Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 12.djvu/172

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Cope
186
Cope

chosen Psalmes of the Prophet David … by Sir Anthony Cope, Knight’ (black letter), J. Day, 1547, 4to, reprinted with biographical preface and notes, 1848, by William H. Cope. Among the manuscripts at Bramshill are two ascribed to Cope—an abbreviated chronology and a commentary on the first two gospels dedicated to Edward VI.

Sir Anthony Cope (1548?–1614), Cope's elder grandson, high sheriff of Oxfordshire (1581, 1590, and 1603), represented Banbury in seven parliaments (1571–83, 1586–1604), and Oxfordshire (1606–14). He was committed to the Tower (27 Feb. to 23 March 1586–7) for presenting to the speaker a puritan revision of the common prayer-book and a bill abrogating existing ecclesiastical law. He became a knight (1590) and a baronet (29 June 1611); twice entertained James I at Hanwell (1606 and 1612); married (1) Frances Lytton, by whom he had 4 sons and 3 daughters, and (2) Anne Paston, who had been twice a widow; died July 1614, and was buried at Hanwell. The present baronet, Sir Anthony Cope of Bramshill, Hampshire, descends from Anthony, Sir Anthony's second son.

[W. H. Cope's preface to the Meditations; Hist. MSS. Comm. 3rd Rep. 242–4; Davenport's Lord Lieutenants of Oxfordshire; Nichols's Progresses; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), i. 192; Bale's Brit. Scriptt. xi. 74; Pits, Angliæ Scriptt. 735; Tanner's Bibl. Brit. 198; Leland's Itinerary (Hearne, 1744), iv. ii. 59; Strype's Cranmer (8vo ed.), 209.]

W. H.

COPE, EDWARD MEREDITH (1818–1873), classical scholar, was born on 28 July 1818 at Birmingham, was educated at the schools of Ludlow and Shrewsbury, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1837. After taking his degree in the mathematical tripos of 1841, and appearing as senior in the classical tripos, he was elected fellow of Trinity College in 1842, and took the degree of M.A. in 1844. In 1845 he was appointed assistant tutor of Trinity College, and here, excepting the portions of the year he spent in foreign travel, the greater part of his life was spent. He was ordained deacon in 1848 and priest in 1850, but he found the work of the educational clergy more congenial than that of the parochial. In 1867 he was a candidate for the Greek professorship at Cambridge; the votes of the electors were divided, and as the vice-chancellor and the master of Trinity College, on whom the election then devolved, differed, the appointment lapsed to the chancellor, who gave it to Dr. Kennedy. There is no doubt that his disappointment on this occasion preyed on Cope's mind, and was one of the causes of his seizure in 1869. His mind then gave way, and after lingering for four years, he died on 4 Aug. 1873, and was buried at Birmingham.

Eminent as a Greek and Latin scholar, he knew the chief modern languages of Europe. His first published work of any importance was his criticism of Mr. Grote's dissertation on the sophists in the ‘Cambridge Journal of Classical Philology,’ 1854–6. He published a translation of the Gorgias in 1864, and an introduction to Aristotle's ‘Rhetorick’ in 1867. After his death his translation of the ‘Phædo’ was edited by Mr. H. Jackson, and his edition of the ‘Rhetorick of Aristotle,’ with an elaborate commentary, by Mr. J. E. Sandys in 1877. Notes and corrections of his are in a later volume of Grote's ‘History of Greece.’

[Munro's Memoir, prefixed to Sandys's edition of the Rhetorick, Camb. 1877.]

H. R. L.

COPE, Sir JOHN (d. 1760), commander-in-chief of the forces in Scotland during the rebellion of 1745, was early indebted to the favour of Thomas Wentworth, third earl of Strafford [q. v.], with whom, as appears from letters in the British Museum, he was on terms of intimate friendship. He entered the army as a cavalry officer, and in 1707 held the rank of cornet. He was colonel of 39th foot 1730–32, 5th foot 1732–7, 9th dragoons 1737–41, and 7th dragoons 1741 till death. He obtained the dignity of a knight of the Bath. He was M.P. for Queenborough 1722–7, for Liskeard 1727–34, and for Orford 1738–41. In 1742 he was one of the generals appointed to the command of troops sent to assist the queen of Hungary. Promoted brigadier-general in 1735 and major-general in 1739, he became lieutenant-general in 1743. In 1745, when Prince Charles landed in the highlands, he was commander-in-chief in Scotland, and on rumours reaching him of the prince's arrival he resolved to march to the highlands to check the prince's progress. The feverish eagerness with which at the urgent request of the lords of the regency he set out on this expedition was gradually spent on the march northwards. When he left Stirling on 19 Aug. the number of men under his command did not exceed fourteen hundred, and the auxiliaries on which he relied to join him on the march, not having time for preparation, failed to appear. The difficulties of the mountain passes also began to overawe his resolution, and when he came in sight of the rebels posted at Corryarak, barring the way to Fort Augustus, he became alarmed, and at the junction of the roads at Catlaig turned southwards towards Inverness. The highlanders on learning the news uttered cries of exultation, and advanced to Garvamore. At