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YORKE, PHILIP. 



YOUNG, ARTHUR. 



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borne by Richard Plantagenet, the second son of that king, upon 

 whom it was conferred in 1474, and who was murdered, along with 

 his elder brother Edward V., in 1483; by Henry Tudor, second son 

 of Henry VIL, who was created Duke of York in 1491, and who 

 became Prince of Wales on the death of his elder brother Arthur in 

 1503, and ascended the throne as Henry VIII. in 1509 ; by Charles 

 Stuart, second son of James I., upon whom it was conferred in 1604, 

 aud who became Duke of Cornwall on the death of his elder brother 

 Henry in 1612, was created Prince of Wales in 1616, and ascended 

 the throne as Charles I. in 1625; by James Stuart, second son of 

 Charles I., upon whom it was conferred in 1643, and who ascended 

 the throne as James II. in 1685 ; by Ernest Augustus, fifth brother 

 of King George I., who was created Duke of York and Albany in 1716, 

 and died without issue in 1728 ; by Edward Augustus, next brother 

 of George III., who was created Duke of York aud Albany in 1760, 

 and died without issue in 1767; and by Frederick, next brother of 

 George IV., who was created Duke of York and Albany in 1784, aud 

 died without issue in 1827. 



YORKE, PHILIP. [HARDWICKE, IST EARL OP.] 



YORKE, CHARLES, second eon of the first Lord Hardwicke, was 

 born 30th December 1722. He was entered at Ben'et (now called 

 Corpus Chrisbi) College, Cambridge, on the 13th of June 1739, and 

 called to the bar in 1753, He was a member of Lincoln's Inn. While 

 at Cambridge he assisted his elder brother Philip, the second Lord 

 Hardwicke, and some other friends, in the composition of 'Athenian 

 Letters, or the epistolary Correspondence of an Agent of the King of 

 Persia residing at Athens during the Peloponnesian War,' The idea 

 of the work was taken from Barthelemi's ' Travels of Anacnarsis.' A 

 few copies were printed in 1741 ; a reprint of 100 copies was brought 

 out in 1782 ; and in 1798 the second Earl of Hardwicke published it 

 with an explanatory memoir. The young authors are therein said to 

 have composed the Letters as a preparatory trial of their strength, 

 and as the best method of imprinting some subjects of their academi- 

 cal studies on their memories. The letters to which the initial C is 

 appended were the composition of Charles Yorke. In February 1744- 

 45, he published ' Some Considerations on the Law of Forfeiture for 

 High Treason, occasioned by a clause in the late Act for making it 

 treason to correspond with the Pretender's sous or any of their agents.' 

 The 'late act' is the act 17 Geo. II. c. 29. A ' Short Review 'of 

 Yorke's work was published in 1746, by Thomas Gordon. Enlarged 

 and corrected editions of the 'Considerations' were published in 1746 

 and 1748. These two latter editions contain, in an appendix, remarks 

 on the operation of the act 7 Anne, c. 21, on the law of forfeiture in 

 Scotland. The work bears marks of its author's youth, but indicates 

 considerable talent for defining technical words and phrases, and for 

 stating a legal argument. In 1747 Charles succeeded his elder brother, 

 who was in that year elected M.P. for the county of Cambridge, in the 

 representation of the borough of Ryegate. He married on the 19th of 

 May 1755, Catherine Freeman, daughter of a country gentleman of 

 Hertfoi-dshire, by whom he had one son, Philip, afterwards the third 

 Earl Hardwicke. After her death he married (30th December 1762) 

 Agneta Johnston, also daughter of a Hertfordshire landowner, by 

 whom he had three children. 



By family influence or his own abilities Charles Yorke was first 

 solicitor-general and then attorney-general. The latter office he re- 

 signed in 1764, on account of some discontent with the ministry, but 

 was induced to resume it in 1765. In 1770 he accepted the seals, at 

 the urgent request of the king, upon the resignation of Lord Camden, 

 but died suddenly (it was reported) on the 20th of January, while the 

 patent for his peerage was making out, under the title of Baron 

 Morden. His death was reported to have been caused by the rupture 

 of some internal vessel, but it is now generally believed by his own 

 hand. (See Earl Stanhope's ' Hist, of Eug.,' b. v., c. xlviii.) 



(Biographia Britannica (Appendix); Annual Register for 1770; 

 Bui ke's Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage ; the Preface to the 

 Athenian Letters, edition of 1798 ; the manuscript Note by Dr. Birch, 

 in his presentation copy of the Considerations on the Law of Forfeiture, 

 now in the library of the British Museum.) 



YOUNG, ARTHUR. Few men have acquired such celebrity as 

 agricultural writers as Arthur Young. His name is perhaps more 

 generally known all over the Continent than even in England ; his 

 situation as secretary to the Board of Agriculture gave him a most 

 extensive correspondence, and his zeal for the improvement of agricul- 

 ture all over the world made him publish many works, in which every 

 new experiment and every theory suggested was examined and dis- 

 cussed. " To the works of Arthur Young," says Kirwan (' Irish Trans- 

 actions,' vol. v.), "the world is more indebted for the diffusion of 

 agricultural knowledge than to any writer who has yet appeared. If 

 great zeal, indefatigable exertions, and an unsparing expense in making 

 expei'imeuts can give a man a claim to the gratitude of agriculturists, 

 Arthur Young deserved it more than most men. We will not assert 

 that in all cases his conclusions were correct, or his judgment unim- 

 peachable ; but even his blunders, if he committed any, have tended to 

 the benefit of agriculture, by exciting discussion and criticism." 



Arthur Young was born on the 7th of September 1741. His father 

 was a Doctor of Divinity, a prebendary of Canterbury, and chaplain 

 to Arthur Onslow, Speaker of the House of Commons. The subject 

 of this memoir was his third son. He was educated at Laveuham 



13IOG, DIV. VOL. VI. 



school, where he went in 1748. He showed considerable talents at 

 school, where he remained till 1758, when he was apprenticed to the 

 mercantile house of Mr. Robinson at Lynn, in the hopes of his becom- 

 ing in time a thriving merchant ; but he had no genius for this pro- 

 fession, and the money, as he often lamented, which this apprentice- 

 ship cost, would have maintained him at college, and he might have 

 become qualified to hold the rectory of Bradfield, which was then held 

 by his father. As the rector of a large agricultural parish, there is 

 every reason to suppose that his latent love of agriculture would have 

 been fostered. He would probably have been equally zealous in this 

 pursuit, without so great pecuniary sacrifices as he was called on by 

 circumstances to make in the improvement of the several farms he 

 occupied ; but it is most likely that he would not have been able to 

 extend his investigations over so wide an area, or have been induced 

 to give the results so largely to the world. 



Having no taste for business, he took to reading at Lynn, and read 

 every book he could procure. At seventeen years of age he wrote a 

 political pamphlet, entitled ' The Theatre of the present War in North 

 America,' for which he got 101. worth of books from the publisher 

 to him a great treasure. After his father's death, whih happened in 

 1759, he was much tempted, by the offer of a pair of colours, to enter 

 the army ; but his mother would not hear of it, aud like a good son he 

 gave up all thoughts of it. He began a periodical work, called the 

 ' Universal Museum,' but dropped it after the sixth number, by the 

 advice of Dr. Samuel Johnson. His whole fortune then consisted of a 

 copyhold estate of 20 acres, worth annually as many pounds. His 

 mother had a lease of a farm of 80 acres at Bradfield ; and on her 

 renewing the lease, she gave him the management, and he commenced 

 practical farmer, without any real practical knowledge of farming, and 

 his head full of wild notions of improvement, as he afterwards himself 

 confessed. In the following year he became a contributor to the 

 ' Museum Rusticum,' the first agricultural work he tried his pen in. 

 He married in the same year (1765) Miss Martha Allen of Lynn; but 

 from some peculiarities on both sides, this union was not very happy. 

 In 1767 he undertook the management, on his own account, of a farm 

 called Samford Hall, in Essex, consisting of 300 acres of land. There 

 he was in his element, making experiments and carefully noting them 

 down for five years, when he published the results in two thick vols. 

 4to, under the title of ' A Course of Experimental Agriculture, con- 

 taining an exact Register of the business transacted during five years 

 on near 300 acres of various soils,' Dodsley, 1770. The style in 

 which this book, which, after all, is by no means instructive, was 

 brought out on fine paper, large type, and wide margin proves that 

 either the public were beginning to have a taste for agricultural works, 

 or that Arthur Young had too favourable an idea of the value of his 

 experiments. But this work was published after his ' Tour through 

 the Southern Counties of England,' a work which became very popular, 

 and of which several editions were sold. Young was a keen observer, 

 and had a ready and lively mode of communicating his observations ; 

 if he was sometimes rather hasty in his conclusions, or superficial in 

 his remarks, he had the talent of enlivening them by an easy and 

 sometimes imaginative style. An account of proceedings and experi- 

 ments on a poor farm, not always very judiciously planned or executed, 

 could not be very entertaining or instructive. After five years, in 

 which he suffered great losses and disappointments, he was glad to 

 give 100 to a practical farmer to take the lease off bis hands. Where 

 the literary and scientific farmer had failed entirely, the plain practical 

 cultivator saved a little fortune. It is amusing to read Young's invec- 

 tives against the soil, climate, and everything about this horrid farm ; 

 but when it is considered that he only saw it from Saturday till Mon- 

 day, and was occupied as a parliamentary reporter the remainder of 

 the week, the wonder will cease, and the only surprise excited will be 

 caused by the fact of his finding time to note down the results of his 

 experiments so as to form two quarto volumes. 



In the year 1768 he was induced by the success of his 'Six Weeks' 

 Tour,' to take another in the north of England, of which he published 

 a minute account in 4 vols. 8vo, which had a very rapid sale. The 

 activity of his mind could not be concentrated in agricultural writings, 

 but embraced subjects of general political economy; and the next 

 year he published a work on the expediency of a free importation of 

 corn, which met with great approbation in a high quarter. In 1770 

 he undertook his Eastern Tour, and published his observations in 4 

 vols. 8vo. These tours of Arthur Young excited the liveliest inte est 

 in all those who were connected with agriculture, either as proprietors 

 or tenants; and there is no doubt that his works, if they did not 

 kindle the rising zeal for agricultural improvements, gave it a strong 

 impetus, and blew it into a vivid flame. Many tours had been made 

 through every part of Britain, and many lively descriptions of places 

 had been published : but in none were the agricultural and political 

 circumstances of different districts accurately recorded. Wherever he 

 went he was received by proprietors and farmers with the greatest 

 frankness and hospitality. In his discussions on their different modes 

 of cultivating the soil, he acquired extensive practical knowledge, and 

 also imparted it to his hosts : by placing before them the more rational 

 and economical courses adopted in other districts, he led them to 

 make experiments ; and if these, somewhat hastily conducted, did not 

 always give a favourable result, they always tended to make men 

 reflect and compare, and often led them to see their errors in manage 



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