MEREDITH 



3745 



MERGANSER 



(1885), that his power as a novelist received 

 general recognition. Like his contemporary 

 Browning, he was given to condensing the 

 thought of an entire paragraph into a single 

 sentence or a phrase, and this style of writing, 

 together with his tendency to analyze his char- 

 acters and to study them from the viewpoint of 

 psychology, kept him from enjoying the popu- 

 larity that Dickens and Thackeray enjoyed. 

 Thoughtful readers, however, rank him among 

 the foremost novelists of his generation. 



Meredith was born in Portsmouth, where his 

 father was engaged in the naval-outfitting busi- 

 ness. He was educated in England and in 

 Germany, and for a brief period studied law. 

 When he was twenty-one his first poem, Chil- 

 lian-Wallah, was published, and two years later, 

 in 1851, a volume of Poems appeared. Then 

 followed The Shaving of Shagpat, an Arabian 

 fantasy (1855), and four years later the master- 

 piece of his early period, Richard Feverel. 

 None of his later efforts surpassed this book in 

 descriptive power, imagination, humor, tender- 

 ness and insight into character. The tragic 

 outcome of the story represents Meredith's be- 

 lief that a novel should have a logical conclu- 

 sion, that it should portray life as it is. 



During thirty years of his long career he 

 acted as literary adviser to a large publishing 

 house, and was the means of encouraging many 

 young writers by his helpful criticism. When 

 Tennyson died, in 1892, his place as president 

 of the British Society of Authors was filled by 

 Meredith, and the latter's seventieth and eighti- 

 eth birthdays were observed by some of the 

 most eminent writers of the day. Four years 

 before his death, in 1905, he received from King 

 Edward VII the Order of Merit. 



Among his most important novels, aside from 

 those mentioned, are The Egoist, Evan Harring- 

 ton, Sandra Belloni, Rhoda Fleming, The Ad- 

 ventures of Harry Richmond, Beauchamp's 

 Career and The Amazing Marriage. His poetry, 

 like his novels, requires too much thought of 

 the reader to be widely popular, but much of 

 his verse is of an exceedingly high order. 

 Modern Love should be read for its wonderful 

 rhythm and word painting. It is probably the 

 author's best achievement in verse. B.M.W. 



MEREDITH, SIR WILLIAM RALPH (1840- 

 ), a Canadian statesman and jurist, chief 

 justice of Ontario since 1912. Sir William is 

 one of the most distinguished and most re- 

 spected of the members of the Canadian bench. 

 The list of offices he has held is helpful, but 

 by no means completely indicates the universal 

 235 



respect in which he is held, not merely for his 

 technical knowledge of the law but for the 

 wide range of his knowledge and his sympathies. 

 Legislation in the interests of workingmen has 

 especially aroused his interest, but all progres- 

 sive legislation has won his support. 



Sir William was bom in Middlesex County, 

 Ontario. He went to school at London, Ont., 

 and later attended the University of Toronto. 

 In 1861 he was called to the bar, and until 1894, 

 when he was elevated to the bench, remained in 

 active practice. Political life also attracted 

 him, with the result that he sat in the Ontario 

 assembly from 1872 to 1894. For the larger 

 part of this period, from 1878 to 1894, he was 

 leader of the Conservative opposition. In 1894 

 he was appointed chief justice of the court of 

 common pleas for Ontario, and in 1912 was 

 appointed chief justice of the supreme court, 

 with the title of chief justice of Ontario. He 

 was given the honor of knighthood in 1896 and 

 in 1900 was elected chancellor of the University 

 of Toronto. 



MERGAN'SER, a family of fishing ducks, 

 commonly called sawbills, of which there are 

 three groups, the American merganser, red- 

 breasted merganser and hooded merganser. 

 These birds are distinguished by their long, saw- 



RED-BREASTED MERGANSER 



toothed bills, the edges of which are notched to 

 enable them to keep hold of their slippery prey. 

 The experienced housewife will never purchase 

 sawbilled duck for the table, because the flesh 

 of these fish-eating birds is rank and unpalat- 

 able. The American merganser, known also as 

 goosander, shelldrake, wcaser, and by various 

 other names, is a North American resident 

 which nests from Minnesota northward, prefer- 

 ring the waterways north of the Canadian bor- 

 der. It is about twenty-three inches long, and 

 has a small crest of feathers on its head. Its 



