STRAFFORD 



5583 



STRAITS SETTLEMENTS 



ing. Not until 1690 did he free himself from 

 the traditions of the Amati school and begin 

 to exhibit a style of his own. From 1700 to 

 1715 his instruments reached the height of per- 

 fection, not only in brilliance of tone and 

 power, but in the excellence of form and won- 

 derful precision with which the minutest detail 

 was executed. He seldom afterward deviated 

 from his standard pattern. The Stradivarii of 

 his later period were made merely under his di- 

 rection, and they therefore never again reached 

 the standard of perfection of the master's own 

 products, which brought fabulous prices. 



At the time of his death many unfinished in- 

 struments were found in his workshop. These 

 were completed either by his sons or his pupils, 

 but bore his name on the printed labels. Un- 

 suspecting purchasers have been deceived into 

 buying instruments having the outward ap- 

 pearance of his violins, but there are very few 

 genuine specimens in existence. 



STRAFFORD, straj' erd, THOMAS WENT- 

 WORTH, First Earl of (1593-1641), an English 

 statesman, the signing of whose death warrant 

 was one of the greatest blots on the character 

 of Charles I. He was born in London, of an 

 ancient family, educated at Saint John's Col- 

 lege, Cambridge, and in 1614 and 1621 was 

 elected to Parliament. 



Opposed the King's Policies. In the second 

 Parliament of which he was a member, he stood 

 strongly for the rights of that body, and this 

 spirit of resistance to the aggressions of the 

 king characterized him also in the first Parlia- 

 ment of Charles I. He did not, however, sym- 

 pathize with the Puritans nor share their in- 

 tense hostility toward the Crown. In 1627 he 

 was imprisoned for a short time for refusing 

 to pay ship money, a tax the king levied upon 

 persons and communities for his national de- 

 fense, and in 1628 was one of the advocates of 

 the Petition of Right. 



Became Follower of the King. Feeling that 

 he could not follow Parliament further in its 

 demands, he accepted from the king, in 1628, 

 the presidentship of the Council of the North, 

 and was created Baron Wentworth and later, 

 Viscount Wentworth. In his dealing with af- 

 fairs in the north he showed himself very zeal- 

 ous to restore order and gradually he identified 

 himself more and more thoroughly with the 

 king and became less and less in sympathy with 

 Parliament. In 1633 he went to Ireland as 

 lord deputy, and there introduced his famous 

 system of "thorough," as he called it, which 

 conferred unquestioned benefit on Ireland, but 



was administered by methods so harsh that 

 Wentworth came to be cordially hated in the 

 island. 



Returning to England in 1639, he was created 

 Earl of Strafford and consulted by the king on 

 all important questions. The Presbyterians of 

 Scotland had become troublesome, and Straf- 

 ford advised the king to make use of Irish 

 troops against them, and to assert his royal 

 prerogative in every possible way. When the 

 Long Parliament met in November, 1640, it at 

 once determined to impeach Strafford for his 

 administration of Ireland, and the king sum- 

 moned him to London, promising that he 

 "should not suffer in his person, honour or 

 fortune." Parliament dropped the impeach- 

 ment, for which there was insufficient evidence, 

 and in May, 1641, passed a bill of attainder, 

 action being hurried by the discovery of a plot 

 of the king's to rescue Strafford by force. The 

 unfortunate statesman released Charles from 

 his promise, and the king signed the bill on 

 May 10. Two days later Strafford was exe- 

 cuted. 



Sought His Country's Good. It was long the 

 fashion to sneer at Strafford as a turncoat and 

 traitor, but a careful study of his life shows 

 that he was in all things true to his convictions 

 and acted for what he conscientiously believed 

 to be the good of his country. A.MC c. 



The events with which Strafford was con- 

 nected led to the COMMONWEALTH OF ENGLAND, 

 which see. Consult Forster's Strafford, in States- 

 men of the Commonwealth Series ; Browning's 

 Strafford. 



STRAITS SETTLEMENTS, the British 

 possessions on and adjacent to the southwest- 

 ern part of the Malay Peninsula other than the 

 Federated Malay States (see map of Asia, op- 

 posite page 417). They are so called from the 

 straits (Malacca) that separate the peninsula 

 from Sumatra. The colony includes the three 

 settlements of Singapore, Penang and Malacca. 

 It has a total area of about 1,600 square miles 

 and a population estimated in 1914 to be 761,- 

 521. There are about 8,000 whites; the Asiatic 

 inhabitants are chiefly Chinese, Malays and 

 natives of India. 



Singapore is an island less than a mile from 

 the southern extremity of the peninsula. In 

 the Singapore settlement are included also the 

 Cocos Islands, a small group of coral islands 

 1,200 miles southwest of Singapore; and Christ- 

 mas Island, 700 miles east of the Cocos group. 



Penang settlement consists of the island of 

 Penang, off the west coast of the peninsula, a 



