230 



DESPOIS, EUGENE A. 



DIEZ, FRIEDRICH C. 



would compel a scattering of the military 

 forces. In the later plans the defense of the 

 whole country was given up, and attention was 

 directed to making secure only Seeland, or 

 rather the capital. The plans included, indeed, 

 shore-batteries to be built along the shores of 

 the Little Belt as w,ell as of the Great Belt, but 

 these were intended especially to secure com- 

 munication with the mainland. To defend the 

 capital against bombardment from the side of 

 the sea, the old sea-forts were to be strength- 

 ened and new ones built. Works to prevent the 

 irruption of small hostile forces from the side 

 of the land could be built after the other works 

 were finished. Great stress was laid upon the 

 strengthening of the fleet, which it was desired 

 to put in such a condition as to be capable of 

 preventing the landing of an enemy's force, of 

 destroying his transports, and even of engag- 

 ing in battle on the open sea. A fortified naval 

 station on the west side of Seeland was pro- 

 posed, to furnish a place of retreat and a point 

 of support for the fleet. 



The Governor of the Danish West India Isl- 

 ands visited Copenhagen early in February, in 

 order to attend to the legislation to be had 

 respecting those islands, and especially to 

 secure an advance from the Treasury of a sum 

 of money to help the sugar-planters in building 

 refineries. The Folkething voted a loan of 

 2,000,000 crowns for this purpose. 



In July the King opened the exhibition of 

 the industries of Jutland at Aarhuus, and sub- 

 sequently visited the military exercise camp at 

 Hald. 



A statue of the astronomer Tycho Brahe 

 was unveiled at Copenhagen on the 8th of 

 August. 



DESPOIS, EUGEXE ANDRE, a French writer 

 and scholar, born December 25, 1818; died 

 September 23, 1876. He studied at the Col- 

 lege Saint-Louis, entered the normal school in 

 1838, taught rhetoric during one year at 

 Bourges, and was called to Paris, where he 

 became Professor of Rhetoric at the College 

 Louis-le-Grand. After the coup-cPetat of 1851 

 he devoted himself entirely to literary labors. 

 He furnished to the " Bibliotheque Latine- 

 Francaise" of Panckoucke, the translation of 

 " Rutilius Nunvatianus," of " Rufus Festus 

 Avienus," and of ' Aratus " the two latter 

 together with Saviot (1844). He contributed 

 to the publication in Latin of the works of 

 Abelard by Cooisin (1849), and published 

 several annotated editions of the classics. He 

 became well known by his contributions to 

 the Liberte de pemer, the Revue des Deux 

 Mondes, the Revue de Paris, the Revue Natio- 

 nale, etc. He also published a number of his- 

 torical works, the best known of which are : 

 "La Revolution d'Angleterre, 1603-1668" 

 (1861), "Les Lettres et la Liberte " (1865), and 

 " Le Vandulisine revolutionnaire " (1869). 



DIAZ DE LA PENA, NAROISSE VIRGILE, a 

 French painter, born in August, 1809; died 

 November 18, 1876. He made his first ap- 



pearance in 1831, with several landscape 

 sketches, and afterward brought out " The 

 Surroundings of Saragossa " (1834), " The 

 Battle of Medina Cceli " (1835), and " The Old 

 Ben - Emek." " The Nymphs of Calypso " 

 (1840), and "The Dream" (1841), showed a 

 change in his style ; and in 1844 his "View of 

 Bas-Brean," " The Oriental," and " Bohemians 

 going to a Festival," displayed those effects of 

 light which formed his characteristic. In 1851 

 he finished his two paintings, " The Bathing- 

 Woman " and " Love disarmed." He sent 

 to the Universal Exhibition of 1855 several of 

 his older works, among them " The Presents 

 of Love," " The Rival," "The Close of a Fine 

 Day," "Sleeping Nymph," "The Nymph tor- 

 mented by Love," and "The Last Tears," of 

 which the dull coloring called forth consider- 

 able criticism. About this time he undertook 

 a journey to the East, and in 1859 exhibited 

 " Galathea," "Venus and Adonis," and other 

 paintings. Recently his older works were 

 sold at very high prices, while his later works 

 were not valued so highly. His son, Eugene 

 Diaz, has gained considerable renown as a 

 musical composer. 



DIDOT, AMBROSE FIRMIN, the head of the 

 celebrated French publishing-house of Firmin 

 Didot Freres, Fils et Cie., born December 20, 

 1790; died February 22, 1876. He studied 

 particularly the ancient languages, traveled 

 through the East, was attached for a time to 

 the legation in Constantinople, and then en- 

 tered his father's business, of which he took 

 charge with his brother Hyacinthe Firmin in 

 1827. He published numerous works of Cham- 

 pollion, Jacquemont, and others ; a new edi- 

 tion of the " Dictionnaire de 1'Academie Fran- 

 gaise," and a new revised edition of the 

 " Thesaurus Linguse Grsecoe " of Henricus Ste- 

 phanus. He wrote himself " Notes d'un Voy- 

 age dans le Levant en 1816 et 1817," and 

 gained considerable fame by translations of 

 Anacreon and Thucyrlides, and by excellent 

 works on bibliography and other subjects, of 

 which the best known are : " Essai typo- 

 graphique et bibliographique sur 1'Histoire de 

 la Gravure sur Bois " (1863), " Etudes sur la 

 Vie et les Travaux de Jean Sire de Joinville " 

 (1871), " Etudes sur Jean Cousin" (1872), and 

 " Aide Manuce et 1'Hellenisme a Venise " 

 (1875). He also wrote several works on French 

 orthography. In 1873 he was elected a member 

 of the French Academy. Among the more re- 

 cent works published by Didot are: "Collec- 

 tions des Classiques Francais," "Bibliotheque 

 des Auteurs Grecs," " Glossarium Mediae et In- 

 fimae Latinitatis " of Dufresne, and the " Nou- 

 velle Biographie generale " (1851, et seq.). The 

 house is one of the oldest in Europe, having 

 been established in 1713 by Francois Didot. 

 Under his successors it rapidly grew, occupy- 

 ing at the present time a foremost rank among 

 the publishing-houses of Europe. 



DIEZ, FRIEDRIOH CHRISTIAN, the founder of 

 the philology of the Romance languages, died 



