text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/99

 WEAVER, THOMAS (1616–1663), poetaster, son of Thomas Weaver, was born at Worcester in 1616. Several of the family were prominent members of the Stationers' Company in London. An uncle of the poetaster, Edmund Weaver (son of Thomas Weaver, a weaver of Worcester), was from 1603 until his death in 1638 an active London publisher. This Edmund Weaver's son, another Thomas Weaver (the poetaster's first cousin), became a freeman of the Stationers' Company in 1627, was called into the livery in 1633, and, retiring from business in 1639, seems to have entered as a student of Gray's Inn on 1 Nov. 1640 (Gray's Inn Register, p. 228;, Transcript of Stationers' Company, ii. 176, iii. 686, iv. 29, 33, 449, 471, 499).

The poetaster matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, on 21 March 1633–4, at the age of eighteen, graduated B.A. on 19 Oct. 1637, and M.A. on 31 June 1640. In 1641 he was made one of the chaplains or petty canons of the cathedral. He was a sturdy royalist, and was accordingly ejected from his office by the parliamentary visitors in 1648 (Register of Visitors to Oxford, Camden Soc. p. 491). Under the Commonwealth he ‘shifted from place to place and lived upon his wits.’ Like Richard Corbet, William Strode, and other resident graduates of Christ Church in holy orders, he was an adept at lighter forms of verse, in which he took a more indulgent view of human frailties than is ordinarily reckoned becoming in the clerical profession. In October 1654 there was published a collection entitled ‘Songs and Poems of Love and Drollery, by T. W.’ It was dedicated ‘to my most obliging friend E. C. Esquire.’ The verse shows some lyrical capacity, and deals freely with amorous topics. Many of the pieces were skits on the author's political and theological foes; of these, a ballad, ‘to the tune of “Chevy Chase”’ (p. 21), called ‘Zeal overheated, or a relation of a lamentable fire which hapned in Oxon in a religious brother's shop,’ proved especially obnoxious to puritans. The ‘religious brother’ whom Weaver sarcastically denounced was Thomas Williams, an Oxford milliner, who belonged to the flock of Henry Cornish, the presbyterian minister at All Saints' Church. The work was declared to be seditious and libellous. Weaver was arrested in London, was imprisoned and tried on a capital charge of treason. At the trial (information about which seems only accessible in Wood's ‘Athenæ’), the book was produced; but the judge, after reading some pages of it, summed up strongly in favour of Weaver. He was unwilling, he said, to condemn ‘a scholar and a man of wit.’ A verdict of ‘not guilty’ was returned, and Weaver was set at liberty. His book is rare (, Anecdotes, vi. 86–9). Perfect copies are in the British Museum and in Malone's collection in the Bodleian Library. A poem by Weaver, called ‘The Archbishop of York's [John Williams's] Revels,’ was reprinted from his book in some editions of the works of John Cleaveland. Weaver is in no way responsible for the collection of verse called ‘Choice Drollery with Songs and Sonnets,’ which imitated his title and was published in 1656. Further specimens of his poetry are said, however, to be found in miscellanies of the date.

On the restoration of Charles II in 1660 Weaver was, according to Wood, made exciseman or collector of customs for Liverpool (cf. Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1670, p. 346). Wood further states that he was commonly called ‘Captan Weaver.’ He died at Liverpool on 3 Jan. 1662–3, ‘prosecuting too much the crimes of poets,’ and was buried there.

To Weaver has been frequently ascribed a second volume of verse, entitled ‘Plantaganets Tragicall Story: or, the Death of King Edward the Fourth: with the unnaturall voyage of Richard the Third through the Red Sea of his Nephews innocent bloud, to his usurped Crowne. Metaphrased by T. W. Gent.’ (London, by F. B. for George Badger, 1647). A portrait of the author, engraved by Marshall, is prefixed. The first book is dedicated ‘To the truly heroick Edward Benlowes, Esquire.’ There are commendatory verses by ‘I. C., Art. Mag.,’ ‘S. N.,’ and ‘I. S. Lincoln's Inn.’ I. C. refers to the surpassing merits of the more serious work of the writer, whom he describes as a soldier and a scholar, and addresses as ‘Captain T. W.’ ‘I. S.’ writes in a like vein, and calls ‘his ever-honoured friend Captain T. W.’ a ‘perfecter of poetry and patterne of gallantry.’ The second book of the poem is dedicated by the author to ‘D. W.,’ and the work is declared to be ‘the offspring of a country-muse’ (see, Bibliographical Memorials, 1816, pp. 114–21). A copy of the book is in the British Museum. Internal evidence fails to connect the chronicle-poem with Weaver's acknowledged verse, and at the time of its publication in 1647 Weaver was a chaplain of Christ Church, Oxford—a rank which would not allow him to be designated on a title-page as ‘T. W. Gent.,’ or to be greeted as ‘captain’ by his friends.

[Wood's Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, iii. 622–3; authorities cited.]


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/236

 been opposed by force, there permitted under protest. At Lodève, where very fine new wrought-iron gates have lately been added to the porch, the clergy took good care not to fasten them and expose them to be damaged, but bolted the inner door of wood, very thin, and easily cut through. That was the form of their protest. At Alais the curé received the State officials at the door and contented himself with reading a written remonstrance, after which he drew aside and allowed them to do their duty.

Actually, the curés in most places took no lead in the demonstrations, which were often organised by reactionaries so as to excite hostility to the Republic, in view of the approaching elections for the Chamber of Deputies. They failed utterly in their purpose, as the election, when it did take place, proved to demonstration. But in many a country place the resistance was due to the excited passions of the people ungoaded on by their superiors. A man said to me when I asked him the object of these futile resistances to authority: "Mais, il nous faut, à tout prix—des émotions."

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/238

162 feats achieved. The road for the rails has been hewn as a cornice in the face of the cliff, every salient buttress has been bored through, and every inconvenient lateral gorge overleaped. In 132 kilometres (81 miles) from the confluence of the Dège with the Allier up to La Levade, there are ninety tunnels, which happens to be precisely the number of kilometres between those points as the crow flies.

Precisely this fact makes the ascent of the ravine by train prove so unsatisfactory. It consists in a rapid succession of flashes followed by darkness—a constant flutter, as it were, of the eyelid. Moreover, the tunnels are carried through the shoulders of the mountain, avoiding the finest parts of the cañon.

The only possible way of doing justice to the scenery is to halt at the little stations where poor villages have been planted at the opening of lateral ravines, and thence follow the river by a footpath as far as it will lead.

The ascent of the river by train is indeed one of the great curiosities of the country, and it will be done generally in this way till the authorities of the department undertake to drive a carriage-road up the gorge. It is true that the villages are few, the population small, and trade a negligible quantity at present. But the scenery and the coolness of the mountain air, and the abundance of crystal water, are drawing annually more and ever more from the sweltering plains of Languedoc and the burning zone of Provence to this region for the summer, and it is accordingly to be regretted that they are debarred by lack of roadway from exploring what is the most magnificent feature of the country.

I have described the cañon of the Ardèche; this of


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/239

Rh the Allier is also a cañon, but they are as unlike as is a blonde beauty to one who is dark. They are both superb, but in manner totally different The Allier runs through rough basalt and crystalline rocks; the Ardèche flows between bluffs of limestone. The latter can be descended in a boat, the Allier cannot. The Allier looks north—the colouring, the vegetation, the climate are northern; the Ardèche in every one of these particulars is southern. The Ardèche has cut its way through a level plateau; the Allier flows between ranges of mountains. The cañon of the Ardèche is a street; the defile of the Allier is a lane. We cannot seek the Ardèche in the height of summer; it is just then when we would refresh in the cool draughts and the blue shadows of the Allier.

The chasm of this latter river has been formed at the point of contact of the lava with the granite. The volcanoes of Le Velay poured forth their molten floods which beat against the granitic mass of the Margeride, and the lava in cooling may have shrunk and cracked and so allowed the river an opportunity of escaping into the plain. In places it has cut through granite and schist. It had cut this channel before the volcanic vents opened. What these latter did was to deposit what they threw out in the trough of the Allier, and force that stream to renew its work of excavation; in the latter part of its course the ravine is cut through lava.

Langeac will serve as a starting-point for visits if the tourist be not very particular as to accommodation. It does possess one passable inn, and that is at some distance from the station in the town. The place itself is of no great interest. It has manufactures, favoured by


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/240

 the presence of coal-beds near at hand. The church, however, is curious. It consists of a nave without aisles, but with chapels between the buttresses, and with an apse, lined within with well-carved oak stalls of the sixteenth century; once occupied at Mass by canons, now by schoolboys. The tower is at the east end, and supports an octagonal campanile.

From Langeac Chanteuges is easily reached. It clusters about a basaltic hunch at the junction of the Dège with the Allier. The village creeps up the side of the hill, the summit of which is occupied by a church and the ruins of a priory. The original church was a fine example of Romanesque, but is now a sad jumble of styles; every age as it passed has left a trace on the building. The platform on which it stands is ascended by a zigzag path; basaltic prisms, range above range, form the mass of the rock.

The main entrance to the old priory is on the north, and was defended by a tower. On one of the blocks at the top of the wall may be read the date 1115. The monks had evidently converted their habitation into a fortress, and it was precisely this that led to their suppression and the dispersion of the fraternity.

One Iter de Maudulf, a knight who had led a lawless life, felt a twinge of compunction, and resolved on quitting the world and embracing a life of religion. Accordingly he assumed the cowl in Chanteuges. But the old Adam was not dead in him. Cucullus non facit monachum. The choir offices proved tedious, the meagre fare unacceptable, and the wine was vinegar. His temper gave way, and with it his good resolutions. He became restive. In the refectory he talked to the other monks of the good old days when he roistered and


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/241

Rh roved over the country; ate and drank and did wild deeds of devilry. They listened; their mouths watered, and their fingers itched. Eventually Maudulf succeeded in corrupting the whole fraternity. The monks abandoned their reading and psalmody to fortify the height. Every night a diabolical horde issued from the gate of the monastery, clothed in mail armour under their serge habits. They swept the country, levied blackmail on the farmers, stopped and robbed merchants, and plundered the pilgrims bound for the shrine of Our Lady of Le Puy. In the dead of night they forced their way into convents, and romped and revelled with the nuns, or else carried off comely peasants' daughters en croupe to their stronghold at Chanteuges.

Of all the confraternity, the abbot alone kept his head; but his objurgations were disregarded, his authority was flouted. In despair he appealed to the Bishop of Clermont, who at once visited the monastery, but took the precaution of doing so at the head of a body of armed men. "I saw," said he, "the abbey in the most deplorable condition. The buildings were in ruins, the sanctuary was despoiled, the church converted into a fortress, no one serving God, the holy habitation transformed into a den of thieves and murderers."

Accordingly the monastery was suppressed, the monks dispersed among other houses, and the abbey converted into a priory under the rule and supervision of Chaisedieu. To the present day the belief prevails among the peasantry that in winter, at night, when a storm rages and the snow is driving, a black cavalcade issues from the gate, with cowls drawn over grinning skulls, and with serge habits flapping in the wind,


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/242

166 that it sweeps over the plateau till cock-crow, when it returns through the portal and vanishes.

East of the church is a little chapel of flamboyant character with richly sculptured doorway, surmounted by a representation of the Assumption. It is the sole specimen of this style in the department. At the Revolution it was converted into a haystore.

The fête at Chanteuges is on Whitsun Day, and has a peculiar observance. It begins in the Pré du Fou. This field may not be mown till after Pentecost. A beggar is induced to hide in the long grass. The youths of the parish, wearing hats decked with cock's feathers, march to the field in two files led by fifes and drums and preceded by a banner. The procession circles thrice about the field, and some of the young men detach themselves from it and beat it in search of the beggar. If they do not find him at once, others come to their aid. When the fou has been discovered, he is grasped by the legs, thrown on his back, and spun round once by each of the youths forming the procession. Then a pistol is discharged, the procession reforms, and the train mounts to the church, taking the poor fool along with it. There he is again thrown down and undergoes the same process of spinning. After this he is indemnified by a few coppers from each of the Spinners, and every seller of cakes and buns who has a stall there is bound to supply him with sufficient food to satisfy his maw. The spinning over, the young men enter the church for Mass. At Chanteuges the festival of Pentecost is devoted partly to God, partly to dancing, partly to drinking. God is often forgotten, dancing sometimes, the bottle never.

Opposite Chanteuges is S. Arcons, where the Fioule


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/243

Rh flows into the Allier. It rises among the pine-clad heights of Fix S. Genys, and receives the stream that issues from the Lake of Limagne, a volcanic basin like that of Bourget, but not of like regularity of outline.

Above Langeac is the land of the Lafayettes. They were great seigneurs in the Middle Ages. They derive from Gilbert Motier, lord of Lafayette, who was one of the great captains that drove the English out of France. He died in 1463, and was grandson of a Gilbert who fell on the field of Poitiers, 1356, also with his face set against the English. So Marie Jean Paul, the famous marquess, fought the English on the side of the Americans, 1777-1785. The Marquess was born at Chavagnac, 1757, on the tableland about the junction of lines at S. Georges d'Aurac. The castle was built in 1701.

From Langeac one can explore the granitic Margeride, peopled by a race distinct from the Cevenols. They are pale, often fair-headed and blue-eyed, grave, dignified, and intensely conservative. They are and ever have been sturdy Catholics, have never been shaken, even ruffled, by the shock to faith given by Calvin and his followers. Whereas a Cevenol is ready at all times for a prophecy, a revelation, a new doctrine, the upset of one that is old, taking up what is fresh with fanaticism, and then letting it drop and lapsing into indifference, the man of the Margeride remains as constant, as unmoved as his own rocky mountains. The Margeride, "as seen from the Pec Finiels, is a long black line drawn against the sky of central France, a wall without battlements, without towers, without a keep." It is in reality a long series of successive undulating plains high uplifted, covered with forests of oaks, beech and pines, or else with pastures


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/244

168 on which feed during the summer the sheep of Basse Languedoc and the oxen of the Camargue. It is composed of granite, and its loftiest points reach only 4,650 feet. A visitor will probably content himself with an expedition to Sauges, that lies in scenery called the Switzerland of the Margeride. The rich green swath, the dark pine-woods, the abundance of crystal rills contrast with the bare lava plain and mountain cones of Le Velay.

The Sauge stream falls in cascade over a dyke of trap that has been forced through a rent in the granite, near the farm of Luchadou, built on and out of the ruins of a castle. There a phantom horse, magnificently caparisoned, is said to be seen grazing. It neighs when it sees children approach, and invites them to mount its back, which will lengthen conveniently to accommodate as many as desire to have a ride. When the horse has received a full complement, it dashes into the river, and buck-jumps till it has flung all the riders against the rocks or into the pools.

One day when a couple of dozen children were on its back, as the steed was galloping towards the stream one little boy sang out "Gloria Patri," etc., whereby he was able to master the "Drac " and make it gallop round and round the field till exhausted, when it let the children descend unmolested. This is none other than the Irish Pooka. The celebrated fall of the Liffey, near Ballymore Eustace, is named Pool-a-Phooka, and precisely the same story is told there of a phantom horse as here at Sauges. The same also in North Wales of the Ceffyl-y-Dwyr, the water-horse of Marchlyn. Can this myth have originated and been told by the Celtic race before its separation into several


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/245

Rh branches? I can see no other explanation of the puzzle.

The church at Sauges has an early and remarkable belfry. An immense arch, richly moulded, admits to a porch. Above this is a still larger relieving arch to sustain the octagonal tower that is on two stages. Granite and black basalt are employed in bands and in the arches of the windows, two-light in the tower story, single in that above, and the whole is capped by a dwarf spire.

Near Sauges is the Tour de la Clauze, erected on a protuberant mass of granite fissured into blocks. The rest of the castle is completely ruined. But that which is most curious at Sauges is a monumental structure composed of a cubical base, on which stand four pillars supporting arches and a vault with groined ribs. This goes by the name of the Tombeau du Général Anglais, and is supposed to have been set up in honour of a Captain MacHarren, who commanded one of the mixed companies of English and Gascons that held the land or harried it for the English Crown nominally, actually for themselves. This MacHarren was probably one of the English garrison that held Sauges till 1360, when they were driven out by the Viscount Polignac.

La Voute-Chilhac down the river stands on a peninsula between the Allier and the Avesne that here debouches into it. It possesses a church of the fifteenth century that has taken the place of one erected by S. Odilo of Cluny in 1075. The original door-valves remain, but injured by cutting to make them fit the ogee portal. In the midst it bears the inscription:—


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/246

170 There were other inscriptions, but they have been mutilated. Chilhac stands on a rock composed in the lower portion of beautiful prismatic columnar basalt, capped with an amorphous flow. It is curious how sharp the line of demarcation is between the two beds. The situation is pretty, the church Romanesque.

The course of the Allier above Langeac presents many faces like organ fronts of basalt; in places the pillars form a pavé de géants. The prisms are employed along the roads to mark distances, and might easily be supposed to have been specially cut for the purpose. But all lava does not crystallise into prisms; under pressure it does. When not squeezed by super-incumbent beds it is cinderous. But there is another form it assumes, that of phonolith or clinkstone, flakes that can be cut like slates and divided into laminae. As slates they are employed extensively in Velay. But why the ejected lava should form films here and prismatic pillars there, I do not comprehend.

At Monistrol d' Allier the Ance du Sud comes in from the Margeride after traversing a picturesque gorge. Here may be studied a fine basaltic face, called Escluzels. There are grottoes in the neighbourhood excavated in the tufa by the hand of man, but when is not known. A chapel dedicated to the Magdalen has been scooped out of the rock, but given a frontage of wall, and is an object of pilgrimage on the Sunday following July 22nd, when and where may be seen some of the costumes of the neighbourhood not yet wholly discarded.

On the opposite bank of the Allier is S. Privat, where the stream of Bouchoure comes down writhing between high precipices. The tower of Rochegude occupies the


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/247

Rh summit of a peak 1,500 feet high, commanding the river and the roads. In 1865 a discovery was made at S. Privat of a cache of a Roman oculist of the third century. Along with his little store of coins lay his delicate instruments, and a cube as well, bearing on each face the name of one of the medicaments employed by him, and the cube used probably by him for sealing up his packets. The man seems to have known his business, or at all events of having both instruments and remedies not by any means barbarous. On reaching Alleyras the valley opens into a basin. Above the little town shoots up a mass of rock looking like a gigantic thumb as we approach from the north, but changing form as Alleyras is passed. It is actually a huge slab of rock that is detached from the mountain by a wide fissure.

The basin of Alleyras was once a lake, where the river paused to rest before it renewed its efforts to break a way through the lava. From this point upwards the scenery is less savage and gloomy. At Chapeauroux the railway describes a great curve, and pursues its way through tunnel and over viaduct till it draws up at Langogne, a busy little town of the Gevaudan, of some commercial importance. A monastery was founded here in 998 by Stephen Count of the Gevaudan, and Silvester II. presented to it the relics of SS. Gervasius and Protasius, and further conferred on the town the more than doubtful privilege of being out of episcopal jurisdiction, to be looked after or let alone by the Holy See only. The place suffered severely in the Hundred Years War, and again and worse even in those of religion. From 1562 for nearly a century and a half the Gevaudan was devastated turn and turn


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/248

172 about by Protestants and Catholics, and Langogne passed from the hands of one party to those of the other. In 1568 the Huguenots sacked the town and set fire to the church and monastery.

The church comprises a nave and side aisles, and is substantially in the Romanesque style, but with many alterations. There are three arcades resting on piers with engaged columns in granite, with capitals carved to represent fruit, acanthus leaves, and the seven deadly sins. A pretty flamboyant doorway replaces the western porch, which had been destroyed. Over it is a window in the same style. On the right of the entrance a doorway, that seems to give access only to a passage, communicates with a chapel below the soil, dimly lighted, and containing an image of N. D. de tout Pouvoir, supposed to have been given by Agelmodis, the widow of the founder of church and monastery. It was accorded a crown in 1900 by the Pope, and the anniversary of this ceremony, July 29th, is kept as a fête at Langogne. But the great festival in the town is on the Sunday following June 19th, when is the vogue, in honour of the two patrons, Gervasius and Protasius. On that occasion cars are drawn through the streets bearing groups of allegorical figures; but the special sport of the day is the "chute d'eau." A species of gallows is erected in the main street, with a vessel full of water balanced in the middle. The young men vie with one another as to who by throwing a stick can upset the vessel, and then dash under it so speedily as not to be splashed by the falling water. He who succeeds receives a prize.

Langogne is becoming annually more and more a summer resort. The Languiron here flows into the


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/249

Rh Allier; it does not fill its bed, which is the receptacle for the refuse from the abattoir and the town, and the odours arising from these dejections infect the otherwise pure mountain air.

It is doubtless excellent in principle that every man should be able to dwell under his own fig tree and inhabit his own house; but this has its drawbacks. The theory may be sound, yet the results other than those anticipated. In England, where most householders are tenants, if a slate be blown off the landlord is applied to. If the putty be cracked that retains a window-pane, the landlord must see to it less the glass fall out. If the plaster scales off in one patch the size of a leaf, the landlord must replaster the whole face of the house. If the rats have gnawed through the floor, "Please, squire, have the boards relaid lest my child puts its leg through." If the well be contaminated, he is called upon to clear it, under the threat of complaint to the Local Government Board. But in France, where every man owns his own habitation, the habitations are allowed to fall into a ragged and measly condition. If a slate be carried away, the patron tells his wife to put a basin where it can catch the drip whenever it rains. If the putty falls from the glass, the pane is retained by the gummed border of postage stamps, renewed when necessary. If the rats have eaten through the floor, the child must learn to avoid the hole; it affords a useful lesson in circumspection. If the plaster peals away in masses from the front of the house, "Shall I squander money in titivating it?" asks the owner. "My relatives would consign me to an asylum as incapable of managing my affairs." And as for the well, M. le propriétaire says to himself, "I never


text:
User talk:125.244.164.75

Welcome

Hello, and welcome to Wikisource! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

 * Help pages
 * Style Guide
 * Inclusion policy

You are welcome to continue editing articles without logging in, but you may wish to  [ create an account] . Doing so is free, requires no personal information, and provides several benefits. For one thing, if you continue to edit without a username, your IP address is used to publicly identify you.

In any case, I hope you enjoy donating your time to grow the Wikisource library that is free for everyone to use! In discussions, please sign your comments using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically produce your IP address (or username if you're logged in) and the date. If you need help, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question here (click  [ edit] ) and place  before your question. Again, welcome! — billinghurst  sDrewth  16:14, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

title: User talk:125.244.164.75


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/100

 WEAVER, THOMAS (1773–1855), geologist, born in 1773, studied geology and mineralogy from 1790 to 1794 under Abraham Werner at Freiberg. Soon after his return to England he was entrusted by government with the investigation of the gold deposits in Wicklow, in reference to which he published in 1819 his ‘Memoir on the Geological Relations of the East of Ireland’ (London, 4to). In the early days of the Geological Society he became one of its active members, and published in the second series of its ‘Transactions’ (vols. i. and iv.) memoirs on the geology of Gloucestershire and Somerset and the south of Ireland. In the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ of the Royal Society for 1825 he asserted the relatively modern age of the fossil remains of the great Irish deer (Cervus megaceros), and in the following year he was elected a fellow of the society. He subsequently travelled as a mining geologist in Mexico and the United States, and in 1831 began a series of papers on the carboniferous rocks of America. Weaver had retired from his profession for some years before his death, which took place at his home in Pimlico, 2 July 1855.

In the Royal Society's catalogue (vi. 285–6) he is credited with twenty papers, bearing dates between 1820 and 1841, all of which are geological, and eight refer to Ireland. They were contributed chiefly to Thomson's ‘Annals of Philosophy,’ the ‘Philosophical Magazine,’ the ‘Annals of Natural History,’ and the ‘Transactions and Proceedings of the Geological Society.’

[Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, vol. xii. pp. xxxviii–ix; Michaud's Biographie Universelle, vol. xliv.]  WEBB. [See also .]

WEBB, (d. 1793), actress, whose maiden name was Child, was born in Norwich. She became an actress and a singer in the Norwich company, and married first a Mr. Day, and afterwards a Mr. Webb. She appears to have made her first appearance in Edinburgh on 21 Nov. 1772 at the Theatre Royal in Shakespeare Square as Charlotte Rusport in the ‘West Indian,’ springing at once into favour. She—if the Mrs. Day were she—also played Queen Catherine in ‘Henry VIII.’ Webb was about this time a member of the company, acting the King in ‘Hamlet,’ Kent in ‘Lear,’ and similar parts. On 29 Nov. 1773 Portia in the ‘Merchant of Venice’ was played by Mrs. Webb, from which time Mrs. Day disappears. In the ‘Edinburgh Rosciad,’ 1775, Mrs. Webb is described as ‘very useful,’ and it is said of her that she ‘sings very sweet.’ On 1 June 1778, as Mrs. Webb from Edinburgh, she appeared at the Haymarket, playing Mrs. Cross in Colman's ‘Man and Wife.’ During her first season she acted Lady Sycamore in the ‘Maid of the Mill,’ and Lady Wronghead in the ‘Provoked Husband.’ On 1 July 1779 she was the first Lady Juniper in ‘Summer Amusement, or an Adventure at Margate,’ by Andrews and Miles. She played Mrs. Sneak in Foote's ‘Mayor of Garratt,’ Mrs. Margaret Maxwell in the ‘Devil on Two Sticks,’ and had an original part on 31 Aug. in Colman's unprinted ‘Separate Maintenance.’ As the original Dame Hearty in Goodenough's ‘William and Nanny’ she made on 12 Nov. her first appearance at Covent Garden, where she played Mrs. Peachum in the ‘Beggar's Opera,’ Statira in ‘Rival Queens; or the Life and Death of Alexander the Little.’ She was at the Haymarket on 30 May 1780 the Lady in the Balcony at the first production of Colman's ‘Manager in Distress,’ was Mrs. Honeycombe in ‘Polly Honeycombe,’ and the first Commode in Andrews's ‘Fire and Water’ on 8 July. At Covent Garden she was on 3 Oct. Glumdalca in an alteration of Fielding's ‘Tom Thumb,’ the first Mrs. Highflight in Pilon's ‘Humours of an Election’ on 19 Oct., the Duenna, Mother-in-law in the ‘Chances,’ Queen in ‘Hamlet,’ Emilia in ‘Othello,’ Elvira (an original part) in Dibdin's ‘Islander,’ 25 Nov., Lady Rusport in ‘West Indian,’ and Mrs. Hardcastle. Her principal original characters at this house, which she never quitted, were Lady Tacit in O'Keeffe's ‘Positive Man,’ 16 March 1782; Lady Dangle in Cumberland's ‘Walloons,’ 20 April; Abigail in Cumberland's ‘Capricious Lady,’ 17 Jan. 1783; Widow Grampus in Pilon's ‘Aerostation,’ 29 Oct. 1784; Lady Bull in O'Keeffe's ‘Fontainebleau,’ 16 Nov.; Marcellina in ‘Follies of a Day’ (‘Le Mariage de Figaro’), 14 Dec.; Honour in Macnally's ‘Fashionable Levities,’ 2 April 1785; Lady Mary Magpie in Mrs. Inchbald's ‘Appearance is against Them,’ 22 Oct.; Mabel Flourish in O'Keeffe's ‘Love in a Camp,’ 17 Feb. 1786; Lady Oldstock in Pilon's ‘He would be a Soldier,’ 18 Nov.; Lady Dolphin in O'Keeffe's ‘Man Milliner,’ 27 Jan. 1787; Cecily in Mrs. Inchbald's ‘Midnight Hour,’ 22 May; Katty Kavanagh in O'Keeffe's ‘Toy,’ 3 Feb. 1789; Lady Waitfor't in Reynolds's ‘Dramatist,’ 15 May; Miss Di Clackit in Bate Dudley's ‘Woodman,’ 26 Feb. 1791; Lady Acid in Reynolds's ‘Notoriety,’ 5 Nov.; and Miss Spinster in Mrs. Inchbald's ‘Every One has his Fault,’ 29 Jan. 1793.

To this list may be added the following


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/250

 drink water, only wine. If some of my children get diphtheria, it will leave more money for those who survive."

This it is that gives to so many of the towns and nearly every village in France a palsied, neglected look, as if the houses had lost their self-respect, like a man who has gone down in the world and sunk to be a tramp.

Pradelles is four miles from Langogne, built in an amphitheatre on the flanks of the mountains of Le Velay, surrounded by rich meadows, from which it derives its name (pratellæ). The many Prades that occur in the south are all so called from the pratæ that spread about them. In 1588 Chambaud, at the head of a large body of Huguenots, besieged the town. As it had but a scanty garrison, he shouted to those on the walls, "Ville prise, ville gagnée!" To which a young woman called back, "Pa'ncaro!" (not yet) and flung a great stone at him which broke in his skull. This act of heroism saved Pradelles from being sacked and its citizens from massacre. The memory of that woman, Jeanne de Verdette, is still green there, and in 1888 the third centenary of the deliverance was commemorated at Pradelles.

At Naussac, in the opposite direction, on a granite tableland that goes by the name of the Kidney of Lozère, is an ancient house with a tower that formed a portion of the château of Mgr. de Belsunce, the brave Bishop of Marseilles, who was so devoted in his attentions to the plague-stricken in the terrible pestilence of 1720, which carried off forty thousand of its population. S. Alban-en-Montagne is four miles from Langonne in the department of Ardèche. It lies high—3,565 feet.


text:
Author:Carl Sofus Lumholtz

Works

 * Symbolism of the Huichol Indians
 * Among Cannibals; an account of four years' travels in Australia and of camp life with the aborigines of Queensland (1889)
 * Unknown Mexico; a record of five years' exploration among the tribes of the western Sierra Madre; in the tierra caliente of Tepic and Jalisco; and among the Tarascos of Michoacan (1902)
 * Vol 1
 * Vol 2
 * New trails in Mexico; an account of one year's exploration in north-western Sonora, Mexico, and south-western Arizona 1909-1910 (1912)
 * Through Central Borneo; an account of two years' travel in the land of the head-hunters between the years 1913 and 1917 (1920)
 * My life of exploration (1921)

title: Author:Carl Sofus Lumholtz


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/101

 parts played during the summer seasons at the Haymarket: Hebe Wintertop in O'Keeffe's ‘Dead Alive,’ 16 June 1781; Mefrow Van Boterham in Andrews's ‘Baron Kinkvervankotsdorsprakingatchdern,’ 9 July; Mrs. Cheshire in O'Keeffe's ‘Agreeable Surprise,’ 3 Sept.; Lady Rounceval in O'Keeffe's ‘Young Quaker,’ 26 July 1783; Lady Pedigree in Stuart's ‘Gretna Green,’ 28 Aug.; Mayoress in O'Keeffe's ‘Peeping Tom,’ 6 Sept. 1784; Mrs. Mummery in O'Keeffe's ‘Beggar on Horseback,’ 16 June 1785; Lady Simple in the younger Colman's ‘Turk and no Turk,’ 9 July; Mrs. Scout in the ‘Village Lawyer,’ 28 Aug. 1787; Lady Dunder in Colman's ‘Ways and Means,’ 10 July 1788; Mrs. Malmsey in ‘Family Party,’ 11 July 1789; and Mrs. Maggs in O'Keeffe's ‘London Hermit.’ Other characters assigned her at one or other house were Lady Mary Oldboy in ‘Lionel and Clarissa,’ Lockit in the ‘Beggar's Opera’ (with the male characters played by women and vice versa), Mrs. Amlet in the ‘Confederacy,’ Mrs. Otter in the ‘Silent Woman,’ Mrs. Heidelberg in the ‘Clandestine Marriage,’ Old Lady Lambert in the ‘Hypocrite,’ Lady Wishfort in the ‘Way of the World,’ Dorcas in the ‘Mock Doctor,’ Widow Lackit in ‘Oroonoko,’ Tag in ‘Miss in her Teens,’ Mrs. Dangle in the ‘Critic,’ Widow Blackacre in the ‘Plain Dealer,’ Falstaff (a strange experiment for her benefit), Ursula in the ‘Padlock,’ Mrs. Fardingale in the ‘Funeral,’ Lady Dove in Cumberland's ‘Brothers,’ Mrs. Sealand in ‘Conscious Lovers,’ Mrs. Malaprop, Mrs. Grub in ‘Cross Purposes,’ Mother-in-law in the ‘Chances,’ and Mrs. Mechlin in the ‘Commissary.’ On 5 Nov. 1793 at Covent Garden she played the Duenna, and on the 7th Miss Spinster in ‘Every One has his Fault.’ On the 24th she died.

Mrs. Webb was a good actress with much humour, her best parts being Mrs. Cheshire and Mabel Flourish. She was corpulent in her late years, and was seen to advantage in grotesque characters. Her Lockit did much to recommend the strange experiment of Colman of which it was a feature. A portrait by Dewilde as Lady Dove in the ‘Brothers’ is in the Mathews collection in the Garrick Club, in the catalogue of which she is erroneously said to have appeared in London as Miss Cross.

[Genest's Account of the English Stage; Gilliland's Dramatic Mirror; Thespian Dictionary; Gent. Mag. 1793, ii. 1061, 1147.]  WEBB, BENJAMIN (1819–1885), ecclesiologist and parish priest, eldest son of Benjamin Webb, of the firm of Webb & Sons, wheelwrights, of London, was born at Addle Hill, Doctor's Commons, on 28 Nov. 1819. On 2 Oct. 1828 he was admitted to St. Paul's school under Dr. John Sleath [q. v.], and proceeded with an exhibition to Trinity College, Cambridge, in October 1838. He graduated B.A. in 1842, M.A. in 1845. While still an undergraduate he, together with his somewhat older friend, John Mason Neale [q. v.], founded the Cambridge Camden Society, which played an important part in the ecclesiological revival consequent upon the tractarian movement, and of which Webb continued to be secretary, both at Cambridge and afterwards in London (whither it was removed in 1848 under the name of the Ecclesiological Society), from its beginning to its extinction in 1863. With Webb and Neale were associated in this enterprise Webb's intimate and lifelong friend Alexander James Beresford-Hope [q. v.] and Frederick Apthorp Paley [q. v.] The society restored the ‘round church’ at Cambridge, and Webb had the honour of showing the restored edifice to the poet Wordsworth. Webb was early recognised as a leading authority on questions of ecclesiastical art (see, Life of Pusey i. 476–480). He was ordained deacon in 1842 and priest in 1843, and served as curate first under his college tutor, Archdeacon Thorpe (who had been the first president of the Cambridge Camden Society), at Kemerton in Gloucestershire, and afterwards at Brasted in Kent, under William Hodge Mill [q. v.], who, as regius professor of Hebrew, had countenanced and encouraged his ecclesiological work at Cambridge, and whose daughter he married in 1847. He was also for a while curate to William Dodsworth [q. v.] at Christ Church, St. Pancras, London. In 1851 he was presented by Beresford-Hope to the perpetual curacy of Sheen in Staffordshire, and in 1862 by Lord Palmerston, on the recommendation of Mr. Gladstone, to the crown living of St. Andrew's, Wells Street, London, which he retained till his death. Under him this church obtained a wide celebrity for the musical excellence of its services, and became the centre of an elaborate and efficient system of confraternities, schools, and parochial institutions, in establishing which his powers of practical organisation found a congenial field of exercise. Among these may be especially mentioned his catechetical classes for children and young women of the upper classes, which may be compared with those held by Dupanloup at Paris; and also the day nursery or crèche, said to have been the first of its kind in London.


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/251

Rh On the face of an enormous basaltic rock is a remarkable cave divided into several chambers, and large enough to contain all the villagers. It was employed as a place of refuge during the wars of feudal times, and again in those of religion. Access to it is not easy. As the railway reaches the watershed, barricades on both sides protect it from snow-drifts. Luc is passed, having an old castle on a rock, the donjon braced to sustain a colossal statue of the Virgin. Then the train halts at La Bastide, where is a branch line to Mende.

The Trappist monks have an establishment near this on these bleak heights. Their buildings are tasteless. Hitherto the monks have been left unmolested by Government, due possibly to the fact that they receive and examine the silkworm moths that have laid their eggs, sent to them from great distances round, to examine if they are free from the disease that so fatally threatened the silk industry in the Cevennes.

The breaking out of this complaint caused consternation some years ago, and M. Pasteur was sent down to investigate it. He found that no remedial efforts availed, and that the sole way of getting rid of the disorder was to stamp it out. Accordingly every moth after it has laid its eggs is enclosed along with the seed that has been deposited in a muslin bag and sent to be inspected. Each bag is numbered and ticketed with the name of the sender. The body of the moth is pounded up and submitted to examination under a powerful microscope, and this reveals the presence of the germs of fibrine if they exist. Should these be detected, the eggs of that particular moth are destroyed by fire.

In addition to this service rendered by the Trappists,


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/102

 Webb was appointed by Bishop Jackson of London in 1881 to the prebend of Portpool in St. Paul's Cathedral. From 1881 to his death he was editor of the ‘Church Quarterly Review.’ He died at his house in Chandos Street, Cavendish Square, on 27 Nov. 1885, and was buried in the churchyard of Aldenham in Hertfordshire. A fine monument by Armstead has been placed to his memory in the crypt of St. Paul's.

Webb was throughout his life a consistent high-churchman, although his policy in matters of ritual differed from that of many of his party. He refrained from the adoption of the eucharistic vestments, not from any objection on principle, but, as he stated in his evidence before the royal commission of 1867, on grounds of ‘Christian charity, expediency, and prudence.’ On the other hand, he laid great stress on the ‘eastward position,’ and took an important part in the preparation of the very successful ‘Purchas Remonstrance.’ His refined artistic culture, and his deep conviction that the best of everything should be offered in God's service, prevented him from sharing the prejudice felt by many who otherwise agreed with him against the performance of elaborate modern music in church. He was a good Latin scholar and an accomplished liturgiologist and antiquary. The words of many anthems published by Messrs. Novello, Ewer & Co., and not a few inscriptions, among them those on the windows placed to the memory of Dean Stanley in the chapter-house of Westminster, are from his pen. His discovery, as it may be called, of James Frank Redfern [q. v.], and his encouragement of George Edmund Street [q. v.] in the early stages of his career, should not be forgotten.

He published: 1. ‘Sketches of Continental Ecclesiology,’ 1847. 2. ‘Notes illustrative of the Parish of Sheen’ (a supplement to the ‘Lichfield Diocesan Church Calendar,’ 1859). 3. ‘Instructions and Prayers for Candidates for Confirmation’ (3rd edit. 1882). He contributed numerous articles in the publications of the Cambridge Camden Society (especially on the monogram I.H.S., 1841; on the crypts of London, 1841; on the adaptation of pointed architecture to tropical climates, 1845); and of the Ecclesiological Society, in the ‘Ecclesiologist,’ ‘Christian Remembrancer,’ and ‘Saturday Review.’ He was joint author (with J. M. Neale) of an ‘Essay on Symbolism’ and a translation of Durandus, 1843; editor of Dr. W. H. Mill's ‘Catechetical Lectures,’ 1856, of the second edition of his ‘Mythical Interpretation of the Gospels,’ 1861, and of his ‘Sermons on the Temptation,’ 1873; joint editor of Montague's ‘Articles of Inquiry,’ 1841, of Frank's ‘Sermons’ in the ‘Anglo-Catholic Library,’ and (with W. Cooke) of the ‘Hymnary,’ 1870–2; and one of the editors of ‘Hierurgia Anglicana,’ 1848, the ‘Hymnal Noted,’ 1852, and the Burntisland reprint of the ‘Sarum Missal,’ 1861–83. There is a portrait in oils by E. U. Eddis, A.R.A., in the possession of his widow.

[Private information; obituary notice by A. J. B.-H. in the Guardian, 2 Dec. 1885; Gardner's Admission Registers of St. Paul's School, p. 277. See also an article on Webb in Julian's Dictionary of Hymnology, which gives list of hymns composed by him.]  WEBB, DANIEL (1719?–1798), author, born at Maidstown, co. Limerick, in 1718 or 1719, was the eldest son of Daniel Webb of Maidstown Castle, by his wife Dorothea, daughter and heiress of M. Leake of Castle Leake, co. Tipperary. He matriculated from New College, Oxford, on 13 June 1735. In later life he resided chiefly in Bath. He wrote several theoretical works on art, which had considerable vogue for a time. He died, without issue, on 2 Aug. 1798. He was twice married: first, to Jane Lloyd; and, secondly, to Elizabeth Creed. He was the author of: 1. ‘An Inquiry into the Beauties of Painting,’ London, 1760, 8vo; 4th edit. 1777; Italian translation by Maria Quarin Stampalia, Venice, 1791, 8vo. 2. ‘Remarks on the Beauties of Poetry,’ London, 1762, 8vo; new edit. Dublin, 1764, 12mo. 3. ‘Observations on the Correspondence between Poetry and Music,’ London, 1769, 8vo; German translation by J. J. Eochenburg, Leipzig, 1771, 8vo. 4. ‘Literary Amusements in Verse and Prose,’ London, 1787, 8vo. 5. ‘Some Reasons for thinking the Greek Language was borrowed from the Chinese: in Notes on the “Grammatica Sinica” of Mons. Fourmont,’ London, 1787, 8vo. These five works were republished in one volume in 1802 by Thomas Winstanley [q. v.] under the title of ‘Miscellanies,’ London, 4to. Webb also edited ‘Selections from “Les Recherches Philosophiques sur les Américains” of Mr. Pauw,’ Bath, 1789, 8vo; new edit. with additions, Rochdale, 1806, 8vo.

[Gent. Mag. 1798, ii. 725, 807; Burke's Landed Gentry, 1898, Ireland; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886; Allibone's Dict. of Engl. Lit.; Reuss's Reg. of Living Authors, 1770–90, 1790–1803; Ann. Reg. 1760 ii. 249, 1762 ii. 247, 1766 ii. 225.]  WEBB, FRANCIS (1735–1815), miscellaneous writer, born at Taunton on 18 Sept. 1735, was the third son of John Webb of Taunton, by his wife Mary, daughter and coheiress of William Sweet of the same town.


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/103

 He was educated at Abingdon and Bristol; afterwards studied theology under [q. v.] and his successor, [q. v.], at the independent academy at Northampton and Daventry; and finished his training with (1701–1774) [q. v.] at Taunton. He entered the nonconformist ministry, became pastor of the congregation at Honiton, and on 27 Sept. 1758 was inducted assistant to [q. v.], minister of the general baptist congregation at Paul's Alley, London. On the death of Burroughs, on 23 Nov. 1761, Webb undertook the sole charge. In 1766 he retired from the pastoral office and filled the office of deputy searcher at Gravesend until 1777, when he removed to Poole in Dorset. In 1775 he republished Dr. Johnson's ‘Marmor Norfolciense,’ a squib against Walpole, which first appeared in 1739. Johnson had not concealed his Jacobite principles in penning it, and Webb, in a satirical preface, cleverly contrasted the views he had then held with those he manifested in the ‘False Alarm’ (1770) and in ‘Taxation no Tyranny’ (1775). During Webb's residence in Dorset he acquired the favour of the Duke of Leeds, the secretary of state, who employed him on several occasions. In 1786 he was appointed secretary to Sir [q. v.], and accompanied him to Hesse-Cassel to invest the landgrave with the order of the Garter. In 1801 he accompanied [q. v.] to Paris, acting as his secretary during the negotiation of the treaty of Amiens. He was employed by Jackson during the negotiations as an unofficial intermediary, the French diplomatists having much faith in his integrity from their knowledge of his sympathy with Napoleon's government. The understanding of the British envoys with the royalist and ultra-republican malcontents and conspirators was, however, intolerable to him, and he retired to England before the conclusion of peace. He was an intimate friend of the artist [q. v.], and wrote a memoir of him which appeared in the ‘History of Dorset’ by [q. v.] (iv. 154–160), and in Nichols's ‘Literary Anecdotes’ (viii. 177–92). He also gave a more detailed account of Hussey's methods in ‘Panharmonicon’ (London, 1814, 4to), a description of one of his engravings. Webb became a unitarian while residing at Lufton, near Yeovil, where he settled in 1811. He died at Barrington, near Ilminster in Somerset, on 2 Aug. 1815, without surviving issue. On 31 March 1764 he was married at Wareham in Dorset to Hannah, daughter of William Milner of Poole.

Webb's portrait has been engraved from a picture by Abbott.

Webb was the author of: Three letters of his are preserved among Warren Hastings's correspondence in the British Museum Additional manuscripts (19174 ff. 122, 419, 17176 f. 171).
 * 1) ‘Sermons,’ London, 1766, 16mo; 3rd edit. with memoir, London, 1818, 8vo.
 * 2) ‘Thoughts on the Constitutional Right and Power of the Crown in the bestowal of Places and Pensions,’ London, 1772, 8vo.
 * 3) ‘An Epistle to the Rev. Mr. Kell, with an Ode to Fortitude,’ Salisbury, 1788, 4to.
 * 4) ‘Poems: on Wisdom; on the Deity; on Genius,’ Salisbury, 1790, 4to.
 * 5) ‘Ode to the rural Nymphs of Brasted,’ 1801, 4to.
 * 6) ‘Somerset: a Poem,’ London, 1811, 4to.

WEBB, FRANCIS CORNELIUS (1826–1873), physician and medical writer, born in Hoxton Square on 9 April 1826, was the eldest son of William Webb, a cadet of the family of Webb of Odstock Manor, by his second wife, Elizabeth Priscilla, daughter of Thomas Massett. He was educated at King's College school, London, and at the Devonport grammar school, where he became a sound classical scholar. On 25 Sept. 1841 he was apprenticed to James Sheppard, a surgeon at Stonehouse, and in 1843 he joined the medical school of University College. He was awarded five gold and silver medals for proficiency in different classes. In 1847 he became a member of the College of Surgeons, and in 1849 he proceeded to Edinburgh, and there graduated M.D. in 1850. In 1851 he returned to London. In 1859 he was appointed a member of the Royal College of Physicians, and he was elected a fellow on 31 July 1873. In 1857 he was nominated to the chair of medical jurisprudence in the Grosvenor Place school of medicine, and subsequently he was lecturer on natural history at the Metropolitan School of Dental Science. In 1861 at the Grosvenor Place school Webb delivered the introductory lecture on ‘The Study of Medicine: its Dignity and Rewards,’ which was published by request. His first important literary effort was an article on ‘The Sweating Sickness in England,’ published in the ‘Sanitary Review and Journal of Public Health’ for July 1857, afterwards republished separately. This was followed by ‘An Historical Account of Gaol Fever,’ read before the Epidemiological Society on 6 July 1857,


text:
Page:Federalist, Dawson edition, 1863.djvu/109

Rh


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/104

 and printed in the ‘Transactions’ of the society. In 1858 an essay on ‘Metropolitan Hygiene of the Past’ was written by Webb for the ‘Sanitary Review;’ it was published in the January number and reprinted separately in the same year. It is a brief and a masterly survey of the sanitary condition of London from the time of the Norman conquest until our own era. When in the ‘Dental Review’ the great work of John Hunter on the teeth was published, Webb contributed notes to the text embodying results of modern research on the subject, and designed to bring Hunter's work up to the point of knowledge of the present day. ‘Hunter's Natural History of the Human Teeth,’ with notes by Webb and R. T. Hulme, appeared in 1865. A few years later Webb became one of the editors of the ‘Medical Times and Gazette,’ and for the last years of his life he was editor-in-chief.

He was elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries on 22 May 1856, of the Linnean Society on 21 Jan. 1858, and of other learned bodies. He was an accomplished musician.

He died on 24 Dec. 1873, and was buried at Highgate cemetery. On 10 Feb. 1852 he married Sarah Schröder, daughter of Joseph Croucher of Great James's Street, Buckingham Gate, and by her had twelve children, ten of whom survived him. A bust, exhibited in the Royal Academy in 1874, is in the possession of his widow, and an oil painting, done shortly before his death, is now at Odstock, Netley Abbey, Hampshire; both works were executed by Charles Bell Birch.

Besides the above-mentioned papers, Webb published ‘Biographies of Sir Benjamin Brodie, Bart., and of P. C. Price, Surgeon to King's College Hospital,’ London, 1865.

WEBB, GEORGE (1581–1642), bishop of Limerick, born in 1581, was third son of Hugh Webb, rector of Bromham, Wiltshire. He entered New College, Oxford, in April 1598, and migrated to Corpus Christi as scholar. He was admitted B.A. in February 1601–2, and M.A. in June 1605, when he was already in orders and vicar of Steeple-Aston, Oxfordshire, on Lord Pembroke's presentation. He kept a grammar school at Steeple-Aston and also at Bath, where he became rector of SS. Peter and Paul in 1621. He enjoyed the friendship of Chief-justice Sir Henry Hobart [q. v.] Webb was made D.D. 1624, and appointed chaplain to the Prince of Wales. He was a man of strict life and conversation, and a distinguished preacher. Charles himself, with Laud's approval, selected him for promotion to the bench (Strafford Letters, i. 330), and he was consecrated bishop of Limerick in St. Patrick's, Dublin, 18 Dec. 1634.

When the confederate catholics entered Limerick in June 1642, Webb had already died of gaol fever, having been imprisoned by their sympathisers within the city. He was buried in St. Munchin's churchyard, dug up twenty-four hours later by persons in hope of finding jewels, and reinterred in the same place. We learn from a casual remark in his ‘Practice of Quietness’ that Webb was happily married.

Webb published:
 * 1) ‘A Brief Exposition of the Principles of the Christian Religion,’ London, 1612.
 * 2) ‘The Pathway to Honour. Preached at Paul's Cross, 21 June 1612,’ London, 1612.
 * 3) ‘The Bride-royal, or the Speculative Marriage between Christ and his Church,’ London, 1613.
 * 4) ‘The Araignment of an Unruly Tongue,’ London, 1619.
 * 5) ‘Agur's Prayer, or the Christian Choice,’ London, 1621.
 * 6) ‘Catalogus Protestantium, or the Protestant's Calendar, containing a Surview of the Protestant's Religion long before Luther's Days’ (Preface by  [q. v.]), London, 1624.
 * 7) ‘Lessons and Exercises out of Cicero ad Atticum,’ London, 1624.
 * 8) ‘Pueriles confabulatiunculæ,’ London, 1624.
 * 9) ‘The Practice of Quietness,’ 6th edit. (amplified), London, 1633; to an edition published in 1705 an engraved portrait of Webb is prefixed. Webb also translated during 1629 the ‘Andria’ and ‘Eunuchus’ of Terence.

WEBB or WEBBE, JOHN (1611–1672), architect, came of a Somerset family, but was born in London in 1611. He was educated from 1625 to 1628 at Merchant Taylors' school (, Register, i. 114), and was a pupil and executor, and a connection by birth and marriage, of [q. v.] (, Athenæ, iii. 806, iv. 753–4). His architectural works were largely in connection with or in continuation of those of his master. When Inigo Jones laid out Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, Webb designed (circ. 1640) the large brick house on the south side, and there exists among Jones's drawings at Worcester College, Oxford, a design by Webb of a house in the Strand for


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/105

 Philip Herbert, earl of Pembroke. In 1648 he rebuilt, possibly from designs by Jones, a portion of Wilton House, Wiltshire.

Soon after the Restoration Webb petitioned for the post of surveyor of works, pleading the intention of the late king, his training under Inigo Jones, his appointment as Jones's deputy till thrust out for loyalty in 1643, and his commission under the existing parliament to prepare the royal palaces for residence at a cost of 8,140l. He further urged that there were arrears of salary due to him, both on his own account and as executor to Jones, and proved his loyalty by recalling that he had sent to the king at Oxford designs of all the fortifications in London, with instructions how they might be carried (Dict. of Architecture).

Webb was granted a reversion of the office of surveyor after Sir John Denham (1615–1669) [q. v.] He acted as Denham's assistant in the building (1661–6) of a portion of Inigo Jones's design for Greenwich Palace, which was subsequently incorporated by Wren as the west side of the river front of his buildings. He is described in the order as ‘John Webb of Butleigh, co. Somerset,’ and was granted a salary of 200l. per annum, with 1l. 13s. 10d. a month for travelling (Life of I. Jones, 1848, pp. 34, 38, 48, in Shakespeare Soc.;, Vitruvius Britannicus, 1715, vol. i. plate 31, and vol. iii. plate 1).

With Sir John Denham he also carried out (gratuitously) certain repairs in 1663 at St. Paul's Cathedral (, Londinium Redivivum, 1803, iii. 83), and designed Burlington House, Piccadilly (1664–6), for Richard Boyle, first earl of Burlington; it was remodelled in 1718–20.

Other works which Webb carried out in accordance with or extension of his master's designs were Amesbury, Wiltshire (1661), for Lord Carleton (, Vitruvius Britannicus, 1725, vol. iii. plate 7); Gunnersbury House, near Kew (1663), for Serjeant Maynard (ib. 1717, vol. i. plates 17, 18), to which we may possibly add Ashburnham House, Westminster, and Bedford House, Bloomsbury Square, though Jones's share in the latter and Webb's in the former need further proof.

To Webb are also attributed Horseheath Hall, Cambridgeshire (1665–9), destroyed in 1777; the portico and other works at the Vine, near Basingstoke; Lamport Hall, Northamptonshire (road front only); Ramsbury Manor, Wiltshire; and Ashdown Park, Berkshire.

In 1669, on Denham's death, the post of surveyor passed to Sir Christopher Wren, despite the fact that Webb held the reversion. He died on 24 Oct. 1672 at Butleigh, and was buried there. He married Anne Jones, a kinswoman of Inigo Jones, who left Webb some of his property. He edited ‘The most noble Antiquity called Stoneheng,’ by Inigo Jones (1655, fol.), and wrote ‘Vindication of Stoneheng Restored’ (1665, fol., 2nd edit. 1725). Webb designed the frontispiece of Walton's ‘Polyglot Bible’ 1657, fol.

 WEBB, JOHN (1772–1852), director-general ordnance medical department, fourth son of John Webb of Woodland Hill, Staffordshire, and afterwards of Dublin, by his wife, a daughter of Thomas Heath, was born at Dublin on 25 Oct. 1772. He was appointed assistant surgeon on 17 March 1794. He became a member of the College of Surgeons of England on 22 Feb. 1817, and was made a fellow on 11 Dec. 1843, being one of the first batch of three hundred fellows created at that date. It is stated that he had the degree of M.D., but of what university is not known. The following are the dates of his appointments to the various grades in the army: he was promoted regimental surgeon on 15 July 1795, surgeon to the forces 1 March 1797, field inspector 10 April 1801, deputy inspector-general 30 May 1802, inspector 3 July 1809, inspector-general 20 Nov. 1809, and director-general 1 Aug. 1813. He served on the continent under the Duke of York from April 1794 to May 1795, in the West Indies from November 1795 to June 1798, at The Helder from August to November 1799, in the Mediterranean and Egypt from August 1800 to April 1806, in the Baltic from July to November 1807, and at Walcheren from July to September 1809. He was thus present at the action of Lannoi on 17 and 18 May 1794, at the siege of Morne Fortuné, capture of St. Lucia, the expulsion of the Caribs from St. Vincent in 1796, capture of Trinidad and the descent on the Porto Rico in 1797, at the reduction of the Helder and the capture of the Texel fleet in 1799, on the coast of Spain in 1800, in the Egyptian campaign in 1801, including the actions at the landing and those of 13 and 21 March, at the taking of Grand Cairo and all the subsequent operations, at the siege of Copenhagen and capture of the Danish fleet in 1807, and at the expedition to the Scheldt in 1809. He received the silver war medal with one clasp for Egypt, was knighted in 1821, elected a knight of the Cross of Han-


text: A Book of the Cevennes/The Wood of Païolive


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Gustavus V


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Gutenberg, Johannes


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/110

 rams were rendered useless by over-fattening. The result was that he resolved to exhibit for the future only young rams. He had great success with his Shearling rams exhibited at the French International Exhibition in 1855, for which he received a gold medal of the first class. The Emperor of the French congratulated him on his success, and admired the beauty of the rams he exhibited. Webb presented him with the choicest specimen, receiving some time afterwards in return ‘a candelabrum of massive silver with appropriate devices.’

In the course of the last two years of Webb's life the Babraham flocks were all dispersed, 969 sheep being sold by auction in June 1862 for 10,926l. He, however, bred cattle with success to the last. His herd of shorthorns, begun in 1838, and recruited by purchase from the celebrated herds of Lord Spencer and Lord Ducie, was mentioned by Mons. Tréhonnais in 1859 as the most important shorthorn herd then existing, and one which had perhaps only been surpassed in beauty and perfection by those of Booth and Towneley. At the Royal Agricultural Society's show held at Battersea in 1862, immediately after the dispersion of his flock of Southdowns, Webb's shorthorn bull calf ‘First Fruit’ gained the gold medal as ‘the best male animal in the shorthorn class’ (for a portrait of this bull see Farmers' Magazine, December 1862.)

Webb died at Cambridge on 10 Nov. 1862 (his birthday) quite suddenly, his end being accelerated by the death only five days before of his wife, to whom he was devotedly attached. He was buried at Babraham on the 14th. He was one of nine children, left nine children himself, and his eldest son, Henry Webb of Streetly, has also had nine children. ‘His honour and scrupulous good faith,’ says the famous French agriculturist M. Tréhonnais, ‘his generosity and uniform affability gained him the respect of everybody.’ Elihu Burritt, in his ‘Walk from London to John-o'Groats,’ gives an interesting description of Webb's life and work. A full-length statue of Webb, erected by public subscription, stands in the corn exchange at Cambridge.

[Farmers' Mag. 2nd ser. xi. 195–7 (March 1845), 3rd ser. xxii. 5–9, 464–6 (July–December 1862), containing a notice which also appeared in the Mark Lane Express, 17 Nov. 1862; Illustrated London News, 1862 (portrait and memoir); Journal of the Royal Agricultural Soc. of England (1846) 1st ser. vii. 60, (1847) viii. 8, (1856) xvii. 37, (1858) xix. 381–2; Ann. Register, 1862, p. 793; Journal of Agriculture, 1863, pp. 202–3, 447–8; Robiou de la Tréhonnais's Revue Agricole de l'Angleterre, 1859, i. 104–10, a biographical sketch with a portrait; Comte Gerard de Gourcy's Second Voyage Agricole en Angleterre, 1847, p. 25, Quatrième Voyage, 1859.]  WEBB, MATTHEW (1848–1883), known as ‘Captain Webb,’ the Channel swimmer, was born on 18 Jan. 1848 at Dawley, Shropshire, where his father and grandfather, alike named Matthew, had both practised as country doctors. His father (b. 1813; d. at Ironbridge, 15 Dec. 1876), who had qualified as M.R.C.S. in 1835, subsequently moved to Madeley and then to Ironbridge, where the swimmer's brother, Mr. Thomas Law Webb, is still in practice. Matthew was one of a family of twelve children, eight of whom were sons. He learned to swim in the Severn before he was eight, and saved the life of a younger brother who was endeavouring to swim across the river for the first time. The perusal of Kingston's ‘Old Jack’ inspired him with a strong desire to go to sea, and having been trained for two years on board the Conway in the Mersey, during which period he saved a comrade from drowning, he was in 1862 bound apprentice to Rathbone Brothers of Liverpool, and engaged in the East India and China trade until his indentures expired in 1866. He then shipped as second mate under various owners, and in 1874 was awarded the first Stanhope gold medal upon the occasion of the centenary dinner of the Royal Humane Society, for jumping overboard the Cunard steamship Russia on 22 April 1873 while a stiff breeze was blowing and the ship cutting through the water at the rate of 14½ knots, in an endeavour to save a seaman who had fallen from the rigging (Swimming Notes and Record, 1884; Royal Humane Society Annual Report, 1874). Soon after this he backed himself to remain in the sea longer than a Newfoundland dog, and after Webb had remained in the water about an hour and a half it was found that ‘the poor brute was nearly drowned.’

In January 1875 Webb joined the Emerald of Liverpool, and acted as captain for six months; but in June of this year he determined to relinquish the mercantile marine. In the following month he established a record among salt-water swimmers by a ‘public swim’ from Blackwall Pier to Gravesend, a distance of some twenty miles, in 43/4 hours (3 July); this was eclipsed on 25 July 1899 by M. A. Holbein.

At the beginning of August 1875 public interest was greatly aroused by the announcement that Webb intended to attempt the


text: A Book of the Cevennes/The Ravine of the Allier


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/111

 feat of swimming across the English Channel without any artificial aid. The attempt made by J. B. Johnson to swim the straits in August 1872 had ended in a fiasco. On 28 May 1875 Captain Paul Boyton, the American life-saving expert, had, after one failure, successfully accomplished the feat of paddling across the Straits when clothed in his patent dress; but although the journey demonstrated the great value of the dress, the paddle in itself was mere child's play in comparison with the task which Webb set himself to accomplish. His first attempt on 12 Aug. was a failure, owing to the fact that he drifted upwards of nine miles out of his proper course in consequence of the strong current and the stress of weather. Twelve days later he dived from the Admiralty Pier, Dover, a few seconds before one o'clock in the afternoon (31/4 hours before high water on a 15 ft. 10 in. tide), and swimming through the night by a three-quarter moon reached Calais at 10.40 A.M. next morning (25 Aug.), having been immersed for nearly twenty-two hours, and having swum a distance of about forty miles without having touched a boat or artificial support of any kind. Great anxiety had been felt by his supporters and the special correspondents upon the lugger which accompanied him, owing to the fact that off Cape Gris Nez the wind arose, the sea became choppy, and between eight and ten in the morning scarcely any progress appeared to be made, while Webb was getting thoroughly exhausted. The successful accomplishment of such a feat gave Webb a pre-eminence among all swimmers of whom there is any record. A handsome testimonial was presented to Webb as the result of a public subscription (the amount of the wager against him being only 125l.)

At the time of his performance Webb was twenty-seven and a half years old, his chest measured 40½ in., his height was 5 ft. 8 in., and he weighed 14 stone 8lb. His body was anointed with porpoise grease, and he was sustained while treading water by doses of cod-liver oil, beef-tea, brandy, coffee, and strong old ale. He used the ‘breast stroke’ almost exclusively, averaging twenty strokes per minute. He was examined by Sir William Ferguson and other surgeons, and his exploit was pronounced by medical opinion to stand almost unrivalled as an instance of human prowess and endurance (Brit. Med. Journal, 28 Aug.; cf. Lancet; the best account of the details of the ‘leviathan swim’ is in Land and Water, 7 Aug., 28 Aug., 4 Sept., with map showing the zigzag course, and 11 Sept. 1875).

During the next few years Webb gave exhibitions of diving and swimming, but mainly of his power of endurance in the water, at various towns in the provinces, at the Westminster Aquarium, and in the United States. Despite these efforts, however, his capital dwindled, and his health seemed on the point of breaking. In the early summer of 1883 he resolved to make a further bid for public favour by attempting to swim through the rapids and whirlpool at the foot of the Niagara Falls. The design was so foolhardy as to be hardly distinguishable from suicide; but a considerable amount of capital seems to have been embarked upon the enterprise, mainly by the railway companies bearing excursionists to Niagara. The ferry-man at Niagara, after a last attempt to dissuade him from the enterprise, rowed ‘Captain Webb’ out into the middle of the river on the afternoon of Tuesday, 24 July 1883. Webb plunged from the boat about 4 P.M., and in about eight minutes had got through what looked the worst part of the rapids; but at the entrance to the whirlpool he was engulfed. He was perceived to throw up his arms with his face towards the Canadian shore, but was never seen again. He left a widow and two children.

[Times, 26 and 27 July 1883; Field, 28 July 1883, p. 147; Illustr. Lond. News, 28 July, with portrait, and 4 Aug.; Land and Water, 28 July 1883; Sinclair and Henry's Swimming (Badminton Library), 1894, pp. 161–6, with a map of his course across Channel and interesting technical details. Among the short Lives are Randall's Captain Webb (with portrait), Madeley, 1875; Webb's Art of Swimming, ed. Payne, with a coloured portrait and brief autobiographical preface, 1875; Dolphin's Channel Feats, 1875; and a chap-book by H. L. Williams, 1883.]  WEBB, PHILIP BARKER (1793–1854), botanist, was great-grandson of Philip Carteret Webb (1700–1770) [q. v.], and the eldest of three sons of Philip Smith Webb of Milford House, Surrey, and Hannah, daughter of Sir Robert Barker, bart. Webb was born at Milford House on 10 July 1793, and was educated at Harrow and at Christ Church, Oxford (he matriculated on 17 Oct. 1811), where William Buckland [q. v.] inspired him with a taste for geology. In 1812 he entered Lincoln's Inn, and in 1815 he graduated as B.A.; but, the death of his father having then put him in command of a handsome fortune, he at once began to gratify his taste for travel, for which he had equipped himself by a study of Italian and Spanish while at Oxford.


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 5, 1894.djvu/63

 Rh small extent drawn attention to their possible influence in keeping alive older phases of savage beliefs and customs amidst the growing influences of a higher faith—of Indian fetish worship by the side of Buddhism, of European superstitions of a cruel and revolting kind by the side of Christianity. But I confess I had no testimony, though testimony lay ready to my hand. For instance, in Greenland, members of the community who have fallen out with their fellows become outcasts (kivihit, sing, kivitot) and flee to the mountains or into the interior. "There is great resemblance between these kivitut and the outliers so common in Icelandic popular legends. The great part which these outliers play in the popular fantasy, and the mystic fear with which they are regarded, has caused them from a very early period to be in great measure confounded in common belief with trolls, huldre-folk, and other legendary creatures in whose supernatural faculties they partake. Like the kivitot, they seek the abodes of men in order to pick up something to eat; they steal sheep, food, and clothes from the people of the settlements. The most characteristic feature of both the Greenland and the Iceland legends is that men by being cut off from society obtain supernatural power. The coincidence becomes still more striking when we observe that both in Greenland and in Iceland these legends form an essential part of living popular tradition and belief" If this be compared with what is recorded of the condition of things in Guernsey not long since, its significance can hardly be missed. There was a small hamlet exclusively inhabited by the descendants of a family which from time immemorial has been kept entirely distinct from the surrounding peasantry, and was regarded by them as a race of hereditary witches and wizards, and supposed to have been the first settlers in the island.

This is an important point, and one of great use both to folk-lorists and anthropologists, but the latter will not be


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/112

 Visiting Vienna, he made the acquaintance of the Chevalier Parolini of Bassano, who was of the same age, station, fortune, and tastes as himself, having studied botany and geology under Brocchi. Webb having stayed with him at Bassano, Parolini returned his visit at Milford in 1816, when they planned a joint expedition to the East. Previous to starting upon this, however, Webb paid a short visit to Sweden, visiting Gottenburg, Upsal, and Stockholm, and going as far as 61° N. lat.

The winter of 1817–18 Webb spent at Naples with his mother and two of his sisters, and Parolini joining him there, they started in April 1818 by way of Otranto, Corfu, Patras, and Athens, to the Cyclades, Constantinople, and the Troad, returning by Smyrna and Malta to Sicily. Being well versed in Homer and Strabo, Webb carefully studied the topography of the Troad; and, having come to conclusions very different from those propounded by Le Chevalier in his ‘Voyage de la Troade dans 1785 et 1789,’ he published at Milan in the winter of 1820–21 his ‘Osservazioni intorno allo stato antico e presente dell' agro Trojano,’ which was expanded in 1844 into ‘Topographie de la Troade ancienne et moderne,’ Paris, 8vo, a work showing much antiquarian and geological erudition. He rediscovered the Scamander and Simois, and settled some other important points in Homeric geography.

After this Webb spent some time at Milford, where he collected many interesting plants in his garden; but in July 1825 he visited the entomologist Léon Dufour at St. Sever, and after wintering in the south of France, made a year's tour of the eastern and southern coasts of Spain, collecting birds, fish, shells, and especially plants, a tour afterwards described in his ‘Iter Hispaniense’ (1838) and ‘Otia Hispanica’ (1853). In April 1827 he went from Gibraltar to Tangier, and, though he found it impossible to get far into the interior, made an interesting exploration of Jebel Beni-Hosmar and Jebel Darsa, mountains near Tetuan, the flora of which was then entirely unknown. Returning to Gibraltar in June, Webb devoted the remainder of the year to a journey on horseback through Portugal, the botanical results of which were included in his ‘Iter Hispaniense,’ though his many geological and mineralogical notes, including a geological map of the Lisbon basin, made in conjunction with Louis da Silva Mouzinho d'Albuquerque, remain unpublished.

In May 1828 Webb left Lisbon for Madeira, and in the following September went on to Teneriffe, intending to proceed to Brazil. Falling in with M. Savin Berthelot, however, a young Frenchman who had already spent eight years in the island and had formed a herbarium, Webb remained nearly two years in the Canaries, visiting with him Lanzarote, Feurteventura, Gran Canaria, and Palma. They studied and collected the plants, birds, fish, shells, and insects, examined the rocks, analysed the waters, made thermometrical observations, and neglected nothing which could help towards a complete physical and statistical history of the archipelago. In April 1830 Webb and Berthelot embarked at Santa Cruz, and, being kept out of France by cholera and revolution, went by way of the coast of Algeria to Nice, and thence to Geneva. In June 1833 they established themselves in Paris, where Webb got together a good library and a herbarium finer than any private collection in France, save that of Delessert. In preparing their great work, ‘Histoire Naturelle des îles Canaries’ (Paris, 1836–50, 9 vols. 4to), Webb reserved to himself most of the geology and botany and the description of the mammals, Berthelot contributing the ethnography, the history of the conquest and of the relations of the islanders with the Moors and with America, and the descriptive and statistical geography, while the services of Valenciennes were secured for the description of the fish; Alcide d'Orbigny for the mollusks; Brullé, H. Lucas, and Macquart for the insects; Paul Gervais for the reptiles; and Moquin-Tandon for the birds. Articles were also contributed by Montagne, C. H. Schulz, Decaisne, Parlatore, De Noe, and the younger Reichenbach. The issue of the work itself was followed by that of a folio atlas of 441 plates by the best artists obtainable.

After having spent fourteen years over the preparation of this work, travelling only between Milford and Paris, Webb wished to visit Tunis and Egypt, to solve some botanical problems left unsettled by Vahl and Desfontaines, but was twice stopped at the outset by indifferent health and the news of the unsatisfactory political and sanitary conditions of those countries. He accordingly in January 1848 started for Florence and Rome, the Italian climate suiting him, and devoted two years to collecting Italian plants. At Rome he made the acquaintance of the Countess Elizabeth Mazzanti-Fiorini, the cryptogamist, the only woman, he said, whom he had ever met who loved botany passionately. At Florence he was specially attracted by the botanical gallery


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Guthrie, Okla.


text:
Page:A book of the Cevennes (-1907-).djvu/280

202 criminal enterprises to lead to ends the reverse of those aimed at. Our mountaineers have remained what the Romans found them—energetic, sober, satirical. Certainly we have no end of processions; corporations and pious congregations abound. But it is a remarkable fact, that these gatherings of the faithful lack that gravity which a religious character should impress upon them. There is prayer, perhaps, but most assuredly there is diversion as well."

Cavalier in England was made a great deal of; he was fêted as a hero, received into the best society, and died Governor of Jersey in receipt of a handsome income; which he certainly did not deserve, as he had shown himself atrociously cruel, not to priests only, but to harmless peasant men and women, whose only crime consisted in adherence to the faith of their fathers.


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/113

 of the museum, then under the care of his friend Parlatore, to which he planned to bequeath his library and herbaria. It was here that in the winter of 1848–9 he prepared his ‘Fragmenta Florulæ Æthiopico-Ægyptiacæ,’ which, however, was not published until 1854 (Paris, 8vo), owing to the Tuscan revolution of 1849.

After six weeks at Bagnères-de-Luchon, where he had been ordered to take the waters, in the summer of 1850, Webb revisited Spain to put some finishing touches to his ‘Otia Hispanica,’ and to visit his friend Graëlls, director of the museum and garden at Madrid. He had recently been given the order of Charles III by Queen Isabella, and on the occasion of this visit was elected corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences at Madrid at the same time as Leverrier.

In 1851 he returned to England, and in August, with his nephew, Godfrey Webb, visited Ireland, and, having received suggestions from his friend John Ball, explored the west coast from Cork to Killarney, Dingle, Tralee, Limerick, Galway, Roundstone, and the Aranmore Islands, the home of an interesting offshoot of the Iberian flora which he so well knew. After a year devoted to a synopsis of the flora of the Canaries, which he did not live to finish, and a second futile attempt to start for Tunis in the autumn of 1852, Webb again visited Italy and his friend Parolini, but was recalled to England by the death of his mother. In May 1854 he started for Geneva to visit his younger brother, Admiral Webb, but at Paris was seized with gout; and, though he so far recovered as to be able to superintend on crutches the classification of his library by Moquin-Tandon, he died on 31 Aug. 1854. He was buried in a mausoleum which he had built in the churchyard of Milford. The whole of his collections and herbarium, including those of Philippe Mercier, Desfontaines, La Billardière, Pavon, and Gustave de Montbret, together with complete sets of the plants collected by Wallich, Wight, Gardner, and Schimper, he bequeathed, with an endowment for their maintenance, to the Grand Duke Leopold II of Tuscany. The collection has a room to itself in the museum at Florence, where there is also a bust of the donor.

Besides the works already mentioned Webb was the author of many papers on various branches of natural history, the most important of which was perhaps his ‘Spicilegia Gorgonea,’ a catalogue of the plants of the Cape de Verd Islands, prefixed to Hooker and Bentham's ‘Niger Flora,’ 1849.

[Notice sur la vie et les travaux de Philippe Barker Webb, by M. J. Gay, Bulletin de la Société Botanique de France, 1856.]  WEBB, PHILIP CARTERET (1700–1770), antiquary and politician, supposed to have been born at Devizes in Wiltshire in 1700, was admitted attorney-at-law on 20 June 1724. He practised at first in Old Jewry, then removed to Budge Row, and afterwards settled in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields. On 18 Dec. 1727 he was admitted at the Middle Temple, and on 8 April 1741 was admitted at Lincoln's Inn. Early in his career he acquired a great reputation for knowledge of records and of precedents of constitutional law. On the suppression of the rebellion of 1745 his abilities as solicitor on the trials of the prisoners proved of great service to the state. He was the author of ‘Remarks on the Pretender's Declaration and Commission,’ 1745, dated from Lincoln's Inn on 12 Oct. in that year, and of ‘Remarks on the Pretender's Eldest Son's Second Declaration,’ 1745, which came out subsequently. Lord Hardwicke made him secretary of bankrupts in the court of chancery, and he retained the post until 1766, when Lord Northington ceased to be lord chancellor.

Webb was elected F.S.A. on 26 Nov. 1747 and F.R.S. on 9 Nov. 1749, and in 1751 he assisted materially in obtaining the charter of incorporation for the Society of Antiquaries (, Lit. Anecd. ii. 712–13). In 1748 he purchased the estate of Busbridge, near the borough of Haslemere in Surrey, which gave him considerable influence in that corrupt constituency. He sat for Haslemere in the parliaments from 1754 to 1761 (Carlisle MSS. in Hist. MSS. Comm. 15th Rep. vi. 207), and from 1761 to 1768. The first of these elections elicited in 1754 the well-known ballad, attributed to Dr. King, of St. Mary Hall, Oxford, of ‘The Cow of Haslemere,’ which had eight calves, for each of which a vote in Webb's interest was claimed.

In December 1756 Webb was made joint-solicitor to the treasury, and held that post until June 1765; he was consequently a leading official in the proceedings against John Wilkes, and for his acts was dubbed by Horace Walpole ‘a most villainous tool and agent in any iniquity,’ ‘that dirty wretch,’ and ‘a sorry knave.’ Webb was the leader in seizing, among the papers of Wilkes, the poem of the ‘Essay on Woman;’ and when the legality of general warrants was impugned, he printed privately and anonymously a volume of ‘Copies taken from the Records of the Court of King's


text: Myer v. Car Company

title: Myer v. Car Company


text: Talk:Myer v. Car Company

title: Talk:Myer v. Car Company