7J3 



KMETY, GENERAL GEORGE. 



KNIGHT, RICHARD PAYNE. 



731 



and sublime, but MB rhapsodical manner contrasts strangely with the 

 pedantry which is always apparent. Goethe, in his conversations 

 with Eckenuaun, expressed his opinion that German literature WHS 

 greatly indebted to Klopatock, who was in advance of his times, but 

 that the times had since advanced beyond Klopstock. The young 

 Hardenbere; (who wrote under the name of ' Novalis ') has happily 

 eaid that Klopstock 's works always resemble translations from some 

 unknown poet, done by a clever but unpoetical philologist. Notwith- 

 standing the grandeur of his ' Messiah,' it is exceedingly tedious to 

 read ; and even at the time of Klopstock's greatest popularity this 

 seems to have been felt, for Leasing (Ma contemporary) observes, in 

 au epigram, that everybody praises Klopstock, but few read Mm. His 

 odes are valued by his own countrymen, more than his epic, and some 

 are truly sublime ; but the construction of the language is so singular, 

 and the connection of the thoughts so often non-apparent, that these 

 odea are reckoned among the mot difficult in the language. 



* KMETY, GENERAL GEORGE, was born in 1810 at a village in 

 Gbmoror county, Hungary, where his father was a protestant clergy- 

 man. He was intended for a learned profession, and studied at the 

 protestaut college at Eperies, and afterwards at the protestant lyceum 

 at Presburg. Having by a mistake been disappointed in receiving a 

 German scholarship, to which he was entitled, he went to Vienna, and 

 entered the army as a soldier. He had become a commissioned officer 

 in the Austrian army when the Hungarian war of independence broke 

 out in 1843. He then joined his countrymen, and distinguished him- 

 self by his bravery and activity. After the surrender of the army by 

 Gb'rgei, he escaped into Turkey, where he adopted the Mussulman 

 religion, entered the Turkish army, and received the name and title of 

 Ismail Pasha. He was attached to the army of Asia Minor, and he 

 commanded the Turkish troops in the great battle which was fought 

 with the Russians in defence of Kara. The conflict lasted seven hours 

 and a half, during which General Kmety with the Turkish soldiers 

 fought with the most impetuous and determined bravery, and mate- 

 rially contributed to the repulse of the Russian army on that occasion. 



KNELLEK, GODFREY, was born in 1648, in the city of Lubeck, 

 and received his first instruction in the art of painting in the school of 

 Keinbrandt He afterwards became a pupil of Ferdinand Bol. Having 

 acquired sufficient acquaintance with his profession to qualify Mm to 

 travel with advantage, he went first to Home and afterwards to Venice, 

 where he painted aeveral portraits of noble families, and some histori- 

 cal pictures, with such success aa to gain him considerable reputation, 

 eveu in Italy. Leaving Venice, he went to Hamburg, where he met 

 with extraordinary encouragement, and lastly came to London. Being 

 patronised by the Duke of Monmouth, he was introduced to King 

 Charles II., whose portrait he painted several times. The death of 

 Sir Peter Lely leaving Mm without a competitor, the remainder of 

 his life was a career of fame and fortune. He had incessant employ- 

 ment, and was distinguished by many public marks of honour. He 

 wan state painter to Charles II., James II., William III , Queen Anne, 

 and George I. The Emperor Leopold made Mm a Knight of the Roman 

 Empire, the Grand Duke of Tuccauy asked for his portrait to place it 

 in the Gallery at Florence, and his works were celebrated by the first 

 poets of M.H time. 



Kueller bad much of the freedom of Vandyck, but leaa nature. Hia 

 outline is bold, his attitudes are eaay and not without dignity ; hia 

 colouring is lively, the air of hia heads generally graceful, and there ia 

 a pleasing simplicity in hia portraits combined with a considerable 

 degree of elegance. But there ia also a monotony in the countenances 

 and a want of spirit in hia figures. Thua the beauties of the court of 

 William III., painted by order of the queen, are very inferior and 

 tame in comparison with Sir Peter Lely'a beauties of the court of 

 Charles II. In the collection of the Marquis of Bute at Luton House 

 there is a portrait of Sir John Robinson by Kueller, which, says 

 Dr. Waagen, ia far more elevated and free in the conception than 

 usual, more carefully finished, and so warm in the colouring that we 

 recognise the scholar of Rembrandt. Sir Godfrey died in 1726, at the 

 age of seventy-eight. 



KNIBB, REV. WILLIAM, Baptist missionary, waa born at Ketter- 

 ing in Northamptonshire about the commencement of the present 

 century. In due time he waa apprenticed to a printer at Bristol, 

 where he early joined a Baptist church. His elder brother, Thomas, 

 left England in December 1822, to undertake the charge of a school 

 connected with one of the Baptist mission churches in Jamaica, where 

 ho died in May 1824. The intelligence of his death so excited the 

 zeal of William Knibb, that he offered himself to go out to supply 

 the place of his deceased brother; and, his offer being accepted, he 

 ailed with bia wife in November 1824. Towards the close of 1829 

 he removed, in consequence of delicate health, from Kingston to the 

 north-western part of the island, where he took charge of the Ridge- 

 laud minion, in connection with Savanna- la-Mar ; and subsequently 

 became pastor of the mission church at Falmouth. Shortly after Mr. 

 Kuibb'i settlement at Falmouth ho was brought into painful notoriety 

 in consequence of the breaking out of an alarming spirit of insurrec- 

 tion among the slave population. A notion had by some means been 

 widely circulated among the negroes to the effect that the king of 

 England bad determined to emancipate them from slavery, and that 

 the 'tree paper,' as the; termed the supposed authority for their 

 liberation, had been actually sent to the West Indies, but bad been 



suppressed or held back through the influence of the slaveowners ; 

 and, in consequence of this belief, the slaves upon several estates in 

 Jamaica avowed, towards the latter end of December 1831, their deter- 

 mination, to do no work after Christinas. When the missionaries 

 became acquainted with this state of things, they endeavoured to 

 remove the erroneous impression from the minds of such of the 

 negroes as were under their influence, and were so active in their 

 measures as to lead to a report among the disaffected slaves that the 

 white people had bribed Mr. Blyth (a Presbyterian missionary) and 

 Mr. Knibb to withhold their freedom. Insurrectionary movements 

 were, in spite of all the efforts of the missionaries, actually commenced 

 by the negroes, although the interposition of Mr. Knibb, who possessed 

 great influence over the slaves, prevented their rising upon many estates. 

 Notwithstanding this fact both he and his brother missionaries were 

 regarded with great jealousy by the planters, overseers, and others in 

 the slave-holding interest, whose enmity had been excited by their 

 efforts for ameliorating the condition of the negroes, and by the part 

 they had taken, in exposing many cases of gross cruelty and oppression. 

 On the 1st of January 1832 Mr. Knibb was compelled, without regard 

 to his sacred office, to join the militia, and while on service he was 

 treated with marked indignity. Having, a few days later, memo- 

 rialised the governor for exemption from military service, he was 

 arrested, and debarred from any communication with his family, upon 

 the plea of alarming intelligence by which, it was pretended, the mis- 

 sionaries were implicated in the rebellion. He was released in February, 

 no evidence being obtained to support a criminal prosecution ; but in 

 March fresh steps were taken to bring him to trial, though on the day 

 appointed for trial the proceedings were abandoned upon the appear- 

 ance of about three hundred witnesses who came forward, upon a few 

 hours' notice, in his defence. 



During the continuance of disturbances in the island Mr. Knibb's 

 chapel and mission premises at Falmouth were razed to the ground by 

 the men of the St. Ann's regiment, who had used them as barracks 

 for a time; and as similar outrages had been committed on other 

 missionary stations, it was determined that Mr. Kuibb, accompanied 

 by Mr. Burchell, should visit England to explain the circumstances of 

 the mission. They accordingly reached England in the beginning of 

 June. Down to that time the Baptist Missionary Society had care- 

 fully avoided taking any part in the question of emancipation, regard- 

 ing it as one of the political questions on which it waa desirable to 

 observe a rigid neutrality. Mr. Knibb was accordingly cautioned not 

 to commit the society by his proceedings ; but, warmed with enthu- 

 siasm excited to the highest pitch by his personal knowledge of the 

 horrors of the system, he boldly declared that the society's missionary 

 stations in Jamaica could no longer exist without the entire and 

 immediate abolition of slavery ; and, feeling that the time for neu- 

 trality was passed, lie declared his determination at the annual meeting 

 of the society on the 21st of June, to avow this at the risk of his 

 connection with the society. Mr. Knibb carried the meeting, and 

 subsequently the feelings of the greater part of the country with him, 

 and hia stirring appeals bad no unimportant share in bringing about 

 the Emancipation Act of 1833. 



In the autumn of 1834 Mr. Knibb returned to Jamaica, and in the 

 following year the building of a new chapel at Falmouth, and of a new 

 Lancasterian school for children of all denominations at Trelawney, 

 waa commenced under his superintendence. The same strong feeling 

 which had led Mr. Knibb to take so determined a part in promoting 

 the abolition of slavery, induced him now to expose the failure of the 

 apprenticeship system established by the Act of 1833, as a means of 

 preventing the evils anticipated from sudden emancipation. He 

 showed that many of the worst features of slavery were continued 

 under the guise of apprenticeship, and induced some planters to 

 anticipate the course of law by immediate emancipation. After the 

 complete emancipation of the slaves or apprentices, on the 1st of 

 August 1838, Mr. Knibb purchased, by the aid of English friends, a 

 tract of ground for the purpose of furnishing independent residence 

 and occupation for the liberated negroes ; and he erected a normal 

 school at the village of Kettering in Trelawney, for training native 

 and other schoolmistresses for both Jamaica aud Africa. In 1842, in 

 consequence of the prosperous state of the mission churches in 

 Jamaica, it was determined by the missionaries and congregations to 

 separate themselves from the Baptist Missionary Society, no far aa any 

 dependence upon the society's funds was concerned ; and in the same 

 year Mr. Knibb visited England to promote the establishment of a 

 theological seminary in connection with the native mission to Africa, 

 which had been commenced about two years before through hia 

 exertions. In the early part of 1845 he again visited England, to 

 obtain pecuniary aid for the negroes connected with the Baptist 

 churches in Jamaica, and to expose a new system of taxation which 

 bore upon the liberated negro labourers with extreme severity. Having 

 succeeded in obtaining both sympathy and pecuniary assistance, he 

 returned to Jamaica in July 1845. In the following November he was 

 seized with yellow fever, and died, after an illness of only four days, 

 on the 15th of that month, at the village of Kettering. Though his 

 funeral took place on the following day, such waa the respect enter- 

 tained for his memory that not less than 8000 persons are said to have 

 assembled on the occasion. 



KNIGHT, RICHARD PAYNE, eldest son of the Reverend 



