CHAMELEON MINERALCHARD. 



371 



urity of their literary pursuits. This friendship 

 continued unabated till the death of Mr Nichols, 

 when Mr Chalmers wrote a hiography of him for 

 the Gentleman's Magazine, December, 1826, which 

 is one of the fullest and most pleasing memoirs 

 which ever appeared of a long and laborious lite- 

 rary life. With most of the other principal print- 

 ers and booksellers of London during the last fifty 

 years, Mr Chalmers lived on terms of intimacy ; 

 and has frequently recorded his esteem for them in 

 the obituary of the Gentleman's Magazine. 



Mr Chalmers suffered much from illness during 

 the last few years of his life. His death took 

 place in Throgmorton Street, on the 10th of De- 

 cember, 1834. He was a warm and affectionate 

 friend, and a delightful companion, being very con- 

 vivial, and his conversation replete with both wit 

 and information. He belonged to various literary 

 clubs of the old school, of which he was nearly 

 the last surviving member. 



In 1783, Mr Chalmers married Elizabeth, the 

 widow of Mr John Gillett. She died in June, 

 1816. 



CHAMELEON MINERAL; a name given by 

 the chemists of the 18th century to a mass pro- 

 duced by fusing oxide of manganese with nitre or 

 with potash. It is of a dark green colour, and is 

 soluble in water. The solution, at first green, 

 soon passes through bottle green and purple to a 

 deep red ; and the red liquid may be again rendered 

 green by the addition of caustic alcalies. These 

 remarkable changes of colour have been shown to 

 depend on the production of two acids, the man- 

 ganesic and permanganesic ; the former, which, 

 with its salts, is green, being composed of man- 

 ganese one atom, oxygen three atoms ; and passing 

 readily with separation of binoxide of manganese, 

 into the latter, which is composed of manganese 

 two atoms, oxygen seven atoms. The perman- 

 ganesiate of potash may easily be obtained in per- 

 manent crystals of a bronze colour and metallic 

 lustre, which give to water a splendid purplish red 

 colour. This salt readily yields oxygen to organic 

 substances, and has lately been used on this account 

 in organic analysis. 



CHAMIER, JOHN, was born in London, about 

 the year 1754, and placed at the Charter House 

 on the foundation, at the age of ten years, having 

 received a nomination from queen Charlotte, 

 who had distinguished Mr Chamier's father, the 

 Rev. John Des Champs (de Marsilly), with her 

 particular favour from the earliest period of his 

 quitting her native country, Mecklenburg, and set- 

 tling in England. This worthy divine deserves, 

 indeed, more than a passing notice. He commenced 

 his career at Berlin, as chaplain to the queen of 

 Prussia, and tutor to prince Henry, brother of the 

 great Frederick, who by his harsh and unprinci- 

 pled conduct, and by the sanction which he openly 

 pave to infidel doctrines, drove him from the court. 

 On his arrival in Great Britain, where his fame as 

 a preacher had preceded him, he was immediately 

 appointed minister of the Savoy chapel in the 

 Strand, and afterwards presented to the living of 

 Pillesden, Dorset. His works, which are very 

 numerous, were written entirely in the French 

 language, and consist chiefly of Sermons, " Abrege 

 de la Religion Chretienne," and " Cours de la Phil- 

 osophic WolrJenne." 



At the age of sixteen, Mr Chamier, instead of 

 proceeding to the university, accepted a writer- 

 ship in India. There, from the year 1772 to 1805, 



he was employed in the civil service of the Com- 

 pany at Madras, and filled most of the principal 

 situations in the political, revenue, and commer- 

 cial branches, until at last he was appointed a 

 member of the council at that presidency. 



On his return to England, he settled in the 

 parish of St George, Hanover Square, actively sup- 

 ported several of the public metropolitan institu- 

 tions, became treasurer of St George's hospital, 

 and served the office of church-warden with Lord 

 Amherst in the year 1819. Mr Chamier retired 

 early from the world, and confined himself for 

 many years to the tranquil enjoyments afforded by 

 a well-selected library, and a domestic circle de- 

 voted to his comfort and happiness. Mr Chamier 

 never courted literary reputation; but he was 

 tempted, at the solicitation of some scientific friends, 

 to publish a Meteorological Journal about the year 

 1787, in one volume 4to, which has become ex- 

 ceedingly scarce. His epistolary style was a model 

 of perfection easy, elegant, and playfully satiri- 

 cal. 



About 1781, he took, by royal licence and au- 

 thority, the name and armorial bearings of his ma- 

 ternal uncle, Anthony Chamier, Esq. F. R. S., 

 representative in several parliaments of the borough 

 of Tamworth, and under secretary of state, who, 

 dying in the year 1780 without children, left him 

 sole heir of his property and estates. Mr Anthony 

 Chamier was well known in the literary and fa- 

 shionable circles of his day, and was one of the ori- 

 ginal members of Johnson's Literary Club. He 

 lived on terms of intimacy with the great moralist ; 

 is often mentioned in Boswell's Life; and num- 

 bered amongst his friends Reynolds, Burke, Lang- 

 ton, Topham, Beauclerk, and Goldsmith. 



Mr Chamier married Georgiana Grace, eldest 

 daughter of Adm. Sir William Burnaby, Bart., and 

 by her, who died May 14, 1826, left issue four 

 sons and four daughters. He died at London, 

 Feb. 23, 1831. 



CHAPEL-EN-LE-FRITH; a market-town in 

 Derbyshire, 167 miles, N. W. from London, and 

 twenty S. E. from Manchester. Its name signifies 

 the "Chapel in the Forest," from the Saxon word 

 frith, a forest or wood the church or chapel, 

 which originated the town, having been built 

 within the forest of the High Peak. The town is 

 neat, and pleasantly situated on the declivity of a 

 hill, rising from an extensive and fertile vale, sur- 

 rounded by lofty eminences that bound this ex- 

 tremity of the county. The manufacture of cotton 

 is the principal branch of business here. There is 

 an establishment for warehousing goods, this place 

 being a medium of communication between the 

 large manufacturing towns of Manchester and 

 Sheffield. Lead and coal mines, and lime-stone 

 quarries, are worked in the neighbourhood ; from 

 the latter a railway communicates with the Peak 

 Forest canal, which passes about three miles to the 

 north-west. A large reservoir in the parish sup- 

 plies the canal; it is a fine sheet of v. ater, much 

 frequented by anglers. Population in 1831, 3220. 



CHARD; a town of Somersetshire, 140 miles 

 W. S. W. from London. It is situated at the 

 southern extremity of the county, on the highest 

 ground between the north and south seas, a stream 

 of water in the streets being divertible at pleasure 

 into the English or the Bristol channel. The 

 town consists chiefly of two streets, and a long row 

 of houses called Crow Lane. It was constituted a 

 borough in the reign of Edward I., and sent its re- 

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