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The Manx
Society.

Visit of the
Prince of
Wales to
India.

Francis

The following information in reference to the Manx Society, supplied by Mr. Paul Bridson, of Douglas, Isle of Man, the honorary secretary, also appears on the 28th of August: "The Society, which was organized for the publication of valuable documents illustrating the history of the Manx people and works of interest to the inhabitants of the island, has up to the present period issued twenty-three volumes, and two more are in the press."

The Prince of Wales was to sail for India on the 11th of October, and the Athenæum on the 2nd states that the visit "will, probably, prove of literary as well as of general interest"; and that "whilst other journals give to their readers their accounts of the popular side of the Prince's progress, we shall note its literary phases." A series of articles followed, describing the principal literary works by Indian authors to which the royal visit gave birth, the Oriental curiosities presented to the Prince, and the tone of the vernacular press, with an account of the services held in Hindu temples and Mohammedan mosques, including details of the prayers and ritual.

On December 18th the death, in his fifty-sixth Lieut-Col. year, of the youngest son of Allan Cunningham, Cunningham. Lieut.-Col. Francis Cunningham, is recorded. He was the "editor of Ben Jonson, Marlow, and

Massinger, and a frequent contributor to the Saturday Review." His little house in Clarendon Road, Kensington, was crowded "with curious books, rare engravings, and a few valuable old pictures. Among his most prized possessions was Charles Lamb's copy of Ben Jonson (folio, 1616), the purchase of which for sixteen shillings is triumphantly chronicled in one of Elia's essays. It contains many marginal notes by Lamb and Coleridge. Over his library chimney-piece hung a black and gold frame, containing four finished pencil drawings of Lamb, Coleridge, Southey, and Wordsworth, done for Joseph Cottle, of Bristol, in 1798."

The obituary of 1875 included the Rev. John Moultrie; Sir William Boyd, of Edinburgh, author of a 'History of Literature' and 'Lectures on Ancient and Modern Literature'; Mrs. Trafford Whitehead, who had contributed a series of poems to the Manchester press under the nom de guerre of "A Manchester Lady"; Mr. Charles Rogers, well known in Yorkshire for his writings in the dialect of that county, and the editor of 'T' Bairnsla Foaks Annual an Pogmoor Olmenac,' published annually for more than thirty years; Sir Charles Lyell; Prof. Willis; Mr. Winwood Reade; Admiral Sherard Osborn; the eminent geographer Mr. A. G. Findlay; Prof. Cairnes; Bishop Thirl

VOL. II.

2 A

Obituary,

1875.

wall; Dr. Davies, of Regent's Park College; Sir Francis Head, the well-known author of Rough Notes of a Journey across the Pampas' and 'Bubbles from the Brünnen of Nassau'; Mr. John Wade, author of 'The Black Book an Exposition of Abuses in the Church and State, Public Offices, Courts of Law, Public Companies, Corporations, and Parliamentary Representation,' which, published by Mr. Effingham Wilson in 1820, "when abuses. were plentiful and the Reform spirit rising,” produced a considerable sensation, fifty thousand copies being sold; Dean Hook; Sir John Gardner Wilkinson; the Rev. William Brock, D.D.; and Mr. James Yeowell, for upwards of twenty years the sub-editor of Notes and Queries.

CHAPTER IX.

THE ATHENÆUM, 1876-1878.

1876.

THE death of Mr. John Forster is recorded on the 5th of February, 1876. He was born in John Forster. Newcastle in 1812, the same year as his friend Charles Dickens. "Of the fifteen authors and artists whose names figure with his own in the playbills of the amateur performances on behalf of the Guild of Literature and Art, just twentyfive years ago, ten have already passed away; while of that illustrious band who assembled in certain chambers in Lincoln's Inn Fields, in December, 1844, to hear a private reading of The Chimes,' Mr. Carlyle alone is now numbered among the living. In Maclise's outline Present at the reading of picture of that gathering, Mr. Forster's features The Chimes.' -somewhat stern and authoritative in expression even then-might easily be recognized by those acquainted with him, without the aid of the names, which the artist, in modest emulation of the practice of Dick Tinto, has affixed to each portrait." His first essays in biography, his 'Statesmen of the Commonwealth,' con

biography.

tributed to "Lardner's Cyclopædia,” “evidenced Gift for in a remarkable way his gift for biography. They underwent, in the later editions, great modifications; mere sketches becoming substantial memoirs, and all being improved by the light of later knowledge. But they had always the merit of being a conscientious effort to restore the portraits of certain English worthies which had long been defaced and hidden from the knowledge of their countrymen. A nobler task or a higher achievement in this field could hardly be conceived than that of absolutely rescuing out of the darkness of the past a life so brilliant, and of such high example to patriotism and virtue, as that of Sir John Eliot. ......The Life of Goldsmith' has taken its rank as an English classic, and has, from the time of its first appearance, been deservedly popular. His 'Life of Landor' was necessarily a less genial book; but......it had the merit of skilful portraiture. His biography of Dickens, though it has enjoyed a vast circle of readers, could hardly fail to be in great degree disappointing. Written so soon after the death of that great writer, it was necessarily penned under a sense of restraint. ...... His latest work, as our readers know, was his 'Life of Swift,' though this had been for many years in preparation. Of the

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