FRANCIS I 



3310 



FRANCIS 



Francis I (1494-1547). King of 

 France. Son of Charles of Valois, 

 he was born at Cognac, Sept. 12, 

 1494, and in 

 1515 succeed- 

 ed his cousin 

 Louis XII, 

 whose daugh- 

 ter he had 

 married in 

 1512. He in-, 

 vaded Italy 

 and defeated 

 the duke of 

 Milan at 

 Marignano in 

 1515. In 1519 

 he made an 

 u n successful 

 bid for the 

 imperial 

 crown, which 



Fro m a portrait Q^te V Ob- 



tained, and the famous rivalry of 

 the two monarchs began. Francis's 

 attempted alliance with Henry 

 VIII of England, at the Field 

 of the Cloth of Gold, 1520, came 

 to nothing, but he again invaded 

 Italy, 1525 , and was captured 

 at Pavia, Feb. 25. Kept prisoner 

 at Madrid,, he was set free in 

 1526 on surrendering Burgundy 

 and abandoning various claims in 

 favour of Charles. Once free, how- 

 ever, he renewed hostilities, and 

 won certain modifications from 

 Charles in 1529, whose sister Mar- 

 garet he married, 1530. 



The struggle was resumed in 

 1536, Francis making useful alli- 

 ances with the German Protestant 

 princes, and with the sultan Soly- 

 man I (1542), but had reached no 

 definite conclusion on his death 

 at Rambouillet, March 31, 1547. 

 Despite the jealousies and vacilla- 

 tions of his foreign policy, Francis 

 greatly strengthened the royal 

 power. He secured for himself the 

 nomination of bishops, reduced the 

 judiciary powers of the nobility, 

 strengthened provincial adminis- 

 tration, reformed the national ex- 

 chequer, and reconstituted the per- 

 manent army. A patron of many 

 notable artists and writers of the 

 Renaissance, he founded the Col- 

 lege de France, 1530. 



Francis II (1544-60). King of 

 France. Born at Fontainebleau, 

 Jan. 19, 1544, he was the eldest son 

 of Henry II. 

 He was married 

 to Mary Stuart, 

 Queen of Scots, 

 1558, and be- 

 came king on 

 his father's 

 murder in 

 April, 1559. His 

 reign only 

 lasted for a year Francis II, 



and a half. King of France 



and during that time the govern- 

 ment was conducted by his mother, 

 Catherine de' Medici, and his kins- 

 men, the Guises. He died suddenly 

 at Paris, Dec. 5, 1560. See Chenon- 

 ceaux," illus. 



Francis I (1777-1830). King of 

 the Two Sicilies. Son. of Ferdinand 

 I, he was born in Naples, Aug. 19, 

 1777. In 1812 his father made him 

 regent of Sicily and in 1820 regent 

 of Naples. He came to the throne 

 in 1824 and placed himself under 

 the tutelage of Austria, inaugurat- 

 ing an era of oppression and cor- 

 ruption which reduced his subjects 

 to despair. An insurrection in 1 828 

 was put down with unexampled 

 cruelty, the commune of Bosco 

 being razed to the groxind. His 

 alarm at the French revolution of 

 1830, and the fear of the vengeance 

 of his own people, caused his 

 death, Nov. 8, 1830. 



Francis II (1836-94). King ol 

 the Two Sicilies. Son of Ferdinand 

 II (Bomba), he was born Jan. 16, 

 1836, and ascended the throne in 



1859. Characterless and weak, he 

 rejected all proposals of reform 

 until Garibaldi's invasion of Sicily, 



1860, when his tardy offer of a 

 constitution was rejected by his 

 people. He fled to Capua and thence 

 to Gaeta, which, after a brief siege, 

 surrendered, Feb. 12, 1861. The 

 kingdom was incorporated with 

 Italy and Francis took refuge in 

 Rome. After 1870, Francis lived 

 in Germany and Austria, dying at 

 Arco, Dec. 27, 1894. 



Francis, JOHN (1811-82). Pub- 

 lisher of The Athenaeum. Born in 

 Bermondsey, July 18, 1811, and 

 apprenticed to a London news- 

 paper agent, he entered The Athe- 

 naeum office as a clerk, Sept., 1831, 

 and became business manager and 

 publisher of thatpaper in Oct. , 1 832. 

 He retained this post for nearly 50 

 years, also supervising the commer- 

 cial side of Notes and Queries from 

 1872. He took an active part in the 

 campaign for the repeal of the 

 advertisement, stamp, and paper 

 duties, 1853-61. He died April 6, 

 1882, and was succeeded by his 

 eldest son, John Collins Francis (d. 

 1916), who wrote a memoir of his 

 father, 1888. 



Francis, MARY E. Pen-name of 

 Mary E. Blundell, British novelist. 

 Born at Killi- 

 ney Park, Dub- 

 lin, a daughter 

 of Michael 

 James Sweet- 

 man, she mar- 

 r i e d Francis 

 Nicholas Blun- 

 dell in 1879. 

 Having early 



achieved suc- 

 cess with her 



Mary E. Francis, 

 British novelist 



stories of North Lancashire life 

 and character, she enhanced her 

 reputation by studies of Dorset 

 life. Her books included Whither ?, 

 1892 ; In a North Country 

 Village, 1893; A Daughter of 

 the Soil, 1895 ; Pastorals of 

 Dorset, 1901 ; The Manor Farm, 

 1902; Dorset Dear, 1905; The 

 Story of Mary Dunne, 1913 ; 

 A Maid o' Dorset, 1917; and 

 Beck of Beckford, 1920. She 

 also wrote some plavs, The Widow 

 Woos, 1904 (intro. Sydney Valen 

 tine) ; The Third Time of Asking, 

 1906 ; and Fiander's Widow (in 

 collaboration with Sydney Valen- 

 tine), 1907. 



Francis, Sra PHILIP (1740- 

 1818). Supposed author of The 

 Letters of Junius (g.v. ). The only 

 son of Philip 

 Francis (c. 

 1708-73), the 

 translator of 

 Horace, he 

 was born in 

 Dublin, Oct. 

 22, 1740. 

 Educated in 

 Dublin and at 

 S. Paul's 

 School, Lon- 

 don, where 

 H. S. Wood- 



fall and P. Rosenhagen were his 

 friends, he filled several minor 

 government appointments and was 

 first clerk at the war office, 1702- 

 72. He married in 1762 a Miss 

 Macrabie (d. 1806). 



A member of the council of 

 Bengal, 1774-81, he quarrelled with 

 Warren Hastings, who wounded 

 him in a pistol duel, 1779. He 

 paid 50,000 rupees as defendant 

 in a marital action brought by 

 G. F. Grand, an officer in the East 

 India Company's service, whose 

 young wife, after living for a time 

 under the protection of Francis, 

 became in 1801 the wife of Talley- 

 rand, and returned to England with 

 a large fortune. He was M.P. for 

 Yarmouth, I.W., 1784 ; Bletching- 

 ley, 1790; and Appleby, 1802; 

 assisted Burke in impeaching 

 Warren Hastings; incurred the 

 enmity of William Pitt ; became an 

 intimate of the Prince Regent ; 

 and supported Wilberforce against 

 the slave trade. In 1793 he founded 

 the Society of Friends of the 

 People ; received in 1806 a K.C.B. 

 instead of the coveted office of 

 governor-general of India, and 

 in 1814 married Emma Watkins, 

 whom he encouraged in her belief 

 that he was the author of the 

 Junius Letters. ,- He died in 

 London, Dec. 22, 1818. See Me- 

 moirs, J. Parkes and H. Merivale, 

 1867 ; Echoes from Old Calcutta, 

 H. E. Busteed, 3rd ed. 1897. 



