Page:Cousins's Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.djvu/187

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
Dictionary of English Literature
175

called to the Bar at the Inner Temple, and appointed a Commissioner of Stamps. Among his earliest writings were papers in the Edinburgh Review; but in 1818 he leaped into a foremost place among historical writers by the publication of his View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages. This was followed in 1827 by The Constitutional History of England from the Accession of Henry VII. to the Death of George II., and his third great work, Introduction to the Literature of Europe in the 15th, 16th, and 17th Centuries, in 4 vols., appeared in 1837-39. All these, which have gone through several ed., and have been translated into the principal languages of Europe, are characterised by wide and profound learning, indefatigable research, and judicial impartiality. They opened a new field of investigation in which their author has had few, if any, superiors. In politics H. was a Whig; but he took no active share in party warfare. He had two sons of great promise, both of whom predeceased him. Of these the elder, Arthur Henry, is the subject of Tennyson's In Memoriam, and of him his f. wrote a touching memoir prefixed to his literary remains.


Halleck, Fitzgreene (1790-1867).—Poet, b. at Guilford, Conn., wrote, with Rodman Drake, a young poet who d. at 25, The Croaker Papers, a series of satirical and humorous verses, and Fanny, also a satire. In 1822 he visited Europe, and the traces of this are found in most of his subsequent poetry, e.g. his lines on Burns, and on Alnwick Castle.


Halliwell-Phillips, James Orchard (1820-1889).—Archæologist and Shakespearian scholar, ed. at Camb., was the author of a Life of Shakespeare (1848), New Boke about Shakespeare and Stratford upon Avon (1850), Folio Edition of Shakespeare (1853-65), and various other works relative to him, also Dictionary of Old English Plays (1860). He also ed. works for the Camden and Percy Societies, and compiled a Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words. In 1872 he added his wife's name of Phillips to his own.


Hamerton, Philip Gilbert (1834-1894).—Artist and writer on æsthetics, s. of a solicitor, was b. near Oldham. Originally intended for the Church, he decided for art and literature. After working as an artist in the Highlands with his wife, who was a Frenchwoman, he settled in France, and devoted himself to writing on art. Among his works are Etching and Etchers, etc. (1868), Painting in France after the Decline of Classicism (1869), The Intellectual Life (1873), Human Intercourse (1884), The Graphic Arts (1882), Landscape (1885), some of which were magnificently illustrated. He also left an autobiography. His writings had a great influence upon artists, and also in stimulating and diffusing the love of art among the public.


Hamilton, Alexander (1757-1804).—Statesman and political writer, b. in the West Indies, was one of the framers of the Constitution of the United States, and was the first Sec. of the national Treasury. He was one of the greatest of American statesmen, and has also a place in literature as the principal writer in the Federalist, a periodical founded to expound and defend the new