645 



DRAYTON, MICHAEL. 



DROUYN DE LHUYS, EDWARD. 



64fl 



by Professor Oosterdyk, in which the other works of Drakenborch are 

 mentioned. Upon leaving Utrecht he went to Leyden to study the 

 law, but there also he devoted his chief attention to the classical 

 lessons of Perizonius and Gronovius. He wrote in 1707 another dis- 

 sertation, 'De Officio Prsefectorum Praetorio,' in which he explains 

 and illustrates the nature and duties of that important military office, 

 and the changes it underwent in the course of time, in the same 

 manner as he had done for that of the prefects of the city. Drakeu- 

 borch undertook, by the advice of Peter Burmann, an edition of Silius 

 Italicus, which appeared in 1717. On Burmann's removal to Leyden, 

 Drakenborch succeeded him in the chair of history and eloquence at 

 Utrecht. His edition of Livy, on which he bestowed much time and 

 labour, was published in 1738-46, in 7 vols. 4to. The value of the 

 edition lies in the large collection of various readings, and the illus- 

 tration of idioms by parallel passages drawn from the writings of Livy. 

 The text is decidedly inferior to that which is found in the unpre- 

 tending editions by Stroth, Raschig, &c. He published also ' De 

 Utilitate et Fructu humanarum Disciplinarum Oratio inauguralis,' 

 ' Oratio funebris in Mortem Francisci Burmanni,' and other orations 

 and dissertations ; and also a ' History of Utrecht,' and ' Genealogies 

 of the Noble Families of Holland.' He died at Utrecht in 1747. 



DHAYTON, MICHAEL, was born at Hartshill in the county of 

 Warwick, in the year 1563. His life is involved iu great obscurity, 

 and different circumstances concerning him are rather conjectured 

 than affirmed. It is supposed that he went to the University of 

 Oxford, but without taking any degree, and also that he was in the 

 army at an early period of life. Nine or ten years before the death of 

 Queen Elizabeth he is said to have written poems. His earliest work 

 was a collection of pastoral poems, published in 1593, under the title 

 of the ' Shepherd a Garland ; ' it was afterwards revised and reprinted 

 in 1619, under the name of ' Eclogues.' Shortly after the ' Shepherd's 

 Garland appeared his long historical poems, 'The Barons' Wars,' 

 ' England's Heroical Epistles,' to. His ' Polyolbion,' a descriptive 

 poem on England, her natural productions and legends, made its 

 appearance in 1613. This is the most celebrated of all his works : 

 independently of its merits as a poem, the most respectable antiquaries 

 refer to it for information, and consider it as authority : the curious 

 Notes appended to it were written by Selden. In 1626 we hear of 

 Drayton as poet-laureate. He died in 1631. 



The merits of Drayton as a poet are very great. His historical 

 poems have about them a heavy magnificence, the most gorgeous 

 images and the boldest descriptions follow in stately array, clothed in 

 well-turned and appropriate verse, but unfortunately the obscurity of 

 diction renders them unattractive. The construction is most painfully 

 involved : a nominative case is often parted from its verb by an inter- 

 val of six or seven lines ; and hence, though these poems contain but 

 few obsolete words, the reading of them is a serious study. The same 

 observations will apply to the ' Polyolbion,' which is an immense mass 

 of good sterling matter. All the counties and rivers of Enghmd are 

 named one after another, but the descriptions are so close that what 

 we gain in instruction we lose iu amusement. This poem is written 

 in Alexandrines, and the measure is admirably managed. ' The Wars 

 of the Barons ' are written in ottava rima. Draytou has left one work 

 which, in its way, has never been surpassed a short fairy poem, called 

 ' Nymphidia.' A more elfin work than this could not be penned : the 

 author has contrived to throw himself into the feelings of the diminu- 

 tive beings whom he represents. His descriptions of helmets made 

 of beetles, ear-wigs being used as chargers, and other oddities of a like 

 nature, display the very highest powers of fancy : a Lilliputian air 

 breathes through the whole performance. Had Drayton written 

 nothing but ' Nymphidia,' he would deserve immortality. 



In Campbell's 'Selections from the British Poets,' a specimen is 

 given of every style in which this fine old author wrote. Drayton has 

 u tomb in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. 



DREBBEL, CORNELIUS VAN, was born at Alkmaar, in Holland, 

 in 1572. He is chiefly distinguished by being the inventor of the 

 thermometer ; or, at least, by sharing that honour with Santorio. His 

 instrument, which is said to have been first used in Germany in 1621, 

 consisted of a tube of glass containing water and connected with a 

 bulb containing air : by the expansion and contraction of the air, in 

 consequence of the variations of temperature, the column of water 

 was allowed to rue or fall in the tube; and thus the height of 

 the column, being measured by a scale, served as an indication of the 

 temperature. 



Drebbel also discovered the means of producing a bright scarlet dye 

 for woollens and silks; and, according to Beckmann, he communicated 

 the discovery to Kuffler, a dyer at Leyden, who had married Ms 

 daughter. The process was afterwards introduced into France by the 

 persons who established the Gobelines manufacture, the objects of 

 which were celebrated for the brilliancy of their scarlets. It has been 

 asserted that he was the inventor of the telescope and microscope ; 

 but it is more probable that he may have made some improvements 

 on those instruments. 



The reputation which Drebbel acquired during his life is less due 

 to his useful discoveries than to a pretended knowledge of the causes 

 of many natural phenomena; few persons, in an age of ignorance 

 respecting physical science, being able to impugn his claim to such 

 knowledge. Many of his pretended inventions are palpably fabulous, 



or have boen absurdly exaggerated by the ignorance and credulity of 

 the narrators. The emperor Rudolph II. granted him a pension, and 

 Ferdinand II. made him the tutor of his son; but a revolution taking 

 place in Austria, he was imprisoned in that country, and, but for the 

 interference of the king of England, James I., he would have been 

 executed. Drebbel spent the rest of his life in this country ; and it 

 is said that, on his arrival, he presented to the king a glass globe 

 which exhibited the phenomena of the tides, thunder, and rain, with 

 the sun and planets in perpetual motion ; he is also said to have con- 

 trived a boat which could be rowed under tiie surface of water, and 

 in which a person might read without artificial light. He died in 

 London in the year 1634. 



Drebbel wrote, in Dutch, two works which were, afterwards trans- 

 lated into Latin and French : one of these is on the ' Nature of the 

 Elements, the Winds, Rain," &c. ;.and the other on the 'Quintessence,' 

 with the manner of obtaining it from minerals, vegetables, &c. 



DREVET, PIERRE, the name of two very distinguished French 

 engravers, father and son. The father was born at Lyon in 1664, and 

 was the pupil of Germain Audrau; and, says Watelet, but for his son, 

 who surpassed him, would have been the best portrait-engraver of 

 his own or any previous, time. He died at Paris in 1739, aged 

 seventy-five. 



PIERRE DREVET, the son, was born at Paris in 1697, and was, it is 

 affirmed, a master in his art in his thirteenth year, when he executed a 

 plate of the ' Resurrection of Christ,' after J. Audr^, which, in correct- 

 ness of drawing and delicacy of execution, is equal to the works of 

 any of his contemporaries : this however may without much hesita- 

 tion be doubted. In his twenty-sixth, or as some say in his thirtieth, 

 year he produced his masterpiece, the full-length portrait of Bossuet, 

 after Rigaud, iu which every object in the picture is executed with great 

 truth and delicacy, and all have a peculiar and characteristic style of 

 execution. He executed several other portraits of nearly equal merit. 

 His style, iu the opinion of some, was less adapted for history than for 

 portrait, as being extremely laboured; it drew the attention from the 

 subject as a whole to the parts, and destroyed the unity of effect. 

 Some of his last works are executed in a freer style. He engraved 

 exclusively after French masters, but his works are not numerous. He 

 died at Paris in the same year as his father, 1739. 



(Watelet, Dtctionnaire da Arts, <kc. ; Huber, Manuel del Amateurs; 

 Began, Diet, da Graveuri.) 



DROUET D'ERLON, JEAN-BAPTISTE, was born at Rheims, on 

 the 29th of July 1765. At the age of seventeen he enlisted as a 

 private soldier, and, progressively rising by his merit, became aide-de- 

 camp to General Lefevre, August 14, 1794. He was present at the 

 siege of Valenciennes, and at those of Condd and Quasnay. After an 

 arduous service of eight years under Pichegru, Hocho, and Moreau, 

 he took part as general of brigade in the battle of Zurich under 

 Massena, and was present at the capture of Con- tun z. After the 

 battle of Hohenlinden, in which he considerably distinguished him- 

 self, he was made general of division, August 27, 1800. On Oc- 

 tober 14, ISOd, his well-timed attack on a Prussian column, con- 

 tributed to the victory of Jena. His skill was conspicuous in the 

 attack and defence of fortified places, and at the siege of Dantzig his 

 exertions were praised by Napoleon himself, who, after the battle of 

 Friedlaud, iu 1807, in which he was badly wounded, bestowed on him 

 the grand cross of the Legion of Honour, with the title of Count 

 d'Erlon, and a pension of 25,000 francs. General Drouet was engaged 

 in the Peninsular war; and at the Col-de-Maya, according to French 

 accounts, he defeated Lord Hill, June 22, 1811. After the restoration 

 of Louis XVIII., he received the command of the 16th Military 

 Division, and was made president of the court-martial by which 

 Excelmans was tried and acquitted. But soon after, being suspected 

 of a share in the conspiracy of General Lefebra-Desnouettes, ho was 

 arrested by orders of his former friend, the Duo de Feltre. The 

 escape of Napoleon from Elba, March 1815, restored him however to 

 liberty. General Drouet was at Waterloo, but, from somo mistake, 

 his corps was not brought into action. After this battle he retired 

 to Germany, but returned to Franco after the amnesty which followed 

 the coronation of Charles X., May 28, 1825. In 1830, after the revo- 

 lution of July and the accession of Louis Philippe, the name of the 

 Count d'Erlon was replaced on the Army List, and he received the 

 command of the 12th Military Division, stationed at Nantes, where 

 he was present at the arrest of the Duchess of Berry. In 1834 he 

 was appointed governor-general of Algeria, and on the 9th of April 

 1843 marshal of France. He died on the 25th of January 1844, 

 having been constantly engaged during the wars for 21 years, and 

 68 years in the service of the French armies. 



DROUYN DE LHUYS, EDWARD, a French statesman and 

 diplomatist, was born at Paris, on the 39th of November 1805. His 

 father's condition secured him a sound education, and afterwards 

 enabled him, at an early age, to enter with advantage upon his 

 political life. In 18?1 he became attach <3 to the French ambassador 

 at Madrid, the Couut de Rayueval, who discovered his taleuts, and 

 soon gave him his entire confidence. Although ouly in his twenty-sixth 

 year, he at once acquired, and has since retained, that credit and 

 authority as a diplomatist which have since rendered his name so popular. 

 He weut to the Hague in 1833 as chargd-d'alFaires, and maiuly con- 

 ducted the diplomatic relations at the critical juncture of the transition 



