OIRARD 



GIUASOL 



219 



the complete works have been edited by J. S. Brewer 

 F. F. Dimock ( Rolls series, 1861-77). 



to confirm the selection, and another bishop was 

 appointed, Girald withdrew for a time to tin* 

 university of Paris, and on his return WHS required 

 by tin- Archbishop of Canterbury to take the 

 administration of the diocese of St Davids, which 

 liad utterly failed in the hands of tin- bishop. He 

 hfld it for four years. Being appointed a royal 

 chaplain, and afterwards preceptor to Prince John, 

 In- accompanied that prince in 1185 in his expedi- 

 tion to Ireland, where he remained after John's 

 return, in onlrr to complete the well-known descrip- 

 tive account of the natural history, the miracles, 

 ami tlit- inhabitants of that country his Topo- 

 graphia //ibernice. His Ej-/>ii>iiiiiti(> Hibernife is an 

 account of the conquest of that country under 

 Henry II. Both are works of very great merit 

 this utter llrewer describes as 'a noble specimen 

 of historical narration, of which the author's age 

 furnished very rare examples.' In 1188 he attended 

 Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury, in his progress 

 through Wales to preach a crusade, and worked up 

 his observations into the Itinerarium Cambrics. 

 Mi- later years were darkened by disappointment. 

 On the see of St Davids again becoming vacant, 

 he was again unanimously elected by the chapter ; 

 but Archbishop Hubert -of Canterbury interposed, 

 and Girald, spite of three different journeys to 

 Rome, failed to get the nomination confirmed. 

 He devoted the remainder of his life to study, 

 and died at St Davids in 1222. The writings 

 of Giraldus Cambrensis, although disfigured by 

 credulity and by excessive personal vanity, are of 

 great value as materials for the history and for 

 the social condition of his age. A translation of 

 the Itinerarium Cambria; was published in 1806; 

 the co. 

 and J. 



<ir;ml. STEPHEN, an American merchant, was 

 born near Bordeaux, France, May 20, 1750, and was 

 successively cabin-boy, mate, captain, and part 

 owner of an American coasting- vessel. In 1769 he 

 settled as a trader in Philadelphia, where ulti- 

 mately he established a bank which became the 

 mainstay of the United States government during 

 the war of 1812-14, and advanced several millions 

 to the treasury. He died 26th December 1831. 

 < lirard was a man of few friends, in religion a scep- 

 tic, in personal habits a miser, yet in public matters 

 his generosity was remarkable. His estate, vast as 

 compared with fortunes of his day, was distributed 

 by his will among his relatives and employees and 

 a number of charitable objects, the major portion 

 of it being devoted to the endowment of the Girard 

 College for poor, male, white orphans, the city of 

 Philadelphia being the trustee. The principal build- 

 ing at this college, which was completed in 1847, is 

 the finest specimen of Grecian architecture in 

 America. On the tract of forty acres occupied by 

 the college are eleven other handsome buildings 

 devoted to its various uses, and affording accommo- 

 dation for 1580 pupils. The income available for the 

 support of the college collected in 1896 amounted to 

 $629,597.84. 



Girardin, EMILE DE, a French journalist and 

 politician, the illegitimate son of the royalist general 

 Alexandre de Girardin and Madame' Dnpu'v, was 

 born in Switzerland in 1806, and educated in' Paris. 

 He bore the name of Delamothe until 1827, when 

 he assumed that of his father, who acknowledged 

 him in 1847 ; and his first attempt in literature 

 was a novel, Kmile, in which he pleaded the cause 

 of adulterine children. After the July revolution 

 (1830) he established the Journal des CoftfMMMmeM 

 Utiles, which attained a sale of 120,000 copies ; other 

 cheap magazines followed, but he did not carry out 

 his idea of a halfpenny newspaper until 1836, when 

 he founded the rresse, an Orleanist journal with 



Conservative leanings. It* rival* accused it of 

 l>i-ing -ul.-idi-cd by the government, and one of the 

 unfortunate result* of the mwrrel* tlniH fastened on 

 Girardin was his duel with Armand Carrel, editor 

 of the National, in which the latter fell. 1- mm 

 t his time onward to the Revolution of 1848 < iirardin 

 was ardently occupied with politic*, both at* a 

 journalist and a deputy, and gradually became a 

 decided republican. He promoted Louis Napoleon 'n 

 election to the presidency, but disapproved of the 

 rn a f> d'etat, and was rewarded with a short period 

 of exile. He next threw himself into the arm- of 

 the Socialists. In 185(5 he sold his share of the 

 Presse, but l>ecame its editor again in 1H62, eventu- 

 ally abandoning it for the direction of the Liberte, 

 which he maintained till 1870. He excelled hi- 

 fellows in braggadocio on the outbreak of the 

 Franco- Prussian war ; and during the Commune 

 he proposed a scheme for splitting up the republic 

 into fifteen federal states. In 1874, however, he 

 founded the France, and both in its pages and in 

 the Petit Journal supported the republic. He 

 wrote a few pieces for the stage ; his political ideas 

 he gave to the world in a host of brochures. 

 Girardin died 27th April 1881. His first wife, 

 whose maiden name was Delphine Gay ( 1805-55), 

 enjoyed for many years a brilliant reputation as 

 a poetess and beauty, and also wrote several novels 

 and plays. Her best -known work is Lettres Parisi- 

 ennes, which appeared in the Presse, under the 

 pseudonym of vicomte de Launay, in 1836-48. 

 Her complete works fill 6 vols. (1860-61). See 

 Imbert de Saint-Amand, Madame de Girardin 

 (Paris, 1874). 



Girardin, FRANCOIS SAINT-MARC, a French 

 journalist and professor, was born at Paris in 1801, 

 studied at the College Henri IV. with brilliant 

 success, and in 1827 obtained a mastership in 

 the College Louis-le-Grand. After two visit* to 

 Germany he published a report on the state of 

 education there, and Notices politiques et litteraires 

 sur I'Allemagne ; in 1834 he was called to the chair 

 of Literature at the Sorbonne, and became leader- 

 writer for the Journal des Debats, distinguishing 

 himself under the July monarchy as a ready com- 

 batant and resolute enemy to the dynastic and 

 democratic opposition. He was elected a member 

 of the Academy in 1844. His parliamentary career 

 (1834-48) was not noteworthy; and under the 

 Second Empire he retained his chair at the Sor- 

 borine, where his lectures, following the orthodox 

 lines of criticism, were very popular. He became a 

 member of the National Assembly in 1871, and died 

 near Paris, llth April 1873. Besides his numerous 

 contributions to the Debats, some collected in Essais 

 de Litterature (2 vols. 1845), he published several 

 large works, among them his Cours de Litterature 

 dramatique (1843; llth ed. 1875-77), being his 

 sixty-three lectures for a period of twenty years, 

 and Souvenirs et Reflexions politiques d"un Jour- 

 naliste ( 1859 ). See Tamisier, Saint-Marc Giranlin, 

 fitude littcraire ( 1876). 



Girasol, a precious stone, exhibiting in strong 

 lights a peculiar and l>eautiful reflection of bright 

 red or yellow light, which seems to come from the 

 interior of the stone. From this it derives ite name 

 ( Ital., ' sun-turning ' ). There are different kinds of 

 girasol, variously referred by mineralogists to quartz 

 and opal, species which, however, are very nearly 

 allied. One kind is also known as Fire Opal, 

 which is found only at Zimapan, in Mexico, and in 

 the Faroe Islands. * The Mexican specimens are of 

 a rich topa/ yellow colour, and the reflection is very 

 bright. Another kind is the (,'inn-f: Iff. finite of 

 Haiiy, so called because of ite characteristic resin- 

 ous fracture. It is found of various colours, some- 

 times of a fine yellow or emerald green, more 



