JONGLEURS JORDAN. 



hospital. Upon the institution of the college of phy- 

 siciuiis of Philadelphia, in 1787, doctor Jones was 

 elected vice-president, and contributed to the first 

 volume of its transactions an interesting paper on 

 Anthrax. He was the intimate friend and physician 

 of doctor Franklin, whom he attended in his last 

 illness, and published a brief account of his death. 

 In 1790, he attended general Washington, then 

 president of the United States, when very ill at New 

 \ ork. When the seat of the federal government 

 was removed to Philadelphia, the president appointed 

 doctor Jones physician to his family. In June, 1791, 

 he contracted a fever, which, added to his previous 

 disorder, put a period to his life on the 23d of that 

 month, in the sixty-third year of his age. 



JONGLEURS. See Jugglers. 



JONSON, BENJAMIN, a celebrated English poet, 

 the contemporary and friend of Shakspeare, whom he 

 has been accused by some, but on insufficient grounds, 

 of regarding with envious and malignant feelings. 

 He was the posthumous son of a clergyman, who had 

 suffered considerable privations for his religious opin- 

 ions, and was born, June 11, 1574, at Westminster ; 

 at the grammar-school of which city he was placed, 

 under Camden, at an early age ; till his mother 

 marrying again to a person who held the humble 

 occupation of a bricklayer, young Ben, as he was 

 familiarly called, was taken home abruptly by his 

 father-in-la\v, and employed by him as an assistant 

 in his trade. The ardent spirit of the future poet 

 revolted against his condition ; he fled from home, 

 and entered the army as a private soldier, in which 

 capacity he served with much commendation from 

 his oiKcers on the score of personal courage, during 

 a campaign in Holland. Returning to England, he 

 quilted the service, and, although his straitened cir- 

 cumstances threw in his way obstacles of no common 

 magnitude, he determined to apply himself to literary 

 pursuits. With this view, he contrived to enter 

 himself of St John's college, Cambridge ; but his 

 failing resources prohibited him from continuing long 

 at the university. He went to London, and com- 

 menced at once author and actor by profession two 

 callings then frequently combined. His progress as 

 a performer was not rapid, and, before he could make 

 any great impression in his favour, a quarrel with a 

 brother actor seemed to close every avenue against 

 this method of gaining a reputation. He had made 

 his debut at the Curtain, an obscure theatre on the 

 skirts of the town, and, a difference arising between 

 him and another member of the company, a duel 

 ensued, which terminated in the death of his anta- 

 gonist, while he himself received a wound in the 

 sword-arm. He was seized and imprisoned, and 

 narrowly escaped with life, in consequence of this 

 rencounter. During his confinement, he is reported 

 to have become, through the intervention of a Roman 

 Catholic priest, a convert to that communion, and to 

 have remained so during a space of twelve years, 

 when he resumed his former opinions. His first 

 attempt at dramatic composition, in the prosecution 

 of which he is said to have been much encouraged, 

 if not actually prompted, by Shakspeare, was in 

 1598, when his Every Man in his Humour, still con- 

 sidered a standard piece, was printed ; and from 

 this period, he seems to have produced a play 

 annually for several years, besides writing, occa- 

 sionally, masks and interludes, for the entertainment 

 of the court. The favour he had enjoyed there, was 

 not, however, sufficient to protect him from the con- 

 sequences of a severe and imprudent satire on the 

 Scottish nation, in a dramatic piece, which he wrote 

 in conjunction with Marston and Chapman, entitled 

 Eastward Hoe. The anger of the court favourites 

 was at once drawn upon his head by this unfortunate 



sally ; he was a second time committed to prison, 

 and only a timely submission saved his nose and ears, 

 \vliidi lie was condemned to lose in the pillory as a 

 libeller. By his address, however, he soon contrived 

 to reinstate himself in the favour of a monarch to 

 whose pleasures the effusions of his muse had become 

 necessary ; and for the remainder of that reign he 

 continued in higli favour as a kind of superintendent 

 of the court revels, enjoying, at the same time, the 

 friendship of all the wits and literati of the age. 

 After a tour through France, in 1613, in the progress 

 of which, with his usual carelessness, he affronted 

 cardinal Du Perron, he returned to England, and 

 afterwards obtained the honorary degree of A.M. 

 from the university of Oxford. On the death of the 

 poet laureate, Jonson was appointed his successor, 

 and the salary of 100 marks, attached to that post, 

 was, on his petition, raised to the sum of .100 by 

 Charles I. But neither this addition to his income, 

 nor a subsequent gratuity from the same royal source, 

 could save him from the consequences of pecuniary 

 improvidence. An attack of palsy at length carried 

 him off, Aug. 16, 1637. Jonson's best dramas are 

 his Alchymist, Epicene, and Volpone, which, besides 

 being admirable as to plot and development, exhibit 

 traits of pungent humour, strong conception, and 

 powerful discrimination. The remainder of his 

 dramas are inferior. His tragedies of Sejanus and 

 Catiline are too learned and declamatory either for 

 the closet or the stage, and a great portion of his 

 comedy is low, forced, and unnatural. Contrary to 

 Shakspeare, he deals rather in passing manners and 

 eccentricities than in general nature, but supplies a 

 good notion of the follies of his times. His poetry is 

 occasionally illuminated by vigorous and pleasing 

 passages, and a few of his short pieces, poems, and, 

 especially, the Hymn from Cynthia's Revels, his 

 epitaph on the countess of Pembroke, and some of 

 his songs and Underwoods are excellent. Besides 

 his dramatic and poetical productions, he was the 

 author of a variety of miscellaneous works, among 

 which are an English Grammar, Discoveries, &c. 

 Several editions of his works have been published, 

 the last and most complete of which is that by Mr 

 Gifford. A curious tradition prevailed with respect 

 to the deposition of his remains in Westminster 

 abbey, where a handsome tablet lias been erected to 

 his memory, in Poet's corner, inscribed rare Sen 

 Jonson ! The same words are found on several small 

 square stones in the floor of the abbey, under one of 

 which it was generally believed his corpse was 

 buried in a perpendicular position. This was ascer- 

 tained a few years since to be the fact, his coffin 

 being discovered so situated in one of the aisles 

 during the preparations making for a recent inter- 

 ment. 



JOPPA. See Jaffa. 



JORDAN. This river, celebrated in Scripture 

 history, rises at the foot of the Antilibanus in Syria 

 (in the pachalic of Damascus), forms the lake Gene- 

 zareth or Tiberias, traverses Palestine, of which it is 

 the only important river, from north to south, re- 

 ceives the Kedron, and, after a course of about 150 

 miles, empties into the Dead sea. The banks are 

 steep, and about fifteen feet high. Its borders, once 

 cultivated and inhabited, are now deserted, and its 

 yellow water rolls slowly in the sand. The Hebrews 

 called it Jordan (river of judgment) ; the Arabs call 

 it Nahar-el-Chiria (river of the ford). They ascribe 

 to bathing in its waters the power of healing. On 

 the countries near the Jordan and eastward, see 

 J. S. Buckingham's Travels among the Arab Tribes 

 inhabiting the Countries east of Syria and Palestine 

 (London, 1825, 4to.). 



JORDAN, DOROTHEA ; an English actress of 



