SHERIFF SHERRY. 



225 



arrested for debt. 'His death took place July 7, 

 1816. Besides the plays already mentioned, Mr 

 Sheridan was the author of St Patrick's Day, or the 

 Scheming Lieutenant, a farce; a Trip to Scar- 

 borough, a comedy, altered from Vanbrugh; the 

 Camp, a farce; the Critic, or the Tragedy rehearsed : 

 Robinson Crusoe, or Harlequin Friday, a panto- 

 mime; and Pizarro,,a play, from the German of 

 Kotzebue. He ' also wfote verses to the Memory 

 of David Gairick (1779, 4to.); and a Comparative 

 Statement of the two Bills for the better Govern- 

 ment of the British Possessions in India (1788, 

 4to..). As a speaker, he ranks among the most 

 finished and varied of the rhetorical school; and 

 his speech already alluded to against Warren Hast- 

 ings, has been deemed one of the most striking 

 specimens of English eloquence upon record. As a 

 dramatist, he may be considered the head of the 

 department of that line of comedy which exhibits 

 the polite malice, the civil detraction, the equivoque, 

 intrigue, persiflage, and lurking irony, which char- 

 acterize social intercourse in the more cultivated 

 ranks of life. Wit usually takes the lead of humour 

 in this species of composition, with a correspondent 

 destruction of nature and verisimilitude. The 

 School for Scandal is a felicitous exemplification of 

 character, and of some of the most conspicuous of 

 the well-bred vices and follies of fashionable life. 

 A collection of his speeches, in five volumes, was 

 published in 1816. His dramatic Works appeared in 

 1821 (2 vols., 8vo.), edited by Thomas Moore, who 

 has since published a Life of Sheridan. 



SHERIFF. The sheriff is an officer of great 

 antiquity, and known by a corresponding name in 

 most countries in Europe. He was called in the 

 Danish gravue, Swedish, grefwe; Anglo-Saxon 

 gerefa; German, graf; and, in the Latin of the 

 middle ages, graphic, or grqfio. Adelung observes 

 Joit the twelve judges appointed by Odin were 

 /'(piled yreve. Both the officer and the name have, 

 Mrith some variations, been retained in Germany. 

 The graf of the Germans is, for the most part, a 

 title of dignity, answering to the count of t^he 

 French, and the earl of the English; and, in some 

 cases, it is also the title of a prince, as the landgraf, 

 or markgraf. Among the Anglo-Saxons, the gerefa, 

 or, as he is called in English, the reeve, was an 

 officer of justice inferior in rank to the alderman. 

 He was a ministerial officer, appointed to execute 

 processes, keep the peace, and put the laws in exe- 

 cution. He witnessed contracts, brought offenders 

 to justice, and delivered them to punishment, took 

 bail of such as were to appear before the shirege- 

 mote, or county court, and presided at the hundred 

 court, or folcmote. There was a distinction both 

 in the rank and jurisdiction of the gerefa. The 

 shire-gerefa, shire-reeve, or sheriff, was probably dis- 

 tinguished by the name of the king's gerefa, because 

 he more immediately executed the king's precepts, 

 and sometimes sat in the place of the alderman in 

 the county court. He appears, also, to* have been 

 distinguished by the title of the heh-gerefa or high- 

 sheriff. The gerefa who acted in the tithing was 

 called the tithing-reeve, he who acted in the byrig, 

 or burgh, a borough-reeve, and he who acted in the 

 town the tun-gerefa. The leading duties of this 

 officer, in Britain and the United 'States, are the 

 same as those performed by the Anglo-Saxon gerefa, 

 namely, of an executive as distinguished from those 

 of a judicial kind. 



SHERIFFMUIR, oil '-SHERIFF MOOR ; a 

 plain of Scotland, near the Grampian mountains, i:i 



VI. 



Perthshire. Here a bloody batde was fought be- 

 tween the army of George I. and the rebels, under 

 the earl of Mar, in 1715. See Stuart, James Ed- 

 ward Francis. 



SHERIFF'S TOURN. See Courts. 



SHERLOCK, WILLIAM, an Episcopal clergy, 

 man, born in Southwark, about 1641, studied at 

 Eton, and afterwards at Peter-house, Cambridge 

 where he proceeded doctor of divinity in 1680. 

 After the revolution, having refused to take the 

 oath of allegiance to William HI., he was suspended 

 from the pastoral office; but, on his subsequent 

 compliance, hewas restored, and, in 1691, promoted 

 to the deanery of St Paul's. His death took place 

 in 1707. Doctor Sherlock distinguished himself as 

 a polemical divine against the Dissenters, and car- 

 ried on a controversy with doctor South relative to 

 the doctrine of the Trinity. His works on practi- 

 cal theology, especially his Discourses on Death 

 and on Judgment, are much esteemed, and have 

 passed through numerous editions. 



SHERLOCK, THOMAS, son of the preceding, 

 was born in London, in 1678, and received his edu- 

 cation at Catharine-hall, Cambridge, where he ob- 

 tained a fellowship. In 1714, he, was chosen mas- 

 ter of Catharine-hall, and was promoted to the 

 deanery of Chichester in 1716, after which he en- 

 tered into a controversy with bishop Hoadly, in 

 defence of the corporation and test acts. In 1725, 

 he published Discourses on Prophecy, intended to 

 obviate the infidel objections of Anthony Collinfe. 

 Doctor Sherlock, in 1728, succeeded Hoadly in the 

 bishopric of Bangor, and, in 1734, in that of Salis- 

 bury. He was offered the primacy on the Decease 

 of archbishop Potter, in 1747; but he refused it; 

 and, the following year, he was translated to t])e 

 see of London, where he remained till his death, 

 1761. Bishop Sherlock was the author of the 

 Trial of the Witnesses of the Resurrection of 

 Jesus ; and his Sermons are among the best speci- 

 mens of English pulpit eloquence extant. 



SHERRY ; a Spanish' wine, growing in the 

 neighbourhood of Xeres de la Frontera, in .the pro- 

 vince of Andalusia, near Cadiz. Many of the 

 principal vineyards are in the hands of British and 

 foreign settlers, to which probably is to be ascribed 

 the improvement which of late has taken place in 

 Sherry wines. The best sou (albariza^ consists 

 chiefly of carbonate of lime, with a small admix- 

 ture of silex and clay, and occasionally magnesia 

 Red and white grapes are used indiscriminately. 

 When ripe and gathered, they ase spread on mats, 

 and left to 'dry for two or three days; they are 

 then freed from the stalks, and the rotten or unripe 

 berries rejected. Being now introduced into vats, 

 with a layer of burnt gypsum on the surface, they 

 are trodden by peasants with, wooden shoes." The 

 juice is collected in casks, in which the fermenta- 

 tion is allowed to take place, continuing generally 

 from October till the beginning or middle of De- 

 cember. The wines are then racked from the lees, 

 and those intended for exportation receive additions 

 of brandy, seldom more than three or four gallons 

 to the butt. The new wine is harsh and fiery, but 

 mellows by being allowed to remain in the wood 

 four or five years, though fifteen or twenty years 

 are required to perfect its flavour. Sometimes bit- 

 ter almonds are infused to give the wine a nutty 

 flavour. The dry sherry is the most esteemed. 

 Its flavour partakes of the taste of leather (called 

 in Spanish olor de bota). This is owing to the 

 custom of bringing the wines down the country in 

 p 



