r 



EGERTON, THOMAS. 



EGINHARDT. 



742 



angaaende den Gronlandske Missions Eegyndelse," published at ' 

 Copenhagen in 1738, is rich iu materials?, but is in itself of a somewhat 

 dry and unattractive character. Its chief recommendation is its plain 

 sincerity. The reader is disposed to give entire confidence to the 

 missionary, who not only tells him that on one occasion he laboured 

 earnestly in hia vocation, but that on another he occupied himself for 

 days in the study of alchemy, who not only speaks of the ardour of 

 his faith at times, but tells us that at others he was seized with a 

 hatred of big task and of religion altogether. This book has been 

 translated into German, but not as yet into any other language. 

 Kgede's second work, 'Den gamle Gronlands nye Perlustration ' 

 (Copenhagen, 1741-4), was translated into English in 1745 under the 

 title of ' A Description of Greenland,' and the translation was reprinted 

 in 1818. It comprises bin observations on the geography and natural 

 history of Greenland, and the manners of its inhabitants. 



The account of the mission was continued by his son POVEL or 

 PAUL EGEDE, who, as has been stated, had gone to Greenland in 1720 

 in his twelfth year, had afterwards studied at Copenhagen, returned 

 to Greenland in 1734, finally left it in 1740, became like his father 

 superintendent of the mission with the title of bishop, and died in 

 1789. He wrote and published a Greenland Grammar and Diction- 

 ary, which have been since improved by Fabricius, translated the 

 New Testament iuto the language, and was the author of a work 

 ' Efterretninger om .Gronland' ('Information on Greenland'), which 

 is one of the most interesting in Danish literature. It gives a history 

 of the mission from 1720 to 1788 in a more interesting style than his 

 father was master of. 



Another son of Hans Egede, NIELS EOEDE, who had spent his 

 youth in Greenknd, returned there in 1738 from Denmark, disgusted 

 with the coldness of the reception he met with in Europe, and wished 

 to spend the rest of his life among the Greenlanders, but was com- 

 pelled to return by the state of his health in 1743. He founded 

 the settlement of Egedcsmiude, so named in remembrance of his 

 father. 



EGERTON, THOMAS, Lord Chancellor of England, was born in 

 1640, in the parish of Doddlestone, Cheshire. He was the natural 

 son of Sir Richard Egerton, of an ancient family in that county. 

 Having been well grounded in Latin and Greek by private tuition, he 

 was entered iu 1556 of Brazenose College, Oxford, where he remained 

 three years ; and then, having taken his Bachelor's degree, removed to 

 Lincoln's Inn, London. In due time he was called to the bar, and 

 soon acquired reputation and practice. It was not long before Queen 

 Elizabeth discovered his value, and made him one of her counsel, 

 which entitled him to wear a silk gown, and to have precedence of 

 the other barristers. He was appointed solicitor-general June 28, 

 1681, and he held this office till June 2, 1592, when ho became 

 attorney-general. Meantime, in 1582, he was chosen Lent Reader to 

 Lincoln's Inn ; he was also made one of the governors of that society, 

 and so continued for twelve years successively. He was knighted in 

 1593, and was appointed chamberlain of the county-palatine of 

 Chester. On the 10th of April 1594 he was made Master of the 

 Rolls; and on the 6th of May 1596 he succeeded Sir John Puckering 

 as Lord Keeper, the queen herself delivering the great seal to him at 

 Greenwich. As a special mark of her favour, he continued to hold 

 the office of Master of the Rolls, together with that of Keeper of the 

 Great Seal, during the remainder of her reign. He was also sworn of 

 her Majesty's privy council. Besides the performance of his duties as 

 a lawyer and a judge, he was consulted and employed by the queen 

 in her most secret councils and most important state affairs, and con- 

 tinued an especial favourite till her death. In August 1602 she paid 

 him a visit of three days at his country-house of Harefield, near 

 Uxbridge, Middlesex, where, among other entertainments provided 

 for her, Shakspere's tragedy of 'Othello' was played by Burbidge 

 and his company. In her last illness at Richmond, in March 1603, she 

 named to him the King of Scotland as her successor. 



After Elizabeth's death, King James, by sign-manual, dated Holyrood 

 Hou-e, Edinburgh, April 5, 1603, directed him to retain the office of 

 Lord Keeper till further orders ; and, having arrived in London, James, 

 on the 19th of July caused the great seal to be broken, and placed a new 

 one in Sir Thomas Egerton's hands, accompanied by a paper in his 

 own writing, by which he created him Baron of Ellesmere, " for his 

 good and faithful services, not only in the administration of justice, 

 out also in council." On the 24th of July 1C03 he was named Lord 

 High Chancellor of England. After being made Lord Chancellor, he 

 resigned the office of Master of the Rolls, which he had held nine 

 year*. In 1605 Lord Ellesmere was appointed High Steward of the 

 City of Oxford, and on the 2nd of December 1610 was elected 

 Chancellor of the University of Oxford. 



On the 7th of November 1616, the king, with much reluctance, 

 granted him permission to retire from office, and at the same time 

 created him Viscount Brackley. On the 3rd of March 1617 he 

 resigned the great seal, when Lord Bacon was appointed his successor. 

 While ho l.iy ill the king sent Buckingham and Lord Bacon to offer 

 him the title of Karl of Bridgewater, and a pension of SOOOt a year. 

 He refused both, saying " these things were now to him but vanities." 

 He expired at York House, London, March 15, 1617, in the seventy 

 seventh year of his age, having held the great seal for a longer period 

 continually than any of his predecessors or successors. He was 



buried in the chancel of Doddlestone Church, Cheshire. His son, 

 John Egerton, was created Earl of Bridgewater. 



Thomas Egerton was a tall and athletic man, and very handsome, 

 and retained his good looks to the last. Ben Jonson says, " He was a 

 ;rave and great orator, and best when he was provoked." Lord 

 Campbell, speaking of him as an equity-judge, makes ths following 

 observations : " With a knowledge of law equal to Edward the 

 Third's lay-chancellors Parnyng and Knyvet, so highly eulogised by 

 Lord Coke, he was much more familiar with the principles of general 

 jurisprudence. Not less noted for despatch and purity than Sir 

 Thomas More, he was much better acquainted with the law of real 

 property, as well as the practice of the court, in which he had long 

 practised as an advocate ; and exhibiting all the patience and suavity 

 of Sir Nicholas Bacon, he possessed more quickness of perception, 

 and a more vigorous grasp of intellect." (' Lives of the Chancellors,' 

 vol. ii.) 



*EGG, AUGUSTUS, A.R.A., was born iu London in 1816. After 

 the usual educational course in the schools of Mr. Sass and of the 

 Royal Academy, Mr. Egg became for the first time in 1838 a con- 

 tributor to the Academy exhibition by sending a ' Spanish Girl ; ' he 

 also in these early years sent pictures to the Society of British 

 Artists, and to the provincial exhibitions. The peculiar turu of his 

 mind was perhaps first distinctly shown by the picture he exhibited 

 at the Academy in 1840, ' A Scene iu the Boar's Head, Cheapside ; ' 

 and he has since been a pretty constant contributor of pictures illus- 

 trating scenes of humour from the pages of Shakspere, Scott, 

 Le Sage, &c., of the order technically styled 'genre.' Their clear 

 bright colouring, vivacity, and a certain coarse theatrical freedom and 

 geniality, made them favourites with those who relish a less refined 

 fare than was afforded by Mr. Leslie, previously the chief caterer iu 

 the same walk. Without any marked departure from his original 

 manner, Mr. Egg has shown a steady advance in the mechanical 

 departments of his art, and he has on more than one occasion shown 

 too that he has as yet done but imperfect justice to his talents. The 

 following are the principal works he has contributed to the Royal 

 Academy exhibitions since 1840 : ' Scene from Romeo and Juliet,' 

 and an 'Italian Festa,' in 1841; ' Cromwell discovering his chaplain 

 Jeremiah White making love to his daughter Frances,' 1842; ' Tiie 

 Introduction of Sir Piercie Shafton to Herbert Glendinniug,' 1343 ; 

 'Scene from the Devil on Two Sticks,' 1844, now iu the Vernon 

 Gallery ; ' Scene from the Winter's Tale,' 1845 ; ' Buckingham 

 Rebuffed,' 1846; 'The Wooing of Katherme from the Tainicg of 

 the Shrew," 1847; 'Queen Elizabeth discovers she is no longer young,' 

 1848, a ridiculous caricature in the very lowest grade of broad farce; 

 'Henrietta Maria in Distress relieved by Cardinal du Retz,' and 

 ' Launce's substitute for Proteus's Dog,' 1849 ; ' Peter the Great sees 

 Katherine, his future Empress, for the first time,' 1850 ; 'Pepys's 

 Introduction to Nell Gwynne,' 1851, like the last, a very clever 

 rendering of a subject not remarkable for its pictorial capability ; 

 'Dame Ursula and Margaret,' 1854; and 'The Life and Death of 

 Buckingham,' 1855. The 'Life and Death of Buckingham' is repre- 

 sented in dramatic fashion withiu the same frame the profligate duke 

 and his sovereign revelling with the courtiers and the courtezans of 

 " the merry monarch," and the death of the debauchee, according to 

 Pope's version of it, "iuthe worst inn's worst room" both scenes 

 being wrought out with uncompromising fidelity. In power iu far 

 surpassed any of Mr. Egg's previous productions, but it was sickening 

 and repulsive, exactly in proportion to its truth and force. Mr. Egg 

 was elected an associate of the Royal Academy in 1848. 



EGINHARDT, a native of Austrasia or East France, was instructed 

 by Alcuinus, and by him introduced to Charlemagne, who made him 

 his secretary, and afterwards superintendent of his buildings. His 

 wife Fmma, or Imma, is said by some to have been a daughter of 

 that prince, and a curious story is related of their amours previous to 

 their marriage, but the whole seems an invention. Egiuhardt himself 

 does not reckon Emma iu his enumeration of the children of Charles. 

 After the death of that monarch, Eginhardt continued to serve his 

 successor, Louis lo De"bonnaire, who entrusted him with the education 

 of his son Lotharius. But after a time Eginhardt resigned his offices, 

 left the court, and withdrew to the monastery of Fontenelle, of which 

 he became abbot : his wife also retired into a nunnery. After remain- 

 ing seven years at Fontenelle, he left it about A.D. 823, and went to 

 another monastery, but iu 827, having received from Rome the relics 

 of the martyrs Marcelliuus and Petrus, he placed them iu his residence 

 at Mulinheim, which he converted into an abbey, which took after- 

 wards the name of Seligenstadt, where he fixed his residence. (' De 

 Translatione SS. martyrum Marcellini et Petri,' in the 'Acta 

 Sanctorum" of Bollandus. The account is written by Eginhardt.) 

 Eginhardt seemS to have still repaired to court from time to time, 

 when his advice was needed, and he appears by his owu letters to 

 have endeavoured to thwart the conspiracy of Louis's sous against 

 that unfortunate mouarch. He spent his latter years in retirement 

 and study : according to one account he was still living in 848, when 

 he attended the council of Mayence, but by others he is said to have 

 died about 841. His wifa had died before him, a loss by which he 



