341 



COMBERMERE, VISCOUNT. 



COMMANDINE, FREDERIC. 



tions have been his ' Remarks on the Principles of Criminal Legisla- 

 tion and the Practice of Prison Discipline : ' 8vo, London, 1854 ; and 

 a work entitled ' Phrenology applied to Painting and Sculpture .: ' &vo, 

 L<m ion and Edinburgh, 1855. He was also author of some letters 

 on th-.: subject of strikes by workmen, which appeared in the ' Scots- 

 man,' an Edinburgh newspaper, and which were afterwards reprinted 

 in ' The Times.' Mr. Combe resides in Edinburgh, which has been 

 the chief scene of his numerous labour?, both philanthropic and scien- 

 tific. He married in 1833 a daughter of the celebrated Mrs. Siddons. 



'COMBERMERE, STAPLETON COTTON, FIRST VISCOUNT, 

 is eldest son of the late Sir R. S. Cotton, M.P. for Cheshire, and was bom 

 about the year 1770. He entered the army in 1791 ; and served in 

 Flanders in the campaign of 1793-94. Two years later he embarked for 

 the Cape of Good Hope under Sir Thomas Craig, in command of the 

 25th Light Dragoons, and, accompanying his regiment to India, went 

 through the campaign of 179S-99 against Tippoo Sultan, and was 

 present at the siege of Seringapatam. In 1808 he accompanied Lord 

 Wellington to the Peninsula in command of a cavalry brigade ; here 

 he particularly signalised himself during the campaign in the north 

 of Portugal and in the operations at Oporto, and afterwards at the 

 battle of Talavera. In the following year he was promoted to the 

 local rank of lieutenant-general, and in 1810 was appointed to 

 the command of the allied forces under the Duke of Wellington. In 

 this position he remained till the close of the war in 1814, dis- 

 tinguishing himself at the head of his cavalry upon every occasion, 

 and being frequently mentioned in the despatches. He covered the 

 retreat from Almeida to Torres Vedra, and took part in the battles of 

 Busaco, Fuendes d'Onor, and Salamanca, where he was severely 

 wounded ; and also in those of the Pyrenees, Orthes, and Toulouse. 

 In 1S17 he was appointed governor of Barbadoes and commander of 

 the forces in the West Indies, which he exchanged in 1822 for the 

 chief command of the British forces in India, and was at the head of 

 the troups at the siege and capture of Bhurtpore in 1825-26. A 

 peerage had been granted to him for his Peninsular services, and ho 

 was now raised to a viscountcy for his Indian exploits. On the death 

 of the Duke of Wellington be was appointed Constable of the Tower 

 of London and lord-lieutenant of the Tower Hamlets ; and in 1855 

 was advanced to the rank of Field-Marshal in the army. His lordship 

 is a G.C.B. ; he also holds an appointment in the court as Gold Stick 

 in Waiting to her Majesty. 



COME'NIUS, JOHN AMOS, was born in 1592, at Comna, in 

 Moravia, from which place he assumed the name of Cumemus. HU 

 parents were of the sect of Moravian brethren. After studying at 

 Hei-born, near Nassau, he returned to Moravia, and became pastor 

 at Fulneck ; but that town being burnt during the religious war then 

 raging, he lost bis property, including books and manuscripts, and 

 took refuge at Lcsna, in Poland, where he became rector of a Moravian 

 school. He there published, in 1031, his 'Jauua Linguarum,' in 

 Bohemian and Latin. This work established his reputation as a 

 philologist, and was translated into most European and some of the 

 Oriental languages. Ail edition in Latin, English, and French, was 

 published in Londou, 1639 : ' The gate of Tongues unlocked and 

 opened, or el.-e a Seminary or Seed-plot of all Tongues and Sciences.' 

 It is a soit of encyclopedic phrase-book, in 100 chapters, every chapter 

 being devoted to a separate department of natural history, the arts, or 

 the \uriouaprofesaions, sciences, and trades, &c., introducing most of 

 the words belonging to each, and giving by means of the context an 

 explanation of the same. His 'Orbia sensualium pictus, hoc est, 

 omnium fundamentalium in mundo rerum et in vita actionum pictura 

 et nomenclature,' Latin and German. Niirnberg, 1G59, is a vocabulary 

 of technical words, likewise arranged in chapters, but not in connected 

 sentences, each chapter being illustrated by a woodcut representing 

 the objects therein mentioned. These two works resemble each other 

 in principle, but differ in the arrangement. The 'Orbis' also has 

 been often reprinted, and translated into various languages. A Latin 

 and English edition appeared in London, 1777. Comeniu< waa sought 

 after by several government* for the purpose of reforming the system 

 of public instruction. He came to England in 1638, and afterwards 

 went to Sweden in 1642, where he was introduced to the Chancellor 

 Oxenstiern ; but he soon after left Sweden and retired to Elbing, 

 where he attended chiefly to the publication of his works. In 1648 

 he returned to Poland. On the invitation of Prince Ragotzky, he 

 went to Transylvania, where he established a school which he after- 

 wards transferred to Patak, near Tokay. After directing the school 

 for four year*, he returned to Lesna in 1654, but was driven away 

 by the ravages of the religious war which continued in Poland. 

 Lesna was burnt by the Catholics, and Comenius again lost his books 

 and manuscripts. He at last settled at Amsterdam, where he found 

 a protector in Laurence de Geer, who defrayed the expense of the 

 publication of his ' Opera didactica," fol., 1657, in which Comenius 

 collected several of his works already published separately. The 

 principal of these are : 1st. ' Novissima linguarum methodus,' a sort 

 of universal grammar, with references to the German, Greek, Hebrew, 

 Hungarian, and Turkish languages; 2nd. ' Januic Linguarum novis- 

 liuia Clavin; ' 3rd. ' Lexicon jauuale, seu Sylva Latina) Linguae ; ' 4th. 

 'Schol.i La !u-,' which consists of dramatic pieces composed for bis 

 pupils a*. Patak and Lesna, and in which men of various classes and 

 conditions "re introduced, each speaking about bis own profession or 



trade, and using tlio technical words belonging to it. He wrote 



troversiea against the Souinians ; ' 'Antiquitates Moravite,' which is 

 still unedited ; a Map of Moravia, with names ia German and Bohe- 

 mian, Amsterdam, 1627; 'Prodromus Pansophise,' London, 1639, a 

 sort of prospectus of a universal cyclopaedia, which was the dream of 

 his life. In his old age he appears to have adopted the views of some 

 religious visionaries, and to have believed in. their revelations. He 

 died at Amsterdam, November 1671. 



COMINES, PHILIPPE DE, Lord of Argenton, was born at the 

 chateau of Comines, near Menin in Flanders, about 1445. His father 

 was in the service of Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, who was also 

 sovereign of Flanders, and Philip himself was early introduced iuto 

 the court of Charles le Tem^raire, Philip's son, whose councillor and 

 favourite he became for a time. When Charles made Louis XI. prisoner 

 at PeYoune in 1468, Comines exerted all his influence to calm his 

 master's violent temper; he acted the part of a conciliator between 

 the two princes, and succeeded in bringing about a. treaty of peace 

 between them. This timely service was not forgotten by Louis. In 

 1472 Comines all at once left the service of the Duke of Burgundy, and 

 passed into that of Louis XL, who received him most graciously, and 

 made him his chamberlain and seneschal of Poitou. The reasons for 

 this step on the part of Comines have remained a secret; probably he 

 was tired of Charles's violent temper, and foresaw his impending ruin. 

 Comines married Helene, of the family of the counts of Monsoreau in 

 Anjou, who brought him as her marriage portion the fiefs of Argenton, 

 Coppoux, Brisson, and others. Couiiucs was employed by Louis XI. 

 in several diplomatic missions to Savoy and other places. After the 

 death of Louis, Comines having joined the party of the Duke of 

 Orleans (afterwards Louis XII.), who aspired to be regent during the 

 minority of Charles VIII., was arrested iu 1486 on a charge of treason, 

 and shut up for several months in an iron cage at Loches, when he 

 was transferred to Paris. He was at last tried and condemned to 

 banishment, and his property was confiscated, but the sentence was 

 not executed, and the fame of his abilities induced Charles VIII. to 

 employ him in several important negociations. He accompanied Charles 

 in his Italian campaign, of which he gives a good account iu his 

 memoirs. Previous to the return of the king through North Italy, in 

 the midst of the hostile armies of the Italian princes, Comines was 

 sent to Venice to endeavour to detach that state from the league, but 

 he did not succeed. The battle of Fornovo (July, 1495) secured the 

 retreat of the French across the Alps. After his return from Italy, 

 Comines retired to his estates, where he began to write his memoirs. 

 When Louis XII. succeeded to the crown in 1498, Comines repaired 

 to court to pay homage to the new sovereign, for whom he had at one 

 time suffered severe imprisonment and risked his life ; but Louis does 

 not seem to have noticed him by any marks of favour. Comines 

 returned into the country, and he died at Argenton in Poitou, October 

 1509, at the age of 64. His body was transferred to Paris, and buried 

 in the church Des Grands Augustins, where Comines had built himself 

 a chapel. His monument has been transferred to the Muse'e des 

 Monumens Francais. He left one daughter, who married a count of 

 Penthievre. 



The memoirs of Comines contain the history of his own times from 

 the year 1464 to the death of Charles VIII. iu 1498. He gives a 

 faithful picture of that singular character Louis XL, whom he greatly 

 extols for his political art. He is also a great admirer of the Venetian 

 government. He was a cool and sagacious observer, and seems to 

 have fully understood the crooked policy of those times. The great 

 value of Comines's ' Memoirs' consists in his frankness and sincerity. 

 He is a matter-of-fact historian ; like his contemporary Maohiavelli, he 

 paints men and politics such as he found them to be, with all their 

 selfishness, craft, and evil doings, which he relates with great imper- 

 turbability. Those historians are the mirror of their a^e, and what 

 that age was may be conceived by reflecting that Louis XL, Ferdinand 

 of Aragon, the Borgias, Ludovico il Moro, and others of the same 

 stamp, were the contemporaries of Comines. The 'Memoirs' of 

 Comines have been often reprinted, and translated into various 

 languages. The edition by Godefroy and Lenglet du Fresnoy, London, 

 1747, consists of 4 vols. 4to, of which however the first volume only is 

 occupied by the ' Memoirs,' the other three being filled with numerous 

 historical documents and additions. 



COMMANDINE, FREDERIC, born in 1509, at Urbino, of a good 

 family, was at first in the service of Clement VII., after whose death 

 lie studied medicine at Padua. Unsatisfied with the state of this 

 science, he applied himself to mathematics, and finally settled at 

 Verona as the instructor of the Duke of Urbino and his son. He died 

 there in September 1575. 



This is all that is generally stated as known of Commandine, except 

 the evidence which his writings afford that be is to be placed at tho 

 head of all the commentators on the mathematics of the Greeks, 

 whether as respects the care which he took to select and print valuable 

 remains (several of which would probably have been lost but for him), 

 or the knowledge which he displayed in the treatment of difficult and 

 corrupt texts. The list of works which we have collected is as follows. 

 The dates stand at the beginning, and separate tho titles : 



