BROWN 



955 



BROWNING 



settlers to decide whether the state should be 

 slave or free territory, enthusiasts from both 

 factions thronged to the state, and among the 

 strongest of the free-state men was Brown. In 

 the fierce warfare which was carried on for 

 several years in Kansas and Missouri he proved 

 an expert fighter, and his victory over a band 

 of Missourians at Osawatomie won him the 

 popular name of "Osawatomie Brown." 



But he was not content with resistance of 

 this nature; he had formed a more aggressive 

 plan to free the slaves, and on the night of 

 October 16, 1859, put it into effect. With 

 about a score of followers he descended upon 



JOHN BROWN'S "FORT" 



An engine house at Harper*s Ferry which 

 Brown held and later lost to Colonel Robert E. 

 Lee, commanding government forces. 



Harper's Ferry, in West Virginia, and seized 

 the national arsenal there, believing that the 

 result would be an immediate rising of the 

 slaves. No such thing occurred, however, and 

 within a day or two United States troops under 

 Robert E. Lee, later the great leader of the 

 Confederate armies, regained possession of the 

 arsenal and took prisoners Brown and such of 

 his followers as had not fled. The leader was 

 tried at Charlestown, convicted of treason, and 

 on December 2, 1859, was hanged. 



Intense was the excitement which the insur- 

 rection kindled; the South naturally looked 

 upon Brown as nothing less than a criminal, 

 while many in the North, even including some 

 of the more temperate abolitionists, regarded 

 him as a martyr to conscientious, if mistaken, 

 enthusiasm. The Harper's Ferry insurrection 

 had no immediate consequences of great im- 

 portance, but the fact that it was condoned in 

 the North made the South more determined 

 in its defense of slavery, and it was one of 

 the indirect causes of the War of Secession 

 (which see). 



BROWNE, CHARLES FARRAR (1834-1867), an 

 American humorist who, under the name of 

 ARTEMUS WARD, became one of the most pop- 

 ular lecturers of his day. He was born in 

 Waterford, Me., and had to begin his career 

 with very little schooling, as he was his moth- 

 er's only support. His first position was that 

 of typesetter in a printing office; then he be- 

 came a reporter, and, finding that the anec- 

 dotes he printed were widely quoted, decided 

 to make use of them on the lecture platform. 

 His lectures took him west to the Rocky 

 Mountains, and he also visited England, where 

 his unusual style of fun-making was very pop- 

 ular. 



He was accustomed to say the most absurd 

 things with an air of great solemnity, and his 

 unexpected turns and ridiculous puns used to 

 set his audiences into unbounded laughter. 

 "Africa is famed for its roses," he would say. 

 "It has the red rose, the white rose and the 

 neg-roes"; or, "If spring is some, June is 

 summer." Often he would give such sound 

 advice as "Always live within your income, if 

 you have to borrow money to do it"; and he 

 admonished the Prince of Wales to be as 

 "good a man as his mother was." The lectures 

 of Artemus Ward, in book form, with their 

 impossible spelling and grammar, preserve for 

 the modern reader the best sayings of this 

 humorist, but do not excite the mirth they did 

 when the lecturer's personality made them the 

 best of their kind. 



BROWNIE, a fairy-like creature in Scotland's 

 superstitions, formerly believed to haunt 

 houses, particularly farmhouses. It was as- 

 sumed he was very useful to the family, par- 

 ticularly to good servants, for whom he merrily 

 did many acts of drudgery while they elept. 

 If offered food or pay for his tasks, he dis- 

 appeared and never came again. The brownie 

 bears a close resemblance to the Robin Good- 

 fellow of England and the Kobold of Germany. 

 Many stories have been woven about this little 

 elf. The best known and most popular are 

 the Brownie Books of Palmer Cox, the Amer- 

 ican artist and writer for children. See Cox, 

 PALMER. 



BROWNING, ELIZABETH BARRETT (1806-1861), 

 considered by competent critics the greatest 

 woman poet that England has produced. Her 

 marriage to one of the most eminent poets of 

 his day did not lead to the eclipse of her genius 

 by his, but rather to the strengthening of both 

 (see BROWNING, ROBERT). 



Elizabeth Barrett, born at Coxhoe Hall, in 



