the joint essay the phrases "natural selection" and "sexual selection" were first made public by Darwin, the "struggle for existence" by Wallace. Darwin and Wallace had met only once before the departure of the latter for the East. Their rivalry in the discovery of the great principle of natural selection was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. Wallace was lying ill with intermittent fever at Ternate in February 1858 when he began to think of Malthus's _Essay on Population_, read several years before: suddenly the idea of the survival of the fittest flashed upon him. In two hours he had "thought out almost the whole of the theory," and in three evenings had finished his essay. Darwin, also inspired after reading Malthus, in October 1838, did not publish until nearly twenty years had elapsed, and then only when Wallace sent him his essay. Canon H. B. Tristram was the first to apply the new theory, explaining by its aid the colours of desert birds, &c. (_Ibis_, October 1859).
Acting under the advice of Lyell and Hooker, Darwin then began to prepare what was to become the great work of his life. It appeared on the 24th of November 1859, with the full title, _On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life_. The whole edition of 1250 copies was exhausted on the day of issue. The first four chapters explain the operation of artificial selection by man and of natural selection in consequence of the struggle for existence. The fifth chapter deals with the laws of variation and causes of modification other than natural selection. The five succeeding chapters consider difficulties in the way of a belief in evolution generally as well as in natural selection. The three remaining chapters (omitting the recapitulation which occupies the last) deal with the evidence for evolution. The theory which suggested a cause of evolution is thus given the foremost place, and the evidence for the existence of evolution considered last of all. This method of presentation was no doubt adopted because it was just the want of a reasonable motive-cause which more than anything else prevented the acceptance of evolution. But the other side of the book must not be eclipsed by the brilliant theory of Darwin and Wallace. The evidence for evolution itself had never before been thought out and marshalled in a manner which bears any comparison with that of Darwin in the _Origin_, and the work would have been in the highest degree epoch-making had it consisted of the later chapters alone. In the fifth chapter Darwin incorporated a certain proportion of the doctrines of Buffon,--modifications due to the direct influence of environment; and of Lamarck,--the hereditary effects of use and disuse. Lyell for a long time hesitated to accept the new teaching, and Darwin carried on a long correspondence with him. His public confession of faith was made at the anniversary dinner of the Royal Society in 1864. A storm of controversy arose over the book, reaching its height at the meeting of the British Association at Oxford in 1860, when the celebrated duel between T. H. Huxley and Bishop Wilberforce of Oxford took place. Throughout these struggles Huxley was the foremost champion for evolution and for fair play to natural selection, although he never entirely accepted the latter theory, holding that until man by his selection had made his domestic breed sterile _inter se_, there was no sufficient evidence that selection accounts for natural species which are thus separated by the barrier of sterility. The theory of natural selection was at first greatly misunderstood. Thus some writers thought it implied conscious choice in the animals themselves, others that it was the personification of some active power. By many it was thought to be practically the same idea as Lamarck's. Herbert Spencer's alternative phrase, "the survival of the fittest," probably helped to spread a clear appreciation of Darwin's meaning.
The history of opinion since 1859 may be summed up as follows. Evolution soon gained general acceptance, except among a certain number of those of middle or more advanced age at the time when the _Origin_ appeared. Although natural selection had been an essential force in producing this conviction, there gradually grew up a tendency to minimize its importance in relation to the causes originally suggested by Buffon and Lamarck, which were ably presented and further elaborated by Herbert Spencer. In America a school of Neo-Lamarckians appeared, and for a time flourished under the inspiration of the vigorous personality of E. D. Cope. The writings of August Weismann next raised a controversy over the scope of heredity, assailing the very foundation of the hypotheses of Buffon, Lamarck and Herbert Spencer by demanding evidence that the "acquired characters" upon which they rest are capable of hereditary transmission. The quantitative determination of heredity has been the subject of much patient investigation under the leadership of Francis Galton. The question of isolation as a factor in species-formation has been greatly discussed, G. J. Romanes proposing, in his hypothesis of "Physiological Selection," that the barrier of sterility may arise spontaneously by variation between two sets of individuals as the beginning instead of the climax of specific distinction. Others have fixed their attention upon the variations, which provided the material for natural selection, and have advocated the view that evolution proceeds by immense strides instead of the minute steps in which Darwin and Wallace believed. Others, again, have found significance in the artificial production of "monstrosities" or huge modifications during individual development. All through the period a varying proportion of naturalists, probably larger now than at any other time, has followed the founders of the theory, and has sought the motive-cause of evolution in "the accumulative power of natural selection," which Darwin, as his first public statement indicates, looked upon "as by far the most important element in the production of new forms." They hold, with Darwin and Wallace, that although variation provides the essential material, natural selection, from its accumulative power, is of such paramount importance that it may be said to create new species as truly as a man may be said to make a building out of the material provided by stones of various shapes, a metaphor suggested and elaborated by Darwin, and forming the concluding sentences of _The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication_. This, probably the second in importance of all his works, was published in 1868, and may be looked upon as a complete account of the material of which he had given a very condensed abstract in the first chapter of the _Origin_, together with the conclusions suggested by it. He finally brought together an immense number of apparently disconnected sets of observations under his "provisional hypothesis of pangenesis," which assumes that every cell in the body, at every stage of growth and in maturity, is represented in each germ-cell by a gemmule. The germ-cell is only the meeting-place of gemmules, and the true reproductive power lies in the whole of the body-cells which despatch their representatives, hence "pangenesis." There are reasons for believing that this infinitely complex conception, in which, as his letters show, he had great confidence, was forced upon Darwin in order to explain the hereditary transmission of acquired characters involved in the small proportion of Lamarckian doctrine which he incorporated. If such transmission does not occur, a far simpler hypothesis based on the lines of Weismann's "continuity of the germ-plasm" is sufficient to account for the facts.
The _Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex_, was published in 1871; as the title implies, it really consists of two distinct works. The first, and by far the shorter, was the full justification of his statement in the Origin that "light would be thrown on the origin of man and his history." In the second part he brought together a large mass of evidence in support of his hypothesis of sexual selection which he had briefly described in the 1858 essay. This hypothesis explains the development of colours and structures peculiar to one sex and displayed by it in courtship, by the preferences of the other sex. The majority of naturalists probably agree with Darwin in believing that the explanation is real, but relatively unimportant. It is interesting to note that only in this subject and those treated of in the _Variation under Domestication_ had Darwin exhausted the whole of the material which he had collected. The _Expression of the Emotions_, published in 1872, offered a natural explanation of phenomena which appeared to be a difficulty in the way of the acceptance of evolution. In 1876 Darwin brought out his two previously published geological works on _Volcanic Islands_ and _South America_ as a single volume. The widely read _Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms_ appeared in 1881. He also published various volumes on botanical subjects. The _Fertilization of Orchids_ appeared in 1862. The subject of cross-fertilization of flowers was in Darwin's mind, as shown by his note-book in 1837. In 1841 Robert Brown directed his attention to Christian Conrad Sprengel's work (Berlin, 1793), which confirmed his determination to pursue this line of research. _The Effects of Cross- and Self-Fertilization in the Vegetable Kingdom_ (1876) contained the direct evidence that the offspring of cross-fertilized individuals are more vigorous, as well as more numerous, than those produced by a self-fertilized parent. _Different Forms of Flowers on Plants of the Same Species_ appeared in 1877. It is here shown that each different form, although possessing both kinds of sexual organs, is specially adapted to be fertilized by the pollen of another form, and that when artificially fertilized by its own pollen less vigorous offspring, bearing some resemblance to hybrids, are produced. He says, "no little discovery of mine ever gave me so much pleasure as the making out the meaning of heterostyled flowers" (_Autobiography_). _Climbing Plants_ was published in 1875, although it had, in large part, been communicated to the Linnean Society, in whose publications much of the material of several of his other works appeared. This inquiry into the nature of the movements of twining plants was suggested to him in a paper by Asa Gray. _The Power of Movement in Plants_ (1880) was produced by him in conjunction with his son Francis. It was an inquiry into the minute power of movement possessed, he believed, by plants generally, out of which the larger movements of climbing plants of many different groups had been evolved. The work included an investigation of other kinds of plant movement due to light, gravity, &c., all of which he regarded as modifications of the one fundamental movement (circumnutation) which exists in a highly specialized form in climbing plants. _Insectivorous Plants_ (1875) is principally concerned with the description of experiments on the Sun-dew (_Drosera_), although other insect-catching plants, such as _Dionaea_, are also investigated.
Charles Darwin's long life of patient, continuous work, the most fruitful, the most inspiring, in the annals of modern science, came to an end on the 19th of April 1882. He was buried in Westminster Abbey on the 26th. It is of much interest to attempt to set forth some of the main characteristics of the man who did so much for modern science, and in so large a measure moulded the form of modern thought. Although his ill-health prevented Darwin, except on rare occasions, from attending scientific and social meetings, and thus from meeting and knowing the great body of scientific and intellectual workers of his time, probably no man has ever inspired a wider and deeper personal interest and affection. This was in part due to the intimate personal friends who represented him in the circles he was unable frequently to enter, but chiefly to the kindly, generous, and courteous nature which was revealed in his large correspondence and published writings, and especially in his treatment of opponents.
In a deeply interesting chapter of the _Life and Letters_ Francis Darwin has given us his reminiscences of his father's everyday life. Rising early, he took a short walk before breakfasting alone at 7.45, and then at once set to work, "considering the 1(1/2) hours between 8.0 and 9.30 one of his best working times." He then read his letters and listened to reading aloud, returning to work at about 10.30. At 12 or 12.15 "he considered his day's work over," and went for a walk, whether wet or fine. For a time he rode, but after accidents had occurred twice, was advised to give it up. After lunch he read the newspaper and wrote his letters or the MS. of his books. At about 3.0 he rested and smoked for an hour while being read to, often going to sleep. He then went for a short walk, and returning about 4.30, worked for an hour. After this he rested and smoked, and listened to reading until tea at 7.30, a meal which he came to prefer to late dinner. He then played two games of backgammon, read to himself, and listened to music and to reading aloud. He went to bed, generally very much tired, at 10.30, and was often much troubled by wakefulness and the activity of his thoughts. It is thus apparent that the number of hours devoted to work in each day was comparatively few. The immense amount he achieved was due to concentration during these hours, also to the unfailing and, because of his health, the necessary regularity of his life.
The appearance of Charles Darwin has been made well known in numerous portraits and statues. He was tall and thin, being about six feet high, but looked less because of a stoop, which increased towards the end of his life. As a young man he had been active, with considerable powers of endurance, and possessed in a marked degree those qualities of eye and hand which make the successful sportsman.
Charles Darwin was, as a young man, a believer in Christianity, and was sent to Cambridge with the idea that he would take orders. It is probable, however, that he had merely yielded to the influences of his home, without thinking much on the subject of religion. He first began to reflect deeply on the subject during the two years and a quarter which intervened between his return from the "Beagle" (October 2nd, 1836) and his marriage (January 29th, 1839). His own words are, "disbelief crept over me at a very slow rate, but was at last complete. The rate was so slow that I felt no distress." His attitude was that of the tolerant unaggressive agnostic, sympathizing with and helping in the social and charitable influences of the English Church in his parish. He was evidently most unwilling that his opinions on religious matters should influence others, holding, as his son, Francis Darwin, says, "that a man ought not to publish on a subject to which he has not given special and continuous thought" (_l.c._ i. p. 305).
In addition to the personal qualities and powers of Charles Darwin, there were other contributing causes without which the world could never have reaped the benefit of his genius. It is evident that Darwin's health could barely have endured the strain of working for a living, and that nothing would have been left over for his researches. A deep debt of gratitude is owing to his father for placing him in a position in which all his energy could be devoted to scientific work and thought. But his ill-health was such that this important and essential condition would have been insufficient without another even more essential. Francis Darwin, in the _Life and Letters_ (i. pp. 159-160), writes these eloquent and pathetic words:--"No one indeed, except my mother, knows the full amount of suffering he endured, or the full amount of his wonderful patience. For all the latter years of his life she never left him for a night; and her days were so planned that all his resting hours might be shared with her. She shielded him from every avoidable annoyance, and omitted nothing that might save him trouble, or prevent him becoming over-tired, or that might alleviate the many discomforts of his ill-health. I hesitate to speak thus freely of a thing so sacred as the lifelong devotion which prompted all this constant and tender care. But it is, I repeat, a principal feature of his life, that for nearly forty years he never knew one day of the health of ordinary men, and that thus his life was one long struggle against the weariness and the strain of sickness. And this cannot be told without speaking of the one condition which enabled him to bear the strain and fight out the struggle to the end."
Charles Darwin was honoured by the chief societies of the civilized world. He was made a knight of the Prussian order, "Pour le Merite," in 1867, a corresponding member of the Berlin Academy of Sciences in 1863, a fellow in 1878, and later in the same year a corresponding member of the French Institute in the botanical section. He received the Bressa prize of the Royal Academy of Turin, and the Baly medal of the Royal College of Physicians in 1879, the Wollaston medal of the Geological Society in 1859, a Royal medal of the Royal Society in 1853, and the Copley medal in 1864. His health prevented him from accepting the honorary degree which Oxford University wished to confer on him, but his own university had stronger claims, and he received its honorary LL.D. in 1877.
Two daughters and five sons survived him, four of the latter becoming prominent in the scientific world,--Sir George Howard (b. 1845), who became professor of astronomy and experimental philosophy at Cambridge in 1883; Francis (b. 1848), the distinguished botanist; Leonard (b. 1850), a major in the royal engineers, and afterwards well known as an economist; and Horace (b. 1851), civil engineer.
See _The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, including an autobiographical chapter_, edited by his son Francis Darwin (3 vols., London, 1887); _Charles Darwin and the Theory of Natural Selection_, by E. B. Poulton (London, 1896); _Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley_, by Leonard Huxley (2 vols., London, 1900); A. R. Wallace, _Darwinism_ (1889); G. J. Romanes, _Darwin and after Darwin_ (1895). Also the article on T. H. HUXLEY. (E. B. P.)
DARWIN, ERASMUS (1731-1802), English man of science and poet, was born at Elton, in Nottinghamshire, on the 12th of December 1731. After studying at St John's College, Cambridge, and at Edinburgh, he settled in 1756 as a physician at Nottingham, but meeting with little success he moved in the following year to Lichfield. There he gained a large practice, and did much, both by example and by more direct effort, to diminish drunkenness among the lower classes. In 1781 he removed to Derby, where he died suddenly on the 18th of April 1802. The fame of Erasmus Darwin as a poet rests upon his _Botanic Garden_, though he also wrote _The Temple of Nature, or the Origin of Society, a Poem, with Philosophical Notes_ (1803), and _The Shrine of Nature_ (posthumously published). The _Botanic Garden_ (the second part of which--_The Loves of the Plants_--was published anonymously in 1789, and the whole of which appeared in 1791) is a long poem in the decasyllabic rhymed couplet. Its merit lies in the genuine scientific enthusiasm and interest in nature which pervade it; and of any other poetic quality--except a certain, sometimes felicitous but oftener ill-placed, elaborated pomp of words--it may without injustice be said to be almost destitute. It was for the most part written laboriously, and polished with unsparing care, line by line, often as he rode from one patient to another, and it occupied the leisure hours of many years. The artificial character of the diction renders it in emotional passages stilted and even absurd, and makes Canning's clever caricature--_The Loves of the Triangles_--often remarkably like the poem it satirizes: in some passages, however, it is not without a stately appropriateness. Gnomes, sylphs and nereids are introduced on almost every page, and personification is carried to an extraordinary excess. Thus he describes the _Loves of the Plants_ according to the Linnaean system by means of a most ingenious but misplaced and amusing personification of each plant, and often even of the parts of the plant. It is significant that botanical notes are added to the poem, and that its eulogies of scientific men are frequent. Erasmus Darwin's mind was in fact rather that of a man of science than that of a poet. His most important scientific work is his _Zoonomia_ (1794-1796), which contains a system of pathology, and a treatise on generation, in which he, in the words of his famous grandson, Charles Robert Darwin, "anticipated the views and erroneous grounds of opinions of Lamarck." The essence of his views is contained in the following passage, which he follows up with the conclusion "that one and the same kind of living filaments is and has been the cause of all organic life":--
"Would it be too bold to imagine that, in the great length of time since the earth began to exist, perhaps millions of ages before the commencement of the history of mankind,--would it be too bold to imagine that all warm-blooded animals have arisen from one living filament, which the great First Cause endued with animality, with the power of acquiring new parts, attended with new propensities, directed by irritations, sensations, volitions and associations, and thus possessing the faculty of continuing to improve by its own inherent activity, and of delivering down these improvements by generation to its posterity, world without end!"
In 1799 Darwin published his _Phytologia, or the Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening_ (1799), in which he states his opinion that plants have sensation and volition. A paper on _Female Education in Boarding Schools_ (1797) completes the list of his works.
Robert Waring Darwin (1766-1848), his third son by his first marriage, a doctor at Shrewsbury, was the father of the famous Charles Darwin; and Violetta, his eldest daughter by his second marriage, was the mother of Francis Galton.
See Anna Seward, _Memoirs of the Life of Dr Darwin_ (1804); and Charles Darwin, _Life of Erasmus Darwin, an introduction to an essay on his works by Ernst Krause_ (1879).
DASENT, SIR GEORGE WEBBE (1817-1896), English writer, was born in St Vincent, West Indies, on the 22nd of May 1817, the son of the attorney-general of that island. He was educated at Westminster school, King's College, and Oxford, where he was a contemporary of J. T. Delane (q.v.), whose friend he had become at King's College. On leaving the university in 1840 he was appointed to a diplomatic post in Stockholm. Here he met Jacob Grimm, and at his suggestion first interested himself in Scandinavian literature and mythology. In 1842 he published the results of his studies, a version of _The Prose or Younger Edda_, and in the following year he issued a _Grammar of the Icelandic or Old-Norse Tongue_, taken from the Swedish. Returning to England in 1845, he became assistant editor of _The Times_ under Delane, whose sister he married; but he still continued his Scandinavian studies, publishing translations of various Norse stories. In 1853 he was appointed professor of English literature and modern history at King's College, London. In 1861-1862 he visited Iceland, and subsequently published _Gisli the Outlaw_ and other translations from the Icelandic. In 1870 he was appointed a civil service commissioner and consequently resigned his post on _The Times_. In 1876 he was knighted. He retired from the public service in 1892, and died at Ascot on the 11th of June 1896. In addition to the works mentioned above, he published _The Story of Burnt Njal_, from the Icelandic of the _Njals Saga_ (1861).
See the _Life of Delane_ (1908), by Arthur Irwin Dasent.
DASHKOV, CATHERINA ROMANOVNA VORONTSOV, PRINCESS (1744-1810), Russian _litterateur_, was the third daughter of Count Roman Vorontsov, a member of the Russian senate, distinguished for his intellectual gifts. (For the family see VORONTSOV.) She received an exceptionally good education, having displayed from a very early age the masculine ability and masculine tastes which made her whole career so singular. She was well versed in mathematics, which she studied at the university of Moscow, and in general literature her favourite authors were Bayle, Montesquieu, Boileau, Voltaire and Helvetius. While still a girl she was connected with the Russian court, and became one of the leaders of the party that attached itself to the grand duchess (afterwards empress) Catherine. Before she was sixteen she married Prince Mikhail Dashkov, a prominent Russian nobleman, and went to reside with him at Moscow. In 1762 she was at St Petersburg and took a leading part, according to her own account _the_ leading part, in the _coup d'etat_ by which Catherine was raised to the throne. (See CATHERINE II.) Another course of events would probably have resulted in the elevation of the Princess Dashkov's elder sister, Elizabeth, who was the emperor's mistress, and in whose favour he made no secret of his intention to depose Catherine. Her relations with the new empress were not of a cordial nature, though she continued devotedly loyal. Her blunt manners, her unconcealed scorn of the male favourites that disgraced the court, and perhaps also her sense of unrequited merit, produced an estrangement between her and the empress, which ended in her asking permission to travel abroad. The cause of the final breach was said to have been the refusal of her request to be appointed colonel of the imperial guards. Her husband having meanwhile died, she set out in 1768 on an extended tour through Europe. She was received with great consideration at foreign courts, and her literary and scientific reputation procured her the _entree_ to the society of the learned in most of the capitals of Europe. In Paris she secured the warm friendship and admiration of Diderot and Voltaire. She showed in various ways a strong liking for England and the English. She corresponded with Garrick, Dr Blair and Principal Robertson; and when in Edinburgh, where she was very well received, she arranged to entrust the education of her son to Principal Robertson. In 1782 she returned to the Russian capital, and was at once taken into favour by the empress, who strongly sympathized with her in her literary tastes, and specially in her desire to elevate Russ to a place among the literary languages of Europe. Immediately after her return the princess was appointed "directeur" of the St Petersburg Academy of Arts and Sciences; and in 1784 she was named the first president of the Russian Academy, which had been founded at her suggestion. In both positions she acquitted herself with marked ability. She projected the Russian dictionary of the Academy, arranged its plan, and executed a part of the work herself. She edited a monthly magazine; and wrote at least two dramatic works, _The Marriage of Fabian_, and a comedy entitled _Toissiokoff_. Shortly before Catherine's death the friends quarrelled over a tragedy which the princess had allowed to find a place in the publications of the Academy, though it contained revolutionary principles, according to the empress. A partial reconciliation was effected, but the princess soon afterwards retired from court. On the accession of the emperor Paul in 1796 she was deprived of all her offices, and ordered to retire to a miserable village in the government of Novgorod, "to meditate on the events of 1762." After a time the sentence was partially recalled on the petition of her friends, and she was permitted to pass the closing years of her life on her own estate near Moscow, where she died on the 4th of January 1810.
Her son, the last of the Dashkov family, died in 1807 and bequeathed his fortune to his cousin Illarion Vorontsov, who thereupon by imperial licence assumed the name Vorontsov-Dashkov; and Illarion's son, Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov (b. 1837), held an appointment in the tsar's household from 1881 to 1897.
The _Memoirs of the Princess Dashkoff written by herself_ were published in 1840 in London in two volumes. They were edited by Mrs W. Bradford, who, as Miss Wilmot, had resided with the princess between 1803 and 1808, and had suggested their preparation.
DASS, PETTER (1647-1708), the "father" of modern Norwegian poetry, was the son of Peter Dundas, a Scottish merchant of Dundee, who, leaving his country about 1630 to escape the troubles of the Presbyterian church, settled in Bergen, and in 1646 married a Norse girl of good family. Petter Dass was born in 1647 on the island of Nord Hero; on the north coast of Norway. Seven years later his father died, and his mother placed him with his aunt, the wife of the priest of another little island-parish. In 1660 he was sent to school at Bergen, in 1665 to the university of Copenhagen, and in 1667 he began to earn his daily bread as a private tutor. In 1672 he was ordained priest, and remained till 1681 as under-chaplain at Nesne, a little parish near his birthplace; for eight years more he was resident chaplain at Nesne; and at last in 1689 he received the living of Alstahoug, the most important in the north of Norway. The rule of Alstahoug extended over all the neighbouring districts, including Dass's native island of Hero, and its privileges were accompanied by great perils, for it was necessary to be constantly crossing stormy firths of sea. Dass lived here in quietude, with something of the honours and responsibilities of a bishop, brought up his family in a God-fearing way, and wrote endless reams of verses. In 1700 he asked leave to resign his living in favour of his son Anders Dass, but this was not permitted; in 1704, however, Anders became his father's chaplain. About this time Petter went to Bergen, where he visited Dorothea Engelbrechtsdatter, with whom he had been for many years in correspondence. He continued to write till 1707, and died in August 1708. The materials for his biography are very numerous; he was regarded with universal curiosity and admiration in his lifetime; and, besides, he left a garrulous autobiography in verse. A portrait, painted in middle age, now in the church of Melhus, near Trondhjem, represents him in canonicals, with deep red beard and hair, the latter waved and silky, and a head of massive proportions. The face is full of fire and vigour. His writings passed in MS. from hand to hand, and few of them were printed in his lifetime. _Nordlands Trompet_ (The Trumpet of Nordland), his greatest and most famous poem, was not published till 1739; _Den norska Dale-Vise_ (The Norwegian Song of the Valley) appeared in 1696; the _Aandelig Tidsfordriv_ (Spiritual Pastime), a volume of sacred poetry, was published in 1711. _The Trumpet of Nordland_ remains as fresh as ever in the memories of the inhabitants of the north of Norway; boatmen, peasants, priests will alike repeat long extracts from it at the slightest notice, and its popularity is unbounded. It is a rhyming description of the province of Nordland, its natural features, its trades, its advantages and its drawbacks, given in dancing verse of the most breathless kind, and full of humour, fancy, wit and quaint learning. The other poems of Petter Dass are less universally read; they abound, however, in queer turns of thought, and fine homely fancies.
The collected writings of Dass were edited (3 vols., Christiania, 1873-1877) by Dr A. E. Eriksen.
DASYURE, a bookname for any member of the zoological family _Dasyuridae_. (See MARSUPIALIA.) The name is better restricted to animals of the typical genus _Dasyurus_, sometimes called true Dasyures. These are mostly inhabitants of the Australian continent and Tasmania, where in the economy of nature they take the place of the smaller predaceous Carnivora, the cats, civets and weasels of other parts of the world. They hide themselves in the daytime in holes among rocks or in hollow trees, but prowl about at night in search of the small living mammals and birds which constitute their prey, and are to some extent arboreal in habit. The spot-tailed dasyure (_D. maculatus_), about the size of a cat, inhabiting Tasmania and Southern Australia, has transversely striated pads on the soles of the feet. These organs are also present in the North Australian dasyure (_D. hallucatus_) and the Papuan _D. albopunctatus_, and are regarded by Oldfield Thomas as indication of arboreal habits; in the common dasyure (_D. viverrinus_) from Tasmania and Victoria, and the black-tailed dasyure (_D. geoffroyi_) from South Australia, these feet-pads are absent, whence these species are believed to seek their prey on the ground. The ursine dasyure (_Sarcophilus ursinus_), often called the "Tasmanian Devil," constitutes a distinct genus. In size it may be compared to an English badger; the general colour of the fur is black tinged with brown, with white patches on the neck, shoulders, rump and chest. It is a burrowing animal, of nocturnal habits, intensely carnivorous, and commits great depredations on the sheepyards and poultry-lofts of the settlers. In writing of this species Krefft says that one--by no means a large one--escaped from confinement and killed in two nights fifty-four fowls, six geese, an albatross and a cat. It was recaptured in what was considered a stout trap, with a door constructed of iron bars as thick as a lead pencil, but escaped by twisting this solid obstacle aside.
DATE PALM. The dates[1] of commerce are the fruit of a species of palm, _Phoenix dactylifera_, a tree which ranges from the Canary Islands through Northern Africa and the south-east of Asia to India. It has been cultivated and much prized throughout most of these regions from the remotest antiquity. Its cultivation and use are described on the mural tablets of the ancient Assyrians. In Arabia it is the chief source of national wealth, and its fruit forms the staple article of food in that country. The tree has also been introduced along the Mediterranean shores of Europe; but as its fruit does not ripen so far north, the European plants are only used to supply leaves for the festival of Palm Sunday among Christians, and for the celebration of the Passover by Jews. It was introduced into the new world by early Spanish missionaries, and is now cultivated in the dry districts of the south-western United States and in Mexico. The date palm is a beautiful tree, growing to a height of from 60 to 80 ft., and its stem, which is strongly marked with old leaf-scars, terminates in a crown of graceful shining pinnate leaves. The flowers spring in branching spadices from the axils of the leaves, and as the trees are unisexual it is necessary in cultivation to fertilize the female flowers by artificial means. The fruit is oblong, fleshy and contains one very hard seed which is deeply furrowed on the inside. The fruit varies much in size, colour and quality under cultivation. Regarding this fruit, W. G. Palgrave (_Central and Eastern Arabia_) remarked: "Those who, like most Europeans at home, only know the date from the dried specimens of that fruit shown beneath a label in shop-windows, can hardly imagine how delicious it is when eaten fresh and in Central Arabia. Nor is it, when newly gathered, heating,--a defect inherent to the preserved fruit everywhere; nor does its richness, however great, bring satiety; in short it is an article of food alike pleasant and healthy." In the oases of Sahara, and in other parts of Northern Africa, dates are pounded and pressed into a cake for food. The dried fruit used for dessert in European countries contains more than half its weight of sugar, about 6% of albumen, and 12% of gummy matter. All parts of the date palm yield valuable economic products. Its trunk furnishes timber for house-building and furniture; the leaves supply thatch; their footstalks are used as fuel, and also yield a fibre from which cordage is spun.
_Date sugar_ is a valuable commercial product of the East Indies, obtained from the sap or toddy of _Phoenix sylvestris_, the toddy palm, a tree so closely allied to the date palm that it has been supposed to be the parent stock of all the cultivated varieties. The juice, when not boiled down to form sugar, is either drunk fresh, or fermented and distilled to form arrack. The uses of the other parts and products of this tree are the same as those of the date palm products. _Date palm meal_ is obtained from the stem of a small species, _Phoenix farinifera_, growing in the hill country of southern India.
For further details see Sir G. Watt, _Dictionary of the Economic Products of India_ (1892); and _The Date Palm_, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Plant Industry, Bulletin No. 53 (W. T. Swingle), 1904.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Lat. _dactylus_, finger, hence fruit of the date palm, gave O. Fr. _date_, mod. _datte_; distinguish "date," in chronology, from Lat. _datum_, _data_, given, used at the beginning of a letter, &c., to show time and place of writing, e.g. _Datum Romae_.
DATIA, a native state of Central India, in the Bundelkhand agency. It lies in the extreme north-west of Bundelkhand, near Gwalior, and is surrounded on all sides by other states of Central India, except on the east where it meets the United Provinces. The state came under the British government after the treaty of Bassein in 1802. Area, 911 sq. m. Pop. (1901) 173,759. Estimated revenue, L70,000; tribute to Sindhia paid through the British Government, L1000. The chief, whose title is maharaja, is a Rajput of the Bundela clan, being descended from a younger son of a former chief of Orchha. The state suffered from famine in 1896-1897, and again to a less extent in 1899-1900. It is traversed by the branch of the Indian Midland railway from Jhansi to Gwalior. The town of Datia has a railway station, 16 m. from Jhansi. Pop. (1901) 24,071. It is surrounded by a stone wall, enclosing handsome palaces, with gardens; the palace of Bir Singh Deo, of the 17th century, is "one of the finest examples of Hindu domestic architecture in India" (_Imperial Gazetteer of India_, 1908).
DATIVE (Lat. _dativus_, giving or given, from _dare_, to give), the name, in grammar, of the case of the "indirect object," the person or thing to or for whom or which anything is given or done. In law, the word signifies something, such as an office, which may be disposed of at will or pleasure, and is opposed to perpetual. In Scots law the term is applied to persons, duties or powers, appointed or granted by a court of law; thus an "executor-dative" is an executor appointed by the court and not by a testator. It answers, therefore, to the English administrator (q.v.). In Roman law, a _tutor_ was either _dativus_, if expressly nominated in a testament, or _optivus_, if a power of selection was given.
DATOLITE, a mineral species consisting of basic calcium and boron orthosilicate, Ca(BOH)SiO4. It was first observed by J. Esmark in 1806, and named by him from [Greek: dateisthai], "to divide," and [Greek: lithos], "stone," in allusion to the granular structure of the massive mineral. It usually occurs as well-developed glassy crystals bounded by numerous bright faces, many of which often have a more or less pentagonal outline. The crystals were for a long time considered to be orthorhombic, and indeed they approach closely to this system in habit, interfacial angles and optical orientation; humboldtite was the name given by A. Levy in 1823 to monoclinic crystals supposed to be distinct from datolite, but the two were afterwards proved to be identical. The mineral also occurs as masses with a granular to compact texture; when compact the fractured surfaces have the appearance of porcelain. A fibrous variety with a botryoidal or globular surface is known as botryolite. Datolite is white or colourless, often with a greenish tinge; it is transparent or opaque. Hardness 5-5(1/2); specific gravity 3.0.
Datolite is a mineral of secondary origin, and in its mode of occurrence it resembles the zeolites, being found with them in the amygdaloidal cavities of basic igneous rocks such as basalt; it is also found in gneiss and serpentine, and in metalliferous veins and in beds of iron ore. At Arendal in Norway, the original locality for both the crystallized and botryoidal varieties, it is found in a bed of magnetite. In amygdaloidal basaltic rocks it is found at Bishopton in Renfrewshire and near Edinburgh; and as excellent crystallized specimens at several localities in the United States, e.g. at Westfield in Massachusetts, Bergen and Paterson in New Jersey, and in the copper-mining region of Lake Superior. At St Andreasberg in the Harz it occurs both in diabase and in the veins of silver ore. Fine specimens have recently been obtained from Tasmania.
Large crystals of datolite completely altered to chalcedony were formerly found with magnetite in the Haytor iron mine on Dartmoor in Devonshire; to these pseudomorphs the name haytorite has been applied. (L. J. S.)
DAUB, KARL (1765-1836), German Protestant theologian, was born at Cassel on the 20th of March 1765. He studied philosophy, philology and theology at Marburg in 1786, and eventually (1795) became professor ordinarius of theology at Heidelberg, where he died on the 22nd of November 1836. Daub was one of the leaders of a school which sought to reconcile theology and philosophy, and to bring about a speculative reconstruction of orthodox dogma. In the course of his intellectual development, he came successively under the influence of Kant, Schelling and Hegel, and on account of the different phases through which he passed he was called the Talleyrand of German thought. There was one great defect in his speculative theology: he ignored historical criticism. His purpose was, as Otto Pfleiderer says, "to connect the metaphysical ideas, which had been arrived at by means of philosophical dialectic, directly with the persons and events of the Gospel narratives, thus raising these above the region of ordinary experience into that of the supernatural, and regarding the most absurd assertions as philosophically justified. Daub had become so hopelessly addicted to this perverse principle that he deduced not only Jesus as the embodiment of the philosophical idea of the union of God and man, but also Judas Iscariot as the embodiment of the idea of a rival god, or Satan." The three stages in Daub's development are clearly marked in his writings. His _Lehrbuch der Katechetik_ (1801) was written under the spell of Kant. His _Theologumena_ (1806), his _Einleitung in das Studium der christl. Dogmatik_ (1810), and his _Judas Ischarioth_ (2 vols., 1816, 2nd ed., 1818), were all written in the spirit of Schelling, the last of them reflecting a change in Schelling himself from theosophy to positive philosophy. Daub's _Die dogmatische Theologie jetziger Zeit oder die Selbstsucht in der Wissenschaft des Glaubens_ (1833), and _Vorlesungen uber die Prolegomena zur Dogmatik_ (1839), are Hegelian in principle and obscure in language.
See Rosenkranz, _Erinnerungen an Karl Daub_ (1837); D. Fr. Strauss, _Charakteristiken und Kritiken_ (2nd ed., 1844); and cf. F. Lichtenberger, _History of German Theology_ (1889); Otto Pfleiderer, _Development of Theology_ (1890). (M. A. C.)
DAUBENTON, LOUIS-JEAN-MARIE (1716-1800), French naturalist, was born at Montbar (Cote d'Or) on the 29th of May 1716. His father, Jean Daubenton, a notary, destined him for the church, and sent him to Paris to learn theology, but the study of medicine was more to his taste. The death of his father in 1736 set him free to follow his own inclinations, and accordingly in 1741 he graduated in medicine at Reims, and returned to his native town with the intention of practising as a physician. But about this time Buffon, also a native of Montbar, had formed the plan of bringing out a grand treatise on natural history, and in 1742 he invited Daubenton to assist him by providing the anatomical descriptions for that work. The characters of the two men were opposed in almost every respect. Buffon was violent and impatient; Daubenton, gentle and patient; Buffon was rash in his judgments, and imaginative, seeking rather to divine than to discover truths; Daubenton was cautious, and believed nothing he had not himself been able to see or ascertain. From nature each appeared to have received the qualities requisite to temper those of the other; and a more suitable coadjutor than Daubenton it would have been difficult for Buffon to obtain. In the first section of the natural history Daubenton gave descriptions and details of the dissection of 182 species of quadrupeds, thus procuring for himself a high reputation, and exciting the envy of Reaumur, who considered himself as at the head of the learned in natural history in France. A feeling of jealousy induced Buffon to dispense with the services of Daubenton in the preparation of the subsequent parts of his work, which, as a consequence, lost much in precision and scientific value. Buffon afterwards perceived and acknowledged his error, and renewed his intimacy with his former associate. The number of dissertations on natural history which Daubenton published in the memoirs of the French Academy is very great. Zoological descriptions and dissections, the comparative anatomy of recent and fossil animals, vegetable physiology, mineralogy, experiments in agriculture, and the introduction of the merino sheep into France gave active occupation to his energies; and the cabinet of natural history in Paris, of which in 1744 he was appointed keeper and demonstrator, was arranged and considerably enriched by him. From 1775 Daubenton lectured on natural history in the college of medicine, and in 1783 on rural economy at the Alfort school. He was also professor of mineralogy at the Jardin du Roi. As a lecturer he was in high repute, and to the last retained his popularity. In December 1799 he was appointed a member of the senate, but at the first meeting which he attended he fell from his seat in an apoplectic fit, and after a short illness died at Paris on the 1st of January 1800.
DAUBENY, CHARLES GILES BRIDLE (1795-1867), English chemist, botanist and geologist, was the third son of the Rev. James Daubeny, and was born at Stratton in Gloucestershire on the 11th of February 1795. In 1808 he went to Winchester, and in 1810 he was elected to a demyship at Magdalen College, Oxford, where the lectures of Dr Kidd first awakened in him a desire for the cultivation of natural science. In 1814 he graduated with second-class honours, and in the next year he obtained the prize for the Latin essay. From 1815 to 1818 he studied medicine in London and Edinburgh. He took his M.D. degree at Oxford, and was a fellow of the College of Physicians. In 1819, in the course of a tour through France, he made the volcanic district of Auvergne a special study, and his _Letters on the Volcanos of Auvergne_ were published in _The Edinburgh Journal_, 1820-21. He was elected F.R.S. in 1822. By subsequent journeys in Hungary, Transylvania, Italy, Sicily, France and Germany he extended his knowledge of volcanic phenomena; and in 1826 the results of his observations were given in a work entitled _A Description of Active and Extinct Volcanos_ (2nd ed., 1848). In common with Gay Lussac and Davy, he held subterraneous thermic disturbances to be probably due to the contact of water with metals of the alkalis and alkaline earths. In November 1822 Daubeny succeeded Dr Kidd as professor of chemistry at Oxford, and retained this post until 1855; and in 1834 he was appointed to the chair of botany, to which was subsequently attached that of rural economy. At the Oxford botanic garden he conducted numerous experiments upon the effect of changes in soil, light and the composition of the atmosphere upon vegetation. In 1830 he published in the _Philosophical Transactions_ a paper on the iodine and bromine of mineral waters. In the following year appeared his _Introduction to the Atomic Theory_, which was succeeded by a supplement in 1840, and in 1850 by a second edition. In 1831 Daubeny represented the universities of England at the first meeting of the British Association, which at his request held their next session at Oxford. In 1836 he communicated to the Association a report on the subject of mineral and thermal waters. In 1837 he visited the United States, and acquired there the materials for papers on the thermal springs and the geology of North America, read in 1838 before the Ashmolean Society and the British Association. In 1856 he became president of the latter body at its meeting at Cheltenham. In 1841 Daubeny published his _Lectures on Agriculture_; in 1857 his _Lectures on Roman Husbandry_; in 1863 _Climate: an inquiry into the causes of its differences and into its influence on Vegetable Life_; and in 1865 an _Essay on the Trees and Shrubs of the Ancients_, and a _Catalogue of the Trees and Shrubs indigenous to Greece and Italy_. His last literary work was the collection of his _Miscellanies_, published in two volumes, in 1867. In all his undertakings Daubeny was actuated by a practical spirit and a desire for the advancement of knowledge; and his personal influence on his contemporaries was in keeping with the high character of his various literary productions. He died in Oxford on the 12th of December 1867.
See Obituary by John Phillips in _Proceedings of Ashmolean Soc._, 1868.
DAUBIGNY, CHARLES FRANCOIS (1817-1878), French landscape painter, allied in several ways with the Barbizon School, was born in Paris, on the 15th of February 1817, but spent much time as a child at Valmondois, a village on the Oise to the north-west of Paris. Daubigny was the son of an artist, and most of his family were painters. He began to paint very early in life, and at the age of seventeen he took a studio of his own. Within twelve months he had saved enough to go to Italy, where he studied and painted for nearly two years; he then returned to Paris, not to leave it again until, in 1860, he took a house at Auvers on the Oise. By 1837 Daubigny had become famous as a river and landscape painter, although he had been devoting himself as well to drawing in black-and-white, to etching, wood engraving, and lithography. In 1855 his picture, "Lock at Optevoz," now in the Louvre, was purchased by the state; four years later Daubigny was created knight of the Legion of Honour, and in 1874 he was promoted to be an officer. In 1866, at the invitation of Lord, then Mr Leighton and others, he visited London, where, however, he was hurt by his now famous "Moonlight" being badly hung in the Old Royal Academy. But the personal encouragement of his admirers in England made up for the disappointment, and the sale of his picture to a Royal Academician greatly pleased him. In 1870-1871 he again visited London, and subsequently Holland, where he painted a number of river scenes with windmills. In 1874, having returned to Paris, he fell ill, and from that time until he died (on the 19th of February 1878) his work won less distinction than before. In 1904 the municipality of Auvers-sur-Oise decided to erect a bronze monument to Daubigny's memory.
Daubigny's finest pictures were painted between 1864 and 1874, and these for the most part consist of carefully completed landscapes with trees, river and a few ducks. It has curiously been said, yet with some appearance of truth, that when Daubigny liked his pictures himself he added another duck or two, so that the number of ducks often indicates greater or less artistic quality in his pictures. One of his sayings was, "The best pictures do not sell," as he frequently found his finest achievements little understood. Yet although during the latter part of his life he was considered a highly successful painter, the money value of his pictures since his death has increased nearly tenfold. Daubigny is chiefly preferred in his riverside pictures, of which he painted a great number, but although there are two large landscapes by Daubigny in the Louvre, neither is a river view. They are for that reason not so typical as many of his smaller Oise and Seine pictures.
The works of Daubigny are, like Corot's, to be found in many modern collections. His most ambitious canvases are: "Springtime" (1857), in the Louvre; "Borde de la Cure, Morvan" (1864); "Villerville sur Mer" (1864); "Moonlight" (1865); "Andresy sur Oise" (1868); and "Return of the Flock--Moonlight" (1878).
His followers and pupils were his son Karl (who sometimes painted so well that his works are occasionally mistaken for those of his father, though in few cases do they equal his father's mastery), Oudinot, Delpy and Damoye.
See Fred Henriet, _C. Daubigny et son oeuvre_ (Paris, 1878); D. Croal Thomson, _The Barbizon School of Painters_ (London, 1890); J. W. Mollett, _Daubigny_ (London, 1890); J. Claretie, _Peintres et sculpteurs contemporains: Daubigny_ (Paris, 1882); Albert Wolff, _La Capitale de l'art: Ch. Francois Daubigny_ (Paris, 1881). (D. C. T.)
DAUBREE, GABRIEL AUGUSTE (1814-1896), French geologist, was born at Metz, on the 25th of June 1814, and educated at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris. At the age of twenty he had qualified as a mining engineer, and in 1838 he was appointed to take charge of the mines in the Bas-Rhin (Alsace), and subsequently to be professor of mineralogy and geology at the Faculty of Sciences, Strassburg. In 1859 he became engineer in chief of mines, and in 1861 he was appointed professor of geology at the museum of natural history in Paris and was also elected member of the Academy of Sciences. In the following year he became professor of mineralogy at the Ecole des Mines, and in 1872 director of that school. In 1880 the Geological Society of London awarded to him the Wollaston medal. His published researches date from 1841, when the origin of certain tin minerals attracted his attention; he subsequently discussed the formation of bog-iron ore, and worked out in detail the geology of the Bas-Rhin (1852). From 1857 to 1861, while engaged in engineering works connected with the springs of Plombieres, he made a series of interesting observations on thermal waters and their influence on the Roman masonry through which they made their exit. He was, however, especially distinguished for his long-continued and often dangerous experiments on the artificial production of minerals and rocks. He likewise discussed the permeability of rocks by water, and the effects of such infiltration in producing volcanic phenomena; he dealt with the subject of metamorphism, with the deformations of the earth's crust, with earthquakes, and with the composition and classification of meteorites. He died in Paris on the 29th of May 1896.
His publications were: _Etudes et experiences synthetiques sur le metamorphisme et sur la formation des roches cristallines_ (1860); _Etudes synthetiques de geologie experimentale_ (1879); _Les Eaux souterraines a l'epoque actuelle_ (2 vols., 1887); _Le Eaux souterraines aux epoques anciennes_ (1887).
DAUDET, ALPHONSE (1840-1897), French novelist, was born at Nimes on the 13th of May 1840. His family, on both sides, belonged to the _bourgeoisie_. The father, Vincent Daudet, was a silk manufacturer--a man dogged through life by misfortune and failure. The lad, amid much truancy, had but a depressing boyhood. In 1856 he left Lyons, where his schooldays had been mainly spent, and began life as an usher at Alais, in the south. The position proved to be intolerable. As Dickens declared that all through his prosperous career he was haunted in dreams by the miseries of his apprenticeship to the blacking business, so Daudet says that for months after leaving Alais he would wake with horror thinking he was still among his unruly pupils. On the 1st of November 1857 he abandoned teaching, and took refuge with his brother Ernest, only some three years his senior, who was trying, "and thereto soberly," to make a living as a journalist in Paris. Alphonse betook himself to his pen likewise,--wrote poems, shortly collected into a small volume _Les Amoureuses_ (1858), which met with a fair reception,--obtained employment on the _Figaro_, then under Cartier de Villemessant's energetic editorship, wrote two or three plays, and began to be recognized, among those interested in literature, as possessing individuality and promise. Morny, the emperor's all-powerful minister, appointed him to be one of his secretaries,--a post which he held till Morny's death in 1865,--and showed him no small kindness. He had put his foot on the road to fortune.
In 1866 appeared _Lettres de mon moulin_, which won the attention of many readers. The first of his longer books, _Le petit chose_ (1868), did not, however, produce any very popular sensation. It is, in its main feature, the story of his own earlier years told with much grace and pathos. The year 1872 produced the famous _Aventures prodigieuses de Tartarin de Tarascon_, and the three-act piece _L'Arlesienne_. But _Fromont jeune et Risler aine_ (1874) at once took the world by storm. It struck a note, not new certainly in English literature, but comparatively new in French. Here was a writer who possessed the gift of laughter and tears, a writer not only sensible to pathos and sorrow, but also to moral beauty. He could create too. His characters were real and also typical; the _rates_, the men who in life's battle had flashed in the pan, were touched with a master hand. The book was alive. It gave the illusion of a real world. _Jack_, the story of an illegitimate child, a martyr to his mother's selfishness, which followed in 1876, served only to deepen the same impression. Henceforward his career was that of a very successful man of letters,--publishing novel on novel, _Le Nabab_ (1877), _Les Rois en exil_ (1879), _Numa Roumestan_ (1881), _Sapho_ (1884), _L'Immortel_ (1888),--and writing for the stage at frequent intervals,--giving to the world his reminiscences in _Trente ans de Paris_ (1887), and _Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres_ (1888). These, with the three _Tartarins_,--Tartarin the mighty hunter, Tartarin the mountaineer, Tartarin the colonist,--and the admirable short stories, written for the most part before he had acquired fame and fortune, constitute his life work.
Though Daudet defended himself from the charge of imitating Dickens, it is difficult altogether to believe that so many similarities of spirit and manner were quite unsought. What, however, was purely his own was his style. It is a style that may rightly be called "_impressionist_," full of light and colour, not descriptive after the old fashion, but flashing its intended effect by a masterly juxtaposition of words that are like pigments. Nor does it convey, like the style of the Goncourts, for example, a constant feeling of effort. It is full of felicity and charm,--_un charmeur_ Zola has called him. An intimate friend of Edmond de Goncourt (who died in his house), of Flaubert, of Zola, Daudet belonged essentially to the naturalist school of fiction. His own experiences, his surroundings, the men with whom he had been brought into contact, various persons who had played a part, more or less public, in Paris life--all passed into his art. But he vivified the material supplied by his memory. His world has the great gift of life. _L'Immortel_ is a bitter attack on the French Academy, to which august body Daudet never belonged.
Daudet wrote some charming stories for children, among which may be mentioned _La Belle Nivernaise_, the story of an old boat and her crew. His married life--he married in 1867 Julia Allard--seems to have been singularly happy. There was perfect intellectual harmony, and Madame Daudet herself possessed much of his literary gift; she is known by her _Impressions de nature et d'art_ (1879), _L'Enfance d'une Parisienne_ (1883), and by some literary studies written under the pseudonym of Karl Steen. In his later years Daudet suffered from insomnia, failure of health and consequent use of chloral. He died in Paris on the 17th of December 1897.
The story of Daudet's earlier years is told in his brother Ernest Daudet's _Mon frere et moi_. There is a good deal of autobiographical detail in Daudet's _Trente ans de Paris_ and _Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres_, and also scattered in his other books. The references to him in the _Journal des Goncourt_ are numerous. See also L. A. Daudet, _Alphonse Daudet_ (1898), and biographical and critical essays by R. H. Sherard (1894); by A. Gerstmann (1883); by B. Diederich (1900); by A. Hermant (1903), and a bibliography by J. Brivois (1895); also _The Works of Alphonse Daudet_, translated by L. Ensor, H. Frith, E. Bartow (1902, etc.). Criticism of Daudet is also to be found in F. Brunetiere, _Le Roman naturaliste_ (new ed., 1897); J. Lemaitre, _Les Contemporains_ (vols. ii. and iv.); G. Pellissier, _Le Mouvement litteraire au XIX^e siecle_ (1890); A. Symons, _Studies in Prose and Verse_ (1904). (F. T. M.)
DAULATABAD, a hill-fortress in Hyderabad state, India, about 10 m. N.W. of the city of Aurangabad. The former city of Daulatabad (Deogiri) has shrunk into a mere village, though to its earlier greatness witness is still borne by its magnificent fortress, and by remains of public buildings noble even in their decay. The fortress stands on a conical rock crowning a hill that rises almost perpendicularly from the plain to a height of some 600 ft. The outer wall, 2(3/4) m. in circumference, once enclosed the ancient city of Deogiri (Devagiri), and between this and the base of the upper fort are three lines of defences. The fort is a place of extraordinary strength. The only means of access to the summit is afforded by a narrow bridge, with passage for not more than two men abreast, and a long gallery, excavated in the rock, which has for the most part a very gradual upward slope, but about midway is intercepted by a steep stair, the top of which is covered by a grating destined in time of war to form the hearth of a huge fire kept burning by the garrison above. Besides the fortifications Daulatabad contains several notable monuments, of which the chief are the Chand Minar and the Chini Mahal. The Chand Minar, considered one of the most remarkable specimens of Mahommedan architecture in southern India, is a tower 210 ft. high and 70 ft. in circumference at the base, and was originally covered with beautiful Persian glazed tiles. It was erected in 1445 by Ala-ud-din Bahmani to commemorate his capture of the fort. The Chini Mahal, or China Palace, is the ruin of a building once of great beauty. In it Abul Hasan, the last of the Kutb Shahi kings of Golconda, was imprisoned by Aurangzeb in 1687.
Deogiri is said to have been founded c. A.D. 1187 by Bhillama I. the prince who renounced his allegiance to the Chalukyas and established the power of the Yadava dynasty in the west. In 1294 the fort was captured by Ala-ud-din Khilji, and the rajas, so powerful that they were held by the Mussulmans at Delhi to be the rulers of all the Deccan, were reduced to pay tribute. The tribute falling into arrear, Deogiri was again occupied by the Mahommedans under Malik Kafur, in 1307 and 1310, and in 1318 the last raja, Harpal, was flayed alive. Deogiri now became an important base for the operations of the Mussulman conquering expeditions southwards, and in 1339 Mahommed ben Tughlak Shah determined to make it his capital, changed its name to Daulatabad ("Abode of Prosperity"), and made arrangements for transferring to it the whole population of Delhi. The project was interrupted by troubles which summoned him to the north; during his absence the Mussulman governors of the Deccan revolted; and Daulatabad itself fell into the hands of Zafar Khan, the governor of Gulbarga. It remained in the hands of the Bahmanis till 1526, when it was taken by the Nizam Shahis. It was captured by the emperor Akbar, but in 1595 it again surrendered to Ahmad Nizam Shah of Ahmednagar, on the fall of whose dynasty in 1607 it passed into the hands of the usurper, the Nizam Shahi minister Malik Amber, originally an Abyssinian slave, who was the founder of Kharki (the present Aurangabad). His successors held it until their overthrow by Shah Jahan, the Mogul emperor, in 1633; after which it remained in the possession of the Delhi emperors until, after the death of Aurangzeb, it fell to the first nizam of Hyderabad. Its glory, however, had already decayed owing to the removal of the seat of government by the emperors to Aurangabad.
DAUMIER, HONORE (1808-1879), French caricaturist and painter, was born at Marseilles. He showed in his earliest youth an irresistible inclination towards the artistic profession, which his father vainly tried to check by placing him first with a _huissier_, and subsequently with a bookseller. Having mastered the technique of lithography, Daumier started his artistic career by producing plates for music publishers, and illustrations for advertisements; these were followed by anonymous work for publishers, in which he followed the style of Charlet and displayed considerable enthusiasm for the Napoleonic legend. When, in the reign of Louis Philippe, Philipon launched the comic journal, _La Caricature_, Daumier joined its staff, which included such powerful artists as Deveria, Raffet and Grandville, and started upon his pictorial campaign of scathing satire upon the foibles of the bourgeoisie, the corruption of the law and the incompetence of a blundering government. His caricature of the king as "Gargantua" led to Daumier's imprisonment for six months at Ste Pelagie in 1832. The publication of _La Caricature_ was discontinued soon after, but Philipon provided a new field for Daumier's activity when he founded the _Charivari_. For this journal Daumier produced his famous social caricatures, in which bourgeois society is held up to ridicule in the figure of Robert Macaire, the hero of a then popular melodrama. Another series, "_L'histoire ancienne_," was directed against the pseudo-classicism which held the art of the period in fetters. In 1848 Daumier embarked again on his political campaign, still in the service of _Charivari_, which he left in 1860 and rejoined in 1864. In spite of his prodigious activity in the field of caricature--the list of Daumier's lithographed plates compiled in 1904 numbers no fewer than 3958--he found time for flight in the higher sphere of painting. Except for the searching truthfulness of his vision and the powerful directness of his brushwork, it would be difficult to recognize the creator of _Robert Macaire_, of _Les Bas bleus_, _Les Bohemiens de Paris_, and the _Masques_, in the paintings of "Christ and His Apostles" at the Ryks Museum in Amsterdam, or in his "Good Samaritan," "Don Quixote and Sancho Panza," "Christ Mocked," or even in the sketches in the Ionides Collection at South Kensington. But as a painter, Daumier, one of the pioneers of naturalism, was before his time, and did not meet with success until in 1878, a year before his death, when M. Durand-Ruel collected his works for exhibition at his galleries and demonstrated the full range of the genius of the man who has been well called the Michelangelo of caricature. At the time of this exhibition Daumier, totally blind, was living in a cottage at Valmondois, which was placed at his disposal by Corot, and where he breathed his last in 1879. An important exhibition of his works was held at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1900.
His life and art were made the subject of an important volume by Arsene Alexandre in 1888; see also Gustave Geffroy, _Daumier_ (Paris, Libraire de l'Art), and Henri Frantz and Octave Uzanne, _Daumier and Gavarni_ (London, _The Studio_, 1904), with a large selection of the artist's work.
DAUN (DHAUN), LEOPOLD JOSEF, COUNT VON (1705-1766), prince of Thiano, Austrian field marshal, was born at Vienna on the 24th of September 1705. He was intended for the church, but his natural inclination for the army, in which his father and grandfather had been distinguished generals, proved irresistible. In 1718 he served in the campaign in Sicily, in his father's regiment. He had already risen to the rank of colonel when he saw further active service in Italy and on the Rhine in the War of the Polish Succession (1734-35). He continued to add to his distinctions in the war against the Turks (1737-39), in which he attained the rank of a general officer. In the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-42), Daun, already a lieutenant field marshal in rank, distinguished himself by the careful leadership which was afterwards his greatest military quality. He was present at Chotusitz and Prague, and led the advanced guard of Khevenhuller's army in the victorious Danube campaign of 1743. Field Marshal Traun, who succeeded Khevenhuller in 1744, thought equally highly of Daun, and entrusted him with the rearguard of the Austrian army when it escaped from the French to attack Frederick the Great. He held important commands in the battles of Hohenfriedberg and Soor, and in the same year (1745) was promoted to the rank of _Feldzeugmeister_. After this he served in the Low Countries, and was present at the battle of Val. He was highly valued by Maria Theresa, who made him commandant of Vienna and a knight of the Golden Fleece, and in 1754 he was elevated to the rank of field marshal.
During the interval of peace that preceded the Seven Years' War he was engaged in carrying out an elaborate scheme for the reorganization of the Austrian army; and it was chiefly through his instrumentality that the military academy was established at Wiener-Neustadt in 1751. He was not actively employed in the first campaigns of the war, but in 1757 he was placed at the head of the army which was raised to relieve Prague. On the 18th of June 1757 Daun defeated Frederick for the first time in his career in the desperately fought battle of Kolin (q.v.). In commemoration of this brilliant exploit the queen immediately instituted a military order bearing her name, of which Daun was nominated first grand cross. The union of the relieving army with the forces of Prince Charles at Prague reduced Daun to the position of second in command, and as such he took part in the pursuit of the Prussians and the victory of Breslau. Frederick now reappeared and won the most brilliant victory of the age at Leuthen. Daun was present on that field, but was not held accountable for the disaster, and when Prince Charles resigned his command, Daun was appointed in his place. With the campaign of 1758 began the war of manoeuvre in which Daun, if he missed, through over-caution, many opportunities of crushing the Prussians, at least maintained a steady and cool resistance to the fiery strategy of Frederick. In 1758 Major-General Loudon, acting under Daun's instructions, forced the king to raise the siege of Olmutz, and later in the same year Daun himself surprised Frederick at Hochkirch and inflicted a severe defeat upon him (October 14th). In the following year the war of manoeuvre continued, and on the 20th and 21st of November he surrounded the entire corps of General Finck at Maxen, forcing the Prussians to surrender. These successes were counterbalanced in the following year by the defeat of Loudon at Liegnitz, which was attributed to the dilatoriness of Daun, and Daun's own defeat in the great battle of Torgau (q.v.). In this engagement Daun was so severely wounded that he had to return to Vienna to recruit.
He continued to command until the end of the war, and afterwards worked with the greatest energy at the reorganization of the imperial forces. In 1762 he had been appointed president of the _Hofkriegsrath_. He died on the 5th of February 1766. By the order of Maria Theresa a monument to his memory was erected in the church of the Augustinians, with an inscription styling him the "saviour of her states." In 1888 the 56th regiment of Austrian infantry was named after him. As a general Daun has been reproached for the dilatoriness of his operations, but wariness was not misplaced in opposing a general like Frederick, who was quick and unexpected in his movements beyond all precedent. Less defence perhaps may be made for him on the score of inability to profit by a victory.
See _Der deutsche Fabius Cunctator, oder Leben u. Thaten S. E. des H. Leopold Reichsgrafen v. Dhaun K.K.F.M._ (Frankfort and Leipzig, 1759-1760), and works dealing with the wars of the period.
DAUNOU, PIERRE CLAUDE FRANCOIS (1761-1840), French statesman and historian, was born at Boulogne-sur-Mer, and after a brilliant career in the school of the Oratorians there, joined the order in Paris in 1777. He was professor in various seminaries from 1780 till 1787, when he was ordained priest. He was already known in literary circles by several essays and poems, when the revolution opened a wider career. He threw himself with ardour into the struggle for liberty, and refused to be silenced in his advocacy of the civil constitution of the clergy by the offer of high office in the church. Elected to the Convention by Pas-le-Calais, he associated himself with the Girondists, but strongly opposed the death sentence on the king. He took little part in the struggle against the Mountain, but was involved in the overthrow of his friends, and was imprisoned for a year. In December 1794 he returned to the Convention, and was the principal author of the constitution of the year III. It seems to have been due to his Girondist ideas that the Ancients were given the right of convoking the _corps legislatif_ outside Paris, an expedient which made possible Napoleon's _coup d'etat_ of the 18th and 19th Brumaire. The creation of the Institute was also due to Daunou, who drew up the plan for its organization. His energy was largely responsible for the suppression of the royalist insurrection of the 13th Vendemiaire, and the important place he occupied at the beginning of the Directory is indicated by the fact that he was elected by twenty-seven departments as member of the Council of Five Hundred, and became its first president. He had himself set the age qualification of the directors at forty, and thus debarred himself as candidate, as he was only thirty-four. The direction of affairs having passed into the hands of Talleyrand and his associates, Daunou turned once more to literature, but in 1798 he was sent to Rome to organize the republic there, and again, almost against his will, he lent his aid to Napoleon in the preparation of the constitution of the year VIII. His attitude towards Napoleon was not lacking in independence, but in this controversy with the pope, the emperor was able again to secure from him the learned treatise _Sur la puissance temporelle du Pape_ (1809). Still he took little part in the new regime, with which at heart he had no sympathy, and turned more and more to literature. At the Restoration he was deprived of the post of archivist of the empire, which he had held from 1807, but from 1819 to 1830 (when he again became archivist of the kingdom) he held the chair of history and ethics at the College de France, and his courses were among the most famous of that age of public lectures. During the reign of Louis Philippe he received many honours. In 1839 he was made a peer. He died in 1840.
In politics Daunou was a Girondist without combativeness; a confirmed republican, who lent himself always to the policy of conciliation, but whose probity remained unchallenged. He belonged essentially to the centre, and lacked both the genius and the temperament which would secure for him a commanding place in a revolutionary era. As an historian his breadth of view is remarkable for his time; for although thoroughly imbued with the classical spirit of the 18th century, he was able to do justice to the middle ages. His _Discours sur l'etat des lettres au XIII^e siecle_, in the sixteenth volume of the _Histoire litteraire de France_, is a remarkable contribution to that vast collection, especially as coming from an author so profoundly learned in the ancient classics. Daunou's lectures at the College de France, collected and published after his death, fill twenty volumes (_Cours d'etudes historiques_, 1842-1846). They treat principally of the criticism of sources and the proper method of writing history, and occupy an important place in the evolution of the scientific study of history in France. All his works were written in the most elegant style and chaste diction; but apart from his share in the editing of the _Historiens de la France_, they were mostly in the form of separate articles on literary and historical subjects. Personally Daunou was reserved and somewhat austere, preserving in his habits a strange mixture of bourgeois and monk. His indefatigable work as archivist in the time when Napoleon was transferring so many treasures to Paris is not his least claim to the gratitude of scholars.
See Mignet, _Notice historique sur la vie et les travaux de Daunou_ (Paris, 1843); Taillandier, _Documents bibliographiques sur Daunou_ (Paris, 1847), including a full list of his works; Sainte-Beuve, _Daunou_ in his _Portraits Contemporains_, t. iii. (unfavourable and somewhat unfair).
DAUPHIN (Lat. _Delphinus_), an ancient feudal title in France, borne only by the counts and dauphins of Vienne, the dauphins of Auvergne, and from 1364 by the eldest sons of the kings of France. The origin of this curious title is obscure and has been the subject of much ingenious controversy; but it now seems clear that it was in the first instance a proper name. Among the Norsemen, and in the countries colonized by them, the name Dolphin or Dolfin (_dolfr_, "a wound") was fairly common, e.g. in the north of England; thus a Dolfin is mentioned among the tenants-in-chief in Domesday Book, and there was a Dolphin, lord of Carlisle, towards the end of the 11th century. It has thus been conjectured by some that the dauphins of Vienne derived their title from Teutonic sources through Germany. But in the south, too, the name--not necessarily derived from the same root--was not unknown, though exceedingly rare, and was moreover illustrated by two conspicuous figures in the Catholic martyrology: St Delphinus, bishop of Bordeaux from 380 to 404, and St Annemundus, surnamed Dalfinus, bishop of Lyons from c. 650 to 657. Whatever its origin, this name was borne by Guigo, or Guigue IV. (d. 1142), count of Albon and Grenoble, as an additional name, during the lifetime of his father, and was also adopted by his son Guigue V. Beatrice, daughter and heiress of Guigue V., whose second husband was Hugh III., duke of Burgundy, bestowed the name on their son Andre, to recall his descent from the ancient house of the counts of Albon, and in the charters he is called sometimes Andreas Dalphinus, sometimes Dalphinus simply, but his style is still "count of Albon and Vienne." His successors Guigue VI. (d. 1270) and John I. (d. 1282) call themselves sometimes Delphinus, sometimes Delphini, the name being obviously treated as a patronymic, and in the latter form it was borne by the sons of the reigning "dauphin." But even under Guigue VI. foreigners had begun to confuse the name with a title of dignity, an imperial diploma of 1248 describing Guigue as "Guigo Dalphinus Viennensis."
It was not until the third dynasty, founded by the marriage of Anne, heiress of John I., with Humbert, lord of La Tour du Pin, that "dauphin" became definitely established as a title. Humbert not only assumed the name of Delphinus, but styled himself regularly Dauphin of the Viennois (Dalphinus Viennensis), and in a treaty concluded in 1285 between Humbert and Robert, duke of Burgundy, the word _delphinatus_ (Dauphine) appears for the first time, as a synonym for _comitatus_ (county). In 1349 Humbert II., the last of his race, sold Dauphine to Charles of Valois, who, when he became king of France in 1364, transferred it to his eldest son. From that time the eldest sons of the kings of France were always either actual or titular dauphins of the Viennois. The "canting arms" of a dolphin, which they quartered with the royal _fleurs de lys_, were originally assumed by Dauphin, count of Clermont, instead of the arms of Auvergne (the earliest extant example is appended to a deed of 1199), and from him they were borrowed by the counts of the Viennois. Guigue VI. used this device on his secret seal from his accession, the earliest extant example dating from 1237, but, though no specimens have survived, M. Prudhomme thinks it probable that the dolphin was also borne by Andre Dauphin. It was also assumed by Guigue V., count of Forez (1203-1241), a descendant of Guigue Raymond of the Viennois, count of Forez, in right of his wife Ida Raymonde. It is thus abundantly clear that the name of Dauphin was not assumed from the armorial device, but vice versa.
The eldest son of the French king was sometimes called "the king dauphin" (_le roy daulphin_), to distinguish him from the dauphin of Auvergne, who was known, since Auvergne became an appanage of the royal house, as "the prince dauphin." The dauphinate of Auvergne, which is to be distinguished from the county, dates from 1155, when William VII., count of Auvergne, was deposed by his uncle William VIII. "the Old." William VII. had married a daughter of Guigue IV. Dauphin, after whom their son was named Dauphin (Delphinus). The name continued, as in Viennois, as a patronymic, and was not used as a title until 1281, when Robert II., count of Clermont, in his will, styles himself for the first time Dauphin of Auvergne (_Alvernie delphinus_) for the portion of the county of Auvergne left to his house. In 1428 Jeanne, heiress of the dauphin Beraud III., married Louis de Bourbon, count of Montpensier (d. 1486), thus bringing the dauphinate into the royal house of France. It was annexed to the crown in 1693.
See A. Prudhomme, "De l'origine et du sens des mots dauphin et dauphine" in _Bibliotheque de l'Ecole des Chartes_, liv. an. 1893 (Paris, 1893).
DAUPHINE, one of the old provinces (the name being still in current use in the country) of pre-Revolutionary France, in the south-east portion of France, between Provence and Savoy; since 1790 it forms the departments of the Isere, the Drome and the Hautes Alpes.
After the death of the last king of Burgundy, Rudolf III., in 1032, the territories known later as Dauphine (as part of his realm) reverted to the far-distant emperor. Much confusion followed, out of which the counts of Albon (between Valence and Vienne) gradually came to the front. The first dynasty ended in 1162 with Guigue V., whose daughter and heiress, Beatrice, carried the possessions of her house to her husband, Hugh III., duke of Burgundy. Their son, Andre, continued the race, this second dynasty making many territorial acquisitions, among them (by marriage) the Embrunais and the Gapencais in 1232. In 1282 the second dynasty ended in another heiress, Anna, who carried all to her husband, Humbert, lord of La Tour du Pin (between Lyons and Grenoble). The title of the chief of the house was Count (later Dauphin) of the Viennois, _not_ of Dauphine. (For the origin of the terms Dauphin and Dauphine see DAUPHIN.) Humbert II. (1333-1349), grandson of the heiress Anna, was the last independent Dauphin, selling his dominions in 1349 to Charles of Valois, who on his accession to the throne of France as Charles V. bestowed Dauphine on his eldest son, and the title was borne by all succeeding eldest sons of the kings of France. In 1422 the Diois and the Valentinois, by the will of the last count, passed to the eldest son of Charles VI., and in 1424 were annexed to the Dauphine. Louis (1440-1461), later Louis XI. of France, was the last Dauphin who occupied a semi-independent position, Dauphine being annexed to the crown in 1456. The suzerainty of the emperor (who in 1378 had named the Dauphin "Imperial Vicar" within Dauphine and Provence) gradually died out. In the 16th century the names of the reformer Guillaume Farel (1489-1565) and of the duke of Lesdiguieres (1543-1626) are prominent in Dauphine history. The "States" of Dauphine (dating from about the middle of the 14th century) were suspended by Louis XIII. in 1628, but their unauthorized meeting (on the 21st of July 1788) in the tennis court (_Salle du Jeu de Paume_) of the castle of Vizille, near Grenoble, was one of the earliest premonitory signs of the great French Revolution of 1789. It was at Laffrey, near Grenoble, that Napoleon (March 7th, 1815) was first acclaimed by his old soldiers sent to arrest him.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--J. Brun-Durand, _Dictionnaire topographique du departement de la Drome_ (Paris, 1891); Jules Chevalier, _Essai historique sur l'eglise et la ville de Die_, Montelimar and Valence (2 vols., 1888 and 1896); W. A. B. Coolidge, H. Duhamel and Felix Perrin, _Climbers' Guide to the Central Alps of the Dauphiny_ (a revision of a French work by the same, issued at Grenoble in 1887), London, 1892 (new ed. 1905); J. J. Guiffrey, _Histoire de la reunion du Dauphine a la France_ (Paris, 1868); Joanne, _Dauphine_ (Paris, 1905); A. Prudhomme, _Histoire de Grenoble_ (Grenoble, 1888); Ib., "De l'origine des mots 'Dauphin' et Dauphine" (article in vol. liv. (1893) of the _Bibliotheque de l'Ecole des Chartes_); A. Rochas, _Biographie du Dauphine_ (2 vols., Paris, 1856); J. Roman, _Dictionnaire topographique_ (Paris, 1884); _Tableau historique_ (Paris, 2 vols., 1887 and 1890); and _Repertoire archeologique du departement des Hautes-Alpes_ (Paris, 1888); J. Roman, _Histoire de la ville de Gap_ (Gap, 1892); A. De Terrebasse, _Notice sur les Dauphins de Viennois_ (Vienne, 1875); J. M. De Valbonnais, _Histoire de Dauphine_ (2 vols., Geneva, 1722); J. A. Felix Faure, _Les Assemblees de Vizille et de Romans_, 1788 (Paris, 1887); O. Chenavas, _La Revolution de 1788 en Dauphine_ (Grenoble, 1888); C. Lory, _Description geologique du Dauphine_ (Paris, 1860). (W. A. B. C.)
DAURAT (or DORAT), JEAN (in Lat. AURATUS), (1508-1588), French poet and scholar, and member of the Pleiade, was born at Limoges in 1508. His name was originally Dinemandy. He belonged to a noble family, and, after studying at the college of Limoges, came up to Paris to be presented to Francis I., who made him tutor to his pages. He rapidly gained an immense reputation as a classical scholar. As a private tutor in the house of Lazare de Baif, he had J. A. de Baif for his pupil. His son, Louis, showed great precocity, and at the age of ten translated into French verse one of his father's Latin pieces; his poems were published with his father's. Jean Daurat became the director of the College de Coqueret, where he had among his pupils, besides Baif, Ronsard, Remy, Belleau and Pontus de Tyard. Joachim du Bellay was added by Ronsard to this group; and these five young poets, under the direction of Daurat, formed a society for the reformation of the French language and literature. They increased their number to seven by the initiation of the dramatist Etienne Jodelle, and thereupon they named themselves La Pleiade, in emulation of the seven Greek poets of Alexandria. The election of Daurat as their president proved the weight of his personal influence, and the value his pupils set on the learning to which he introduced them, but as a writer of French verse he is the least important of the seven. Meanwhile he collected around him a sort of Academy, and stimulated the students on all sides to a passionate study of Greek and Latin poetry. He himself wrote incessantly in both those languages, and was styled the Modern Pindar. His influence extended beyond the bounds of his own country, and he was famous as a scholar in England, Italy and Germany. In 1556 he was appointed professor of Greek at the College Royale, a post which he continued to hold until, in 1567, he resigned it in favour of his nephew, Nicolas Goulu. Charles IX. gave him the title of _poeta regius_. His flow of language was the wonder of his time; he is said to have composed more than 15,000 Greek and Latin verses. The best of these he published at Paris in 1586 as _J. Aurati Lemovicis poetae et interpretis regii poemata_. He died at Paris on the 1st of November 1588, having survived all his illustrious pupils of the Pleiade, except Pontus de Tyard. He was a little, restless man, of untiring energy, rustic in manner and appearance. His unequalled personal influence over the most graceful minds of his age gives him an importance in the history of literature for which his own somewhat vapid writings do not fully account.
The _Oeuvres poetiques_ in the vernacular of Jean Daurat were edited (1875) with biographical notice and bibliography by Ch. Marty-Laveaux in his _Pleiade francaise_.
DAVENANT, CHARLES (1656-1714), English economist, eldest son of Sir William Davenant, the poet, was born in London, and educated at Cheam grammar school and Balliol College, Oxford, but left the university without taking a degree. At the age of nineteen he had composed a tragedy, _Circe_, which met with some success, but he soon turned his attention to law, and having taken the degree of LL.D., he became a member of Doctors' Commons. He was member of parliament successively for St Ives, Cornwall, and for Great Bedwyn. He held the post of commissioner of excise from 1683 to 1689, and that of inspector-general of exports and imports from 1705 till his death in 1714. He was also secretary to the commission appointed to treat for the union with Scotland. As an economist, he must be classed as a strong supporter of the mercantile theory, and in his economic pamphlets--as distinct from his political writings--he takes up an eclectic position, recommending governmental restrictions on colonial commerce as strongly as he advocates freedom of exchange at home. Of his writings, a complete edition of which was published in London in 1771, the following are the more important:--_An Essay on the East India Trade_ (1697); _Two Discourses on the Public Revenues and Trade of England_ (1698); _An Essay on the probable means of making the people gainers in the balance of Trade_ (1699); _A Discourse on Grants and Resumptions and Essays on the Balance of Power_ (1701).
DAVENANT (or D'AVENANT), SIR WILLIAM (1606-1668), English poet and dramatist, was baptized on the 3rd of March 1606; he was born at the Crown Inn, Oxford, of which his father, a wealthy vintner, was proprietor. It was stated that Shakespeare always stopped at this house in passing through the city of Oxford, and out of his known or rumoured admiration of the hostess, a very fine woman, there sprang a scandalous story which attributed Davenant's paternity to Shakespeare, a legend which there is reason to believe Davenant himself encouraged, but which later criticism has cast aside as spurious. In 1621 the vintner was made mayor of Oxford, and in the same year his son left the grammar school of All Saints, where his master had been Edward Sylvester, and was entered an undergraduate of Lincoln College, Oxford. He did not stay at the university, however, long enough to take a degree, but was hurried away to appear at court as a page, in the retinue of the gorgeous duchess of Richmond. From her service he passed into that of Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, in whose house he remained until the murder of that eminent man in 1628. This blow threw him upon the world, not altogether without private means, but greatly in need of a profitable employment.
He turned to the stage for subsistence, and in 1629 produced his first play, the tragedy of _Albovine_. It was not a very brilliant performance, but it pleased the town, and decided the poet to pursue a dramatic career. The next year saw the production at Blackfriars of _The Cruel Brother_, a tragedy, and _The Just Italian_, a tragi-comedy. Inigo Jones, the court architect, for whom Ben Jonson had long supplied the words of masques and complimentary pieces, quarrelled with his great colleague in the year 1634, and applied to William Davenant for verses. The result was _The Temple of Love_, performed by the queen and her ladies at Whitehall on Shrove Tuesday, 1634, and printed in that year. Another masque, _The Triumphs of the Prince D'Amour_, followed in 1636. The poet returned to the legitimate drama by the publication of the tragi-comedy of _The Platonic Lovers_, and the famous comedy of _The Wits_, in 1636, the latter of which, however, had been licensed in 1633. The masque of _Britannica Triumphans_ (1637) brought him into some trouble, for it was suppressed as a punishment for its first performance having been arranged for a Sunday. By this time Davenant had, however, thoroughly ingratiated himself with the court; and on the death of Ben Jonson in 1637 he was rewarded with the office of poet-laureate, to the exclusion of Thomas May, who considered himself entitled to the honour. It was shortly after this event that Davenant collected his minor lyrical pieces in a volume entitled _Madagascar and other Poems_ (1638); and in 1639 he became manager of the new theatre in Drury Lane. The civil war, however, put a check upon this prosperous career; and he was among the most active partisans of royalty through the whole of that struggle for supremacy.
As early as May 1642, Davenant was accused before the Long Parliament of being mainly concerned in a scheme to seduce the army to overthrow the Commons. He was accordingly apprehended at Faversham, and imprisoned for two months in London; he then attempted to escape to France, and succeeded in reaching Canterbury, where he was recaptured. Escaping a second time, he made good his way to the queen, with whom he remained in France until he volunteered to carry over to England some military stores for the army of his old friend the earl of Newcastle, by whom he was induced to enter the service as lieutenant-general of ordnance. He acquitted himself with so much bravery and skill that, after the siege of Gloucester, in 1643, he was knighted by the king. After the battle of Naseby he retired to Paris, where he became a Roman Catholic, and spent some months in the composition of his epic poem of _Gondibert_. In 1646 he was sent by the queen on a mission to Charles I., then at Newcastle, to advise him to "part with the church for his peace and security." The king dismissed him with some sharpness, and Davenant returned to Paris, where he was the guest of Lord Jermyn. In 1650 he took the command of a colonizing expedition that set sail from France to Virginia, but was captured in the Channel by a parliamentary man-of-war, which took him back to the Isle of Wight. Imprisoned in Cowes castle until 1651, he tempered the discomfort and suspense of his condition by continuing the composition of _Gondibert_. He was sent up to the Tower to await his trial for high treason, but just as the storm was about to break over his head, all cleared away. It is believed that the personal intercession of Milton led to this result. Another account is that he was released by the desire of two aldermen of York, once his prisoners, whom he had allowed to escape. Davenant, released from prison, immediately published _Gondibert_, the work on which his fame mainly rests, a chivalric epic in the four-line stanza which Sir John Davies had made popular by his _Nosce teipsum_, the influence of which is strongly marked in the philosophical passages of _Gondibert_. It is a cumbrous, dull production, but is relieved with a multitude of fine and felicitous passages, and lends itself most happily to quotation.
During the civil war one of his plays had been printed, the tragedy of _The Unfortunate Lovers_, in 1643. One of his best plays, _Love and Honour_, was published in 1649, but appears to have been acted long before. He found that there were many who desired him to recommence his theatrical career. Such a step, however, was absolutely forbidden by Puritan law. Davenant, therefore, by the help of some influential friends, obtained permission to open a sort of theatre at Rutland House, in Charterhouse Yard, where, on the 21st of May 1656, he began a series of representations, which he called _operas_, as an inoffensive term. This word was then first introduced into the English language. The opening piece was a kind of dialogue defending the drama in the abstract. This was followed by his own _Siege of Rhodes_, printed the same year, which was performed with stage decorations and machinery of a kind hitherto quite unthought of in England. Two other innovations in its production were the introduction of recitative and the appearance of a woman, Mrs Coleman, on the stage. He continued until the Restoration to produce ephemeral works of this kind, only one of which, _The Cruelty of the Spaniards in Peru_, in 1658, was of sufficient literary merit to survive. In 1660 he had the infinite satisfaction of being able to preserve the life of that glorious poet who had, nine years before, saved his own from a not less imminent danger. The mutual relations of Milton and Davenant do honour to the generosity of two men who, sincerely opposed in politics, knew how to forget their personal anger in their common love of letters. In 1659 Davenant suffered a short imprisonment for complicity in Sir George Booth's revolt. Under Charles II. Davenant flourished in the dramatic world; he opened a new theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields, which he called the Duke's; and he introduced a luxury and polish into the theatrical life which it had never before known in England. Under his management, the great actors of the Restoration, Betterton and his coevals, took their peculiar French style and appearance; and the ancient simplicity of the English stage was completely buried under the tinsel of decoration and splendid scenery. Davenant brought out six new plays in the Duke's Theatre, _The Rivals_ (1668), an adaptation of _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, which Davenant never owned, _The Man's the Master_ (1669), comedies translated from Scarron, _News from Plymouth_, _The Distresses_, _The Siege_, _The Fair Favourite_, tragi-comedies, all of which were printed after his death, and only one of which survived their author on the stage. He died at his house in Lincoln's Inn Fields on the night of the 7th of April 1668, and two days afterwards was buried in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, with the inscription "O rare Sir William Davenant!" In 1672 his writings were collected in folio. His last work had been to travesty Shakespeare's _Tempest_ in company with Dryden.
The personal character, adventures and fame of Davenant, and more especially his position as a leading reformer, or rather debaser, of the stage, have always given him a prominence in the history of literature which his writings hardly justify. His plays are utterly unreadable, and his poems are usually stilted and unnatural. With Cowley he marks the process of transition from the poetry of the imagination to the poetry of the intelligence; but he had far less genius than Cowley, and his influence on English drama must be condemned as wholly deplorable. (E. G.)
DAVENPORT, EDWARD LOOMIS (1816-1877), American actor, born in Boston, made his first appearance on the stage in Providence in support of Junius Brutus Booth. Afterwards he went to England, where he supported Mrs Anna Cora Mowatt (Ritchie) (1819-1870), Macready and others. In 1854 he was again in the United States, appearing in Shakespearian plays and in dramatizations of Dickens's novels. As Bill Sykes he was especially successful, and his Sir Giles Overreach and Brutus were also greatly admired. He died at Canton, Pennsylvania, on the 1st of September 1877. In 1849 he had married Fanny Vining (Mrs Charles Gill) (d. 1891), an English actress also in Mrs Mowatt's company. Their daughter FANNY (LILY GIPSY) DAVENPORT (1850-1898) appeared in America at the age of twelve as the king of Spain in _Faint Heart Never Won Fair Lady_. Later (1869) she was a member of Daly's company; and afterwards, with a company of her own, acted with especial success in Sardou's _Fedora_ (1883), _Cleopatra_ (1890), and similar plays. Her last appearance was on the 25th of March 1898, shortly before her death.
DAVENPORT, ROBERT (fl. 1623-1639), English dramatist, is mentioned as the author of a play licensed in 1624 under the title of _Henry I._ In 1653 _Henry I. and Henry II._ was entered at Stationers' Hall by Humphrey Moseley with a second part said to be the work of Davenport and Shakespeare. Of this play or plays nothing has been discovered, but _King John and Matilda_ (printed 1655), which probably dates from about the same time, has survived. Throughout the play, as in its closing scene quoted by Charles Lamb in his _Dramatic Specimens_, there is much "passion and poetry" which saves the piece from being classed as pure melodrama. _The City-Night-Cap_ was licensed in 1624, but not printed until 1661. The underplot of this unsavoury play was borrowed from Cervantes and Boccaccio, and Mrs Aphra Behn's _Amorous Prince_ (1671) is an adaptation from it. _A New Tricke to Cheat the Divell_ (printed 1639) is a farcical comedy, which contains among other things the idea of the popular supper story which reappears in Hans Andersen's _Little Claus and Big Claus_. As told by Davenport the story closely resembles the _Scottish Freires of Berwick_, which was printed in 1603. Three other plays entered in the Stationers' Register as Davenport's are lost, and he collaborated in two plays with Thomas Drue.
Davenport's plays were reprinted by A. H. Bullen in _Old English Plays_ (new series, 1890). The volume includes two didactic poems, which first saw the light in 1623.
DAVENPORT, a city and the county seat of Scott county, Iowa, U.S.A., on the Mississippi river, opposite Rock Island, Illinois, with which it is connected by two fine bridges and by a ferry. It is the third largest city in the state. Pop. (1890) 26,872; (1900) 35,254, including 8479 foreign-born (6111 German), and 19,230 of foreign parentage (13,294 German); (1905, state census) 39,797; (1910) 43,028. Davenport is served by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, the Chicago, Milwaukee & St Paul, the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific, the Iowa & Illinois (interurban), and the Davenport, Rock Island & North Western railways; opposite the city is the western terminus of the Illinois and Mississippi, or Hennepin, Canal (which connects the Mississippi and Illinois rivers). Davenport lies on the slope of a bluff affording extensive views of landscape and river scenery. In the city are an excellent public library, an Academy of Sciences, several turn-halls and other German social organizations, the Iowa soldiers' orphans' home, Brown business college, and several minor Roman Catholic institutions. Davenport is an episcopal see of the Roman Catholic and the Protestant Episcopal churches. The city has a large commerce and trade by water and rail in coal and grain, which are produced in the vicinity, is of special importance. With Rock Island and Moline it forms one great commercial unit. Among Davenport's manufactures are the products of foundries and machine shops, and of flouring, grist and planing mills; glucose syrup and products; locomotives, steel cars and car parts, washing machines, waggons, carriages, agricultural implements, buttons, macaroni, crackers and brooms. The value of the total factory product for 1905 was $13,695,978, an increase of 38.7% over that of 1900. Davenport was founded in 1835, under the leadership of Colonel George Davenport; it was incorporated as a town in 1838, and was chartered as a city in 1851.
DAVENTRY, a market town and municipal borough in the Southern parliamentary division of Northamptonshire, England, 74 m. N.W. from London by the London & North Western railway. Pop. (1901) 3780. It is picturesquely situated on a sloping site in a rich undulating country. On the adjacent Borough Hill are extensive earthworks, and the discovery of remains here and at Burnt Walls, immediately south, proves the existence of a considerable Roman station. The chief industry of the town is the manufacture of boots and shoes. The borough is under a mayor, four aldermen and twelve councillors. Area, 3633 acres.
In spite of the Roman remains on Borough Hill, nothing is known of the town itself until the time of the Domesday Survey, when the manor consisting of eight hides belonged to the countess Judith, the Conqueror's niece. According to tradition, Daventry was created a borough by King John, but there is no extant charter before that of Elizabeth in 1576, by which the town was incorporated under the name of the bailiff, burgesses and commonalty of the borough of Daventry. The bailiff was to be chosen every year in the Moot Hall and to be assisted by fourteen principal burgesses and a recorder. James I. confirmed this charter in 1605-1606, and Charles II. in 1674-1675 granted a new charter. The "quo warranto" rolls show that a market every Wednesday and a fair on St Augustine's day were granted to Simon son of Walter by King John. The charter of 1576 confirms this market and fair to the burgesses, and grants them two new fairs each continuing for two days, on Tuesday after Easter and on the feast of St Matthew the Apostle. Wednesday is still the market day. The town was an important coaching centre, and there was a large local industry in the manufacture of whips. During the civil wars Daventry was the headquarters of Charles I. in the summer of 1645, immediately before the battle of Naseby, at which he was defeated. A Cluniac priory founded here shortly after the Conquest has left no remains.
DAVEY OF FERNHURST, HORACE DAVEY, BARON (1833-1907), English judge, son of Peter Davey, of Horton, Bucks, was born on the 30th of August 1833, and educated at Rugby and University College, Oxford. He took a double first-class in classics and mathematics, was senior mathematical scholar and Eldon law scholar, and was elected a fellow of his college. In 1861 he was called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn, and read in the chambers of Mr (afterwards Vice-Chancellor) Wickens. Devoting himself to the Chancery side, he soon acquired a large practice, and in 1875 became a Q.C. In 1880 he was returned to parliament as a Liberal for Christchurch, Hants, but lost his seat in 1885. On Gladstone's return to power in 1886 he was appointed solicitor-general and was knighted, but had no seat in the House, being defeated at both Ipswich and Stockport in 1886; in 1888 he found a seat at Stockton-on-Tees, but was rejected by that constituency in 1892. As an equity lawyer Sir Horace Davey ranked among the finest intellects and the most subtle pleaders ever known at the English bar. He was standing counsel to the university of Oxford, and senior counsel to the Charity Commissioners, and was engaged in all the important Chancery suits of his time. Among the chief leading cases in which he took a prominent part were those of _The Mogul Steamship Company_ v. _M'Gregor_, 1892, _Boswell_ v. _Coaks_, 1884, _Erlanger_ v. _New Sombrero Company_, 1878, and the _Ooregum Gold Mines Company_ v. _Roper_, 1892; he was counsel for the promoters in the trial of the bishop of Lincoln, and leading counsel in the Berkeley peerage case. In 1862 he married Miss Louisa Donkin, who, with two sons and four daughters, survived him. In 1893 he was raised to the bench as a lord justice of appeal, and in the next year was made a lord of appeal in ordinary and a life peer. He died in London on the 20th of February 1907. Lord Davey's great legal knowledge was displayed in his judgments no less than at the bar. In legislation he took no conspicuous part, but he was a keen promoter of the act passed in 1906 for the checking of gambling.
DAVID (a Hebrew name meaning probably _beloved_[1]),
Source.
in the Bible, the son of Jesse, king of Judah and Israel, and founder of the royal Judaean dynasty at Jerusalem. The chronology of his period is uncertain: the usual date, 1055-1015 B.C., is probably thirty years to half a century too early. The books of Samuel (strictly, 1 Sam. xvi.-1 Kings ii.), which are our principal source for the history of David, show how deep an impression the personality of the king, his character, his genius and the romantic story of his early years had left on the mind of the nation. Of no hero of antiquity do we possess so life-like a portrait. Minute details and traits of character are portrayed with a vividness which bears all the marks of contemporary narrative. But the record is by no means all of one piece or of one date. This history, as we now have it, is extracted from various sources of unequal value, which are fitted together in a way which offers considerable difficulties to the critic. In the history of David's early adventures, for example, the narrative is not seldom disordered, and sometimes seems to repeat itself with puzzling variations of detail, which have led critics to the unanimous conclusion that the First Book of Samuel is drawn from at least two sources. It is indeed easy to understand that the romantic incidents of this period were much in the mouths of the people--to whom David was a popular hero--and in course of time were written down in various forms which were not combined into perfect harmony by later editors, who gave excerpts from several sources rather than a new and independent history. These excerpts, however, have been so pieced together, that it is often impossible to separate them with precision, and to distinguish accurately between earlier and later elements. It even appears from a study of the Greek text that some copies of the books of Samuel incorporated narratives which other copies did not acknowledge. For the literary problems of these books, see also SAMUEL (BOOKS).
The parallel history of David in 1 Chron. xi.-xxix. contains a great deal of additional matter, which can rarely be treated as of equal historical value with the preceding. Where it follows the chapters in Samuel it is important for textual and other critical problems, but it omits narratives in which it is not interested (David's youth, persecution by Saul, Absalom's revolt, &c.), and adds long passages (David's arrangements for the temple, &c.) which reflect the views of a much later age than David's. The lists of officers, &c., are fuller than those in Samuel, and here and there contain notices of value. A comparison of the two records, however, is especially important for its illustration of the later tendency to idealize the figure of David, and the historical critic has to bear in mind the possibility that this tendency had begun long before the Chronicler's time, and that it may be found in the relatively older records preserved in Samuel.
Introduction to Saul.
David's father, Jesse, was a citizen of Bethlehem in Judah, 5 m. south of Jerusalem; the polite deprecation in 1 Sam. xviii. 18 means little (cf. Saul in ix. 21). Tradition made him a descendant of the ancient nobles of Judah through Boaz and the Moabitess Ruth, but the tendency to furnish a noble ancestry for a noble figure--especially one of obscure birth--is widespread (cf. GENEALOGY). He was the youngest of eight sons,[2] and spent his youth in an occupation which the Hebrews as well as the Arabs seem to have held in low esteem. He kept his father's sheep in the desert steppes of Judah, and there developed the strength, agility, endurance and courage which distinguished him throughout life (cf. 1 Sam. xvii. 34, xxiv. 2; 2 Sam. xvii. 9). There, too, he acquired that skill in music which led to his first introduction to Saul (1 Sam. xvi. 14-23, and the apocryphal Psalm of David, Ps. cli. in the Septuagint). He found favour in the king's eye, and became his armour-bearer.[3] But traditions varied. In 1 Sam. xvii. he does not follow his master to the field against the Philistines; he is an obscure untried shepherd lad sent by his father with supplies for his brothers in the Israelite camp. He does not even present himself before the king, and his brothers treat him with a petulance hardly conceivable if he stood well at court, and it appears from the close that neither Saul nor his captain Abner had heard of him before (vv. 55-58). There is, indeed, a flat contradiction between the two accounts, but a family of Greek MSS. represented by the Vatican text omit xvii. 12-31, xvii. 55-xviii. 5, and thus the difficulty is greatly lessened. Characteristic of the omitted portions are the friendship which sprang up between Jonathan and David and the latter's appointment to a command in the army. A further difficulty is caused by 2 Sam. xxi. 19, which makes Elhanan the slayer of Goliath. David's exploit is not referred to in 1 Sam. xxi. 10-15, xxix., and on this and other grounds the simpler tradition in 2 Sam. is usually preferred. (See GOLIATH.) But it must have been by some valiant deed that Saul was led to notice him (cf. xiv. 52), and David soon became both a popular hero and an object of jealousy to Saul. According to the Hebrew text of 1 Sam. xviii., Saul's jealousy leaped at once to the conclusion that David's ambition would not stop short of the kingship. Such a suspicion would be intelligible if we could suppose that the king had heard something of the significant act of Samuel, which now stands at the head of the history of David in witness of that divine election and unction with the spirit of Yahweh on which his whole career hung (xvi. 1-13). But this passage is the sequel to the rejection of Saul in xv., and Samuel's position agrees with that of the late writer in vii., viii. and xii.[4]
Conflicts with Saul.
The shorter text, represented by the Septuagint, gives an account of Saul's jealousy which is psychologically more intelligible.[5] According to this text Saul was simply possessed with such a personal dislike and dread of David as might easily occupy his disordered brain. To be quit of his hateful presence he gave him a military command. In this charge David increased his reputation as a soldier and became a general favourite. Saul's daughter Michal loved him; and her father, whose jealousy continued to increase, resolved to put the young captain on a perilous enterprise, promising him the hand of Michal as a reward of success, but secretly hoping that he would perish in the attempt. David's good fortune did not desert him; he won his wife, and in this new advancement continued to grow in the popular favour, and to gain fresh laurels in the field. At this point it is necessary to look back on the proposed marriage of David with Saul's eldest daughter Merab (xviii. 17-19; cf. xvii. 2-5). When the time came for Saul to fulfil his promise, Merab was given to Adriel of Abel-Meholah (perhaps an Aramaean). What is said of this affair interrupts the original context of chap. xviii., to which the insertion has been clumsily fitted by an interpolation in the second half of ver. 21 (LXX omits). We have here, therefore, a notice drawn from a distinct source which connects itself with the other omitted passage, xvii. 12-31, where Saul had promised his daughter to the one who should overthrow Goliath (ver. 25). Since Merab and Michal are confounded in 2 Sam. xxi. 8, the whole episode of Merab and David perhaps rests on a similar confusion of names.
As the king's son-in-law, David was necessarily again at court. He became chief of the bodyguard, as Ewald rightly interprets 1 Sam. xxii. 14, and ranked next to Abner (xx. 25), so that Saul's insane fears were constantly exasperated by personal contact with him. On at least one occasion the king's frenzy broke out in an attempt to murder David with his own hand.[6] At another time Saul actually gave commands to assassinate his son-in-law, but the breach was made up by Jonathan, whose chivalrous spirit had united him to David in a covenant of closest friendship (xix. 1-7). The circumstances of the final outburst of Saul's hatred, which drove David into exile, are not easily disentangled. The narrative of 1 Sam. xx., which is the principal account of the matter, cannot originally have been preceded by xix. 11-24; in chap. xx. David appears to be still at court, and Jonathan is even unaware that he is in any danger, whereas the preceding verses represent him as already a fugitive. It may also be doubted whether the narrative of David's escape from his own house by the aid of his wife Michal (xix. 11-17) has any close connexion with ver. 10, and does not rather belong to a later period.[7] David's daring spirit might very well lead him to visit his wife even after his first flight. The danger of such an enterprise was diminished by the reluctance to violate the apartments of women and attack a sleeping foe, which appears also in Judges xvi. 2, and among the Arabs.[8]
According to chap. xx. David was still at court in his usual position when he became certain that the king was aiming at his life. He betook himself to Jonathan, who thought his suspicions groundless, but undertook to test them. A plan was arranged by which Jonathan should draw from the king an expression of his feelings, and a tremendous explosion revealed that Saul regarded David as the rival of his dynasty, and Jonathan as little better than a fellow-conspirator. After a final interview (xx. 40-42), which must be regarded as a later expansion, they parted and David fled. He sought the sanctuary at Nob, where he had been wont to consult the priestly oracle (xxii. 15), and here, concealing his disgrace by a fictitious story, he also obtained bread from the consecrated table and the sword of Goliath (chap. xxi. i-9).[9] His hasty flight--without food and weapon--suggests that the narrative should follow upon xix. 17.
Outlaw life.
It was perhaps after this that David made a last attempt to find a place of refuge in the prophetic circle of Samuel at Ramah (xix. 18-24). The episode now stands in another connexion, where it is certainly out of place. It might, however, fit into the break that plainly exists in the history at xxi. 10 after the affair at Nob. Deprived of the protection of religion as well as of justice, David tried his fortune among the Philistines at Gath. Recognized and suspected as a redoubtable foe, he made his escape by feigning madness, which in the East has inviolable privileges (xxi. 11-16).[10] The passage anticipates chap. xxvii., and it is hardly probable that the slayer of Goliath or of any other Philistine giant fled to the Philistines with their dead hero's sword. He returned to the wilds of Judah, and was joined at Adullam[11] by his father's house and by a small band of outlaws, of which he became the head. Placing his parents under the charge of the king of Moab, he took up the life of a guerilla captain, cultivating friendly relations with the townships of Judah (xxx. 26), which were glad to have on their frontiers a protector so valiant as David, even at the expense of the blackmail which he levied in return. A clear conception of his life at this time, and of the respect which he inspired by the discipline in which he held his men, and of the generosity which tempered his fiery nature, is given in chap. xxv. His force gradually swelled, and he was joined by the prophet Gad (note his message xxii. 5) and by the priest Abiathar, the only survivor of a terrible massacre by which Saul took revenge for the favours which David had received at the sanctuary of Nob. He was even able to strike at the Philistines, and to rescue Keilah (south of Adullam and to the east of Beit Jibrin) from their attack (xxiii. 1-13). Forced to flee by the treachery of the very men whom he had succoured, he lived for a time in constant fear of being captured by Saul, and at length took refuge with Achish king of Gath and established himself in Ziklag. Popular tradition, as though unwilling to let David escape from Saul, told of that king's continual pursuit of the outlaw, of the attempt of the men of Ziph (S.E. of Hebron) to betray him, of David's magnanimity displayed on two occasions, and of Jonathan's visit to console his bosom friend (xxiv.-xxvi.).[12] The situation was one which lent itself to the imagination.
The site of Ziklag is unknown. It hardly lay near Gath (probably Tell es-Safi, 12 m. E. of Ashdod), but rather to the south of Judah (Josh. xix. 5). Here he occupied himself in chastening the Amalekites and other robber tribes who made raids on Judah and the Philistines without distinction (xxvii.). The details of the text are obscure, and seem to imply that David systematically attacked populations friendly to Achish whilst pretending that he had been making forays against Judah. If this were an attempt to steer a middle course his true actions could not have been kept secret long, and as it is implied that the Philistines subsequently acquiesced in David's sovereignty in Hebron, it is not easy to see what interest they had in embroiling him with the men of Judah. At length, in the second year, he was called to join his master in a great campaign against Saul. The Philistines for once directed their forces towards the plain of Jezreel (Esdraelon) in the north; and Saul, forsaken by Yahweh, already gave himself up for lost. David accompanied the army as a matter of course. But his presence was not observed until they reached their destination, when the jealousy of the Philistines overrode his protestations of fidelity and he was ordered to return. He reached Ziklag only to find the town pillaged by the Amalekites. Pursuing the foes, he inflicted upon them a signal chastisement and took a great booty, part of which he spent in politic gifts to the leading men of the towns in the south country.[13]
King at Hebron.
Meantime Saul had fallen in battle, and northern Israel was in a state of chaos. The Philistines took possession of the fertile lowlands of Jezreel and the Jordan, and the shattered forces of Israel were slowly rallied by Abner in the remote city of Mahanaim in Gilead, under the nominal sovereignty of Saul's son Ishbaal. David now took the first great step to the throne. He was no longer an outlaw with a band of wandering companions, but a petty chieftain, head of a small colony of men, allied with families of Caleb and Jezreel (in Judah), and on friendly footing with the sheikhs south of Hebron. In response to an oracle he was bidden to move northwards to Judah and successfully occupied it with Hebron as his capital. Here he was anointed king, the first ruler of the southern kingdom. If the chronological notice may be trusted, he was then thirty years of age, and he reigned there for seven and a half years (2. Sam. ii. 1-4a, 11, v. 4 sq.). The noble elegy on the death of Saul and Jonathan, quoted from the Book of Jashar (2 Sam. i.), is marked by the absence both of religious feeling and of allusions to his earlier experiences with Saul which David might have been expected to make. It was deemed only natural that he should sympathize deeply with the disasters of the northern kingdom. His vengeance on the Amalekite who slew Saul--the account is a doublet of 1 Sam. xxxi.--is consistent with his generous treatment of his late adversary in his outlaw life, and with this agrees his embassy of thanks to the men of Jabesh-Gilead for their chivalrous rescue of the bodies of the fallen heroes (2 Sam. ii. 4b-7). The embassy threw out a hint,--their lord was dead and David himself had been anointed king over Judah; but the relation between Jabesh-Gilead and Saul had been a close one, and it was not to be expected that its eyes would be turned upon the king of Judah when Saul's son was installed at the not distant Mahanaim. The interest of the narratives is now directed away from the Philistines to the decaying fortunes of Saul's house. (See ABNER and SAUL.) Abner had taken Saul's son Ishbaal and his authority was gradually consolidated in the north. War broke out between the two parties at Gibeon a few miles north of Jerusalem. A sham contest was changed into a fatal fray by the treachery of Ishbaal's men; and in the battle which ensued Abner was not only defeated, but, by slaying Asahel, drew upon himself a blood-feud with Joab. The war continued. Ishbaal's party became weaker and weaker; and at length Abner quarrelled with his nominal master and offered the kingdom to David. The king seized the opportunity to demand the return of Michal, his wife. The passage (iii. 12-16) is not free from difficulties, but it is intelligible that David should desire to ally himself as closely as possible with Saul's family (cf. xii. 8). The base murder of Abner by Joab did not long defer the inevitable issue of events. Ishbaal lost hope, and after he had been foully assassinated by two of his own followers, all Israel sought David as king.
The biblical narrative is admittedly not so constructed as to enable us to describe in chronological order the thirty-three years of David's reign over all Israel. It is possible that some of the incidents ascribed to this period properly belong to an earlier part of his life, and that tradition has idealized the life of David the king even as it has not failed to colour the history of David the outlaw and king of Hebron.
Critical considerations.
In the preceding account the biblical narratives have been followed as closely as possible in the light of the critical results generally accepted. That they have been affected by the growth of popular tradition is patent from the traces of duplicate narratives, from the difficulty caused, for example, by the story of Goliath (q.v.), and from a closer study of the chapters. The later views of the history of this period are represented in the book of Chronicles, where immediately after Saul's death David is anointed at Hebron king over all Israel (1 Chron. xi.). It is quite in harmony with this that the same source speaks of the Israelites who joined David at Ziklag (1 Chron. xii. 1-22), and of the host which came to him at Hebron to turn over to him Saul's kingdom (xii. 23-40). This treatment of history can be at once corrected by the books of Samuel, but it is only from a deeper study of the internal evidence that these, too, appear to give expression to doubtful and conflicting views. It is questionable whether David could have become king over all Israel immediately after the death of Ishbaal. The chronological notices in ii. 10 sqq. allow an interval of no less than five and a half years, and nowhere do the events of these years appear to be recorded. But David's position in the south of Judah is clear. He is related by marriage with south Judaean clans of Caleb, Jezreel, and probably Geshur. (See ABSALOM.) He was at the head of a small colony (1 Sam. xxvii. 3), and on friendly terms with the sheikhs south of Hebron (xxx. 26-31).[14] His step forward to Hebron is in every way intelligible and is the natural outcome of his policy. It is less easy to trace his previous moves. There are gaps in the narratives, and the further back we proceed the more serious do their difficulties become. These chapters bring him farther north, and they commence by depicting David as a man of Bethlehem, high in the court of Saul, the king's son-in-law, and a popular favourite with the people. But notwithstanding this, the relation is broken off, and years elapse before David gains hold upon the Hebrews of north Israel, the weakness of the union being proved by the ease with which it was subsequently broken after Solomon's death. Much of the life of Saul is obscure, and this too, it would seem, because tradition loved rather to speak of the founder of the ideal monarchy than of his less successful rival. (See SAUL.) It is not impossible that some traditions did not bring them together. If Jerusalem and its immediate neighbourhood were first conquered by David (2 Sam. v.), it is probable that Beeroth and Gibeon (2 Sam. iv. 2, xxi. 2), Shaalbim, Har-heres and Aijalon (Judg. i. 35), Gezer (ib. i. 29), Chephirah and Kirjath-jearim (Josh. ix. 17) had remained Canaanite. The evidence has obviously some bearing upon the history of Saul, as also upon the intercourse between Judah and Benjamin which David's early history implies. It has been conjectured, therefore, that David's original home lay in the south. Since the early historical narrative (1 Sam. xxv. 2) finds him in Maon, Winckler has suggested that he was a Calebite chief, while a criticism of the details relating to David's family has induced Marquart[15] to conjecture that he was born at Arad (Tell 'Arad) about 17 m. S.E. of Hebron. Once indeed we find him in the wilderness of Paran 1 (Sam.