Hi 



CAVKNDI8H, MAROAKKT. 



CAXTON, WILLIAM. 



of dieeorety." The dbeoveriee of Cave 



I oe <ueuu idles 01 VBWIUIBU w*r uui-uiii , 

 both byanalyaU and synthee*; aaoertoimd 

 that UM weight of his product WM the sum of that of its component*, 

 and determined M! apeoiae gravity. He wu the first who carried the 

 wind and method! of a tnuhemtUcun into the field from which 

 UM ilnhemht had not long retired, and in which the speculator still 

 leiMlnsil And when we my the mind and methodi of a mathema- 

 tician, we do not deny that the inductive philoeopber had already 

 been then; bat U WM to remark phenomena, and not to measure 



(Qe. Wileon. M.D., Zi/ o/ (JU /Ton. //ony Carem/uA, incliuliny 

 All* till / Au M*r taMertSBit inoi/t/fc JMJKT* ; printed for the 

 TTnnlilj. Load, 1851 ; Biot, Art. CewewiisA In Biagrapkie 



. 



CAVBXDISH. MARGARET, DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE. 

 TBM eccentric lady. UM youngeat daughter of Sir Charles Luoaa, WM 

 bore m r^ex towards the close of the reign of JamM I. In 1643 ahe 

 WM appointed a maid of honour to Henrietta Maria ; and, accompanying 

 the qoMO to Parie, ah* became in 1645 UM coud wife of William 

 Cavendish. who had formerly been Earl and wu then Marquis of 

 Xewcsttle. and who bad bom* armi in the eiril war with courage and 

 aelf-deroUon. The exile of tho Marchioness and her husband wai 

 chiefly ipent at Antwerp, and wu accompanied by frequent pecuniary 

 cmbarraeameata, which ahe had the spirit to arow in her memoir of 

 her husband's life. Both of them were forced at one time to pawn 

 Ten their eiothee, A riait which the paid to England wai unsuccessful 

 to procuring any grant out of UM family eetate*; but aanitanoe fur- 

 nished by relation! enabled the Marquis and hii wife to lubsist more 

 comfortably till the HeatoraUon. On that erent they returned to 

 England ; and in 1084 the Marquis wai created Duke of Newcastle. 

 The remainder of their married life wai ipent in the retirement of tho 

 DUMStli. The DoobeM died in the end of the year 1673. and hoi- 

 husband, aged eighty-four, in 1676. 



The period which succeeded the acquisition ef the dukedom wai 

 chiefly derated by the noble pair to that courae of literary itudy and 

 oompoutioo. which, however creditable in the motive, wai rendered 

 ao whimsical by the eccentric character of tho parties. Horace Walpole, 

 in his 'Royal and Noble Author*,' found a tempting theme for hi 

 Ul-natared wit in the picture of the duke and duchess, prosecuting 

 their harmlen oooapationi with an aristocratic forgetfulneu of the 

 whole world besides. each regarding the other as the greatest geniui 

 of UM times, and each lavishing on the other, in conversation and in 

 print, the moct extravagant hyperbole! of commendation. Tho Duke 

 had long before appeared more than once ai an author ; and particularly 

 by the publication of hU work on Honemanihip,' firet printed in 

 Flea oh at Antwerp in 1858, and afterwordi in English, with altera- 

 tions, at London in 1667. In the later period of hia life, the example 

 of hb wife tempted him to perpetrate aomo oomediei which were even 

 woree than her own. She wai indeed at once the more ombitioui and 

 by Car the more industrious writer of the two. There wai acaroely 

 any department of composition, either in prow or in vene, on which 

 ahe did not exercise her reedy pen. Her singularly constituted mind 

 WM alwaya in fermentation ; and, not content with recording its pro- 

 doota at ordinary houn, ehe kept tome of her attendant kdies within 

 call even during the night, to write down the bright thoughts that 

 aroee in boon at iliipliisnin. The remit of this distempered activity 

 WM a collection of ton printed folio*. beaidei other works that never 

 w the light Catalogues of these, and of the Duke's work*, will be 

 foandinWalpoleandTnthe'BiographUUritannica.' The beat known 

 work* of the Duchess are her two volumes of plays, published respect- 

 lively in 1W2 and I W9. These effusions deserve a passing inspection 

 from UM student of literary history, both aa monumenta of unredeemed 

 and mUertiitted absurdity, and u examples of some principles in 

 UUrary composition to which no author before or since has ever been 

 bold enough to avow obedience. Not only for the higher lawi of style, 

 but even for the ordinary rules of English grammar, " the thrioe noble, 

 illustrious, and exoollent Prince*" (as her title-pagea call her) pro- 

 feesed a sovereign oontompt. In several of those nine addressee " to 

 the Headers" which, beaidei other prefaces, stand in succession before 

 her first volume of pUya, abe magnanimously declare! her willingnea* 

 that her writings should be onread by " such pedantical aoholaatioal 

 enoni- M atUoh i-nporUuo. to grammatical JUtinctions of gender, 

 and I to UOM other Uws of language, as to which ahe announces, that, 

 tf ehe wajeritoBd them, as she does not. she would not follow them. 

 Her practice M qniu conformable to this frank profession. It is 

 rarely far example, that the condescends to join a plural verb with a 

 nUrat noinaifre.ftrt ail each technical fault, are as nothing, com- 

 riU the childish and araaaUa extravagancies which in those 

 pUyt make up the whole tiseoe of the matter/ There is not In one of 

 $~*,f{?T. *^* ta ** "Jthiiif bat the form. That they 

 hould be tree from coarsen.* WM not to be expected in such an 



^ t U l i? U **"* ari OM ' foU ' ""M " 

 U l t * td * Up ' u ** The philosophical discus- 

 which abound 



""*? 

 hie 



" a PPars from Harria that he WM of 



ago 



r-s nroperty in 1586, immediately after which 

 bark of 1M tooa" on hi* own accoun 



own account, and 



accompanied Sir Richard Urenville in his voyage to Virginia and the 

 West Indies. HU outlay on this voyage was a serious inroad into his 

 fortune : be derived 110 profit from it. According to some of his 

 biographers, CavendUh, on his return from Virginia, still farther 

 reduced hb property by becoming a courtier, and embarking in the 

 extravagance! of thegallantaof Queen Elizabeth's days ; and they state 

 that his first grand voyage was undertaken (as the iccouJ undoubtedly 

 wu) to recruit his finances. The practice was common, enough iu his 

 time, and men of rank and family thought it no disgrace to retrieve 

 their fortune! by plundering on the Spanish Main. Their system 

 to us appeara to be scarcely better than that of buccaneering; but 

 the cruelties of the Spaniards alrnoat justified oven tho buccaneers : 

 nud it is to be remembered that in the dayi of Elizabeth there wai 

 open war with Spain, and while that power lent armadas to invade 

 England, it WM quite fair that England should attack Spain iu the 

 richest and moat exposed of her transatlantic colonies. 



The expedition, which wu mainly fitted out at the expense of 

 Cavendish, who sold or mortgaged the remainder of hia estate! for 

 the purpose, consisted only of three small Teasel! one of 120 tons, 

 one of 60 tons, and the thud of 40 tons ; and the united crews, men 

 and officers, did not exceed 123. But the mind of every one of theae 

 adventurers was inflamed with ideas of wealth to be obtained in a 

 predatory voyage against the Spaniards, and they had full confidence 

 iu the valour and generosity of their young commander. Cavendish 

 embarked in the largest ship, and sailed from Plymouth on the 21 t 

 of July 15S6. Crossing the Atlantic, he ran along all the continent 

 of South America as far aa the Straits of Magalhaens, into which he 

 boldly sailed on the 6th of January 1537. It took him thirty-three 

 days to clear the Straits, but part of that time was well eiuplo;. 

 surveying tho coasts, rock*, &<x, which were hitherto little knmvn. 

 As soon as he reached tho Pacific Ocean (24th of February) he 

 northward, and soon came to the scene of action which he hod selected 

 as likely to furnish most booty. The men fought and plundered 

 bravely, but not without suffering considerable loss. They burnt 1'aita, 

 Acapuico, and other settlements on or near the coast ; they toot 

 Spanish ships, destroyed others, and ravaged the sea-boar.l of Chili, 

 Peru, aud New Spain. But the crowning blow of the expedition, and 

 that on which Cavendish counted for wealth and honour, waa tho 

 capture of the annual galleon, the St. Anna, which waa loaded with 

 valuable merchandise, and contained 122,000 Spanish dollars in hard 

 cash. This ship was 700 tons burden, and well manned ; yet, after 

 lyiug iu ambush for her under Cape Lucas on the coast of California, 

 the Eugluib, whose number, small at first, had been greatly i 

 by battle and sickness, attacked her, and carried her by boarding. 

 After this Cavendish, starting from California, crossed the Pacific to 

 the Ladrone Island* ; from the Ladronee he sailed through the Indian 

 Archipelago and the Straits of Java to the Cape of Good Hope; from 

 the Cape he made for England, and he reached Plymouth on the 9th 

 of September 15S3, having been absent two years, one mouth, and a 

 few days. 



The circumnavigation of the globe hod not before been performed 

 in so short a time. In addition to despatch, Cavendish had the merit 

 of making some geographical corrections : he reduced to its proper 

 length the distance from Java to the Cape of Good Hope, which the 

 Portuguese had greatly exaggerated ; and he did a good deal, as already 

 stated, towards the hydrography of the Straits of Magalhaens. He 

 was also the first to point out to tho English tho local advantages of 

 Sk Helena, which before had been resorted to only by the Portuguese. 

 He touched at that iahvnd, which he described M a delicious place, 

 then covered with trees. On his return from this voyage he wrote a 

 curioui letter to Lord Hounsdon, a chamberlain and favourite of 

 Queen Elisabeth. After telling the courtier how he had gained victory 

 over her majesty's enemies, he sums up : " I burnt and sunk nineteen 

 sail of ahipa, small and great ; aud all the villages aud towns that ever 

 I landed at I burned and spoik-.l." Elizabeth knighted the successful 

 depredator, and from the portion of the spoils that fell to his share M 

 capitalist and commander, Sir Thomas Cavendish was said, in the 

 language of the time, to hare been " rich enough to purchase a fair 

 earldom." 



But in three yean Cavendish was a poor man again, and to better 

 bis fortunes he once more turned hU eyes to the New World. An 

 expedition was prepared, not as formerly by himself almost alone, but 

 by a sort of joint-block of money, bravery, and adventure an associ- 

 ation which diminished his authority, and proved fatal to discipline ; 

 for those who had contributed as much as he had. pretended to an 

 equality of command with him. Quarrels and dissensions arose ; and 

 in addition to this misfortune the " three tall ship* and two barques,' 

 which are aaid to have been well equipped, had to encounter tempests 

 not met with iu the former voyage. Their only success was the 

 capture of the town of Santos in Brazil, but their reverses were 

 numerous. Cavendish wu obliged, by the mutinous spirit of his 

 men, to abandon his bold plans here. Worn out by disappointments 

 and vexations of all kinds, the hardy navigator died at sea on his 

 return towards England in 1693. 



(Harris, Collection of Voyaget and Travdi.) 



CAVENDISH, WILLIAM, DUKE OF NEWCASTLE. [CAVKN-DHTI, 

 MARQ AIIIT.] 



CAXTON, WILLIAM, to whom England owes tho introduction of 



