Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/299

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

army, and William, in the navy, who both survived him; and three daughters: Elizabeth, who married Lord Edward Bentinck (an alliance which, according to Mrs. Delany, was likely to produce serious consequences to the health of the Duchess of Portland); Sophia, married to William Badcock; and Frances Marianne, born in Spain, who lived with her father and married a Mr. Jansen. To her he left all his property, which was sworn under 450l.

Cumberland died at Tunbridge Wells 7 May 1811, and was buried at Westminster Abbey 14 May, when an oration was pronounced after the service by his old friend Dean Vincent. It is reported in the ‘European Magazine,’ lix. 397. Two volumes of ‘posthumous dramatic works’ were printed in 1813 for the benefit of his daughter, Mrs. Jansen. A list of fifty-four pieces, with some inaccuracies, is given in the ‘Biographia Dramatica.’ Genest (viii. 394) reckons thirty-five regular plays, four operas, and a farce; besides adaptations of ‘Timon of Athens’ (Memoirs, i. 384), in 1771, and others. Six of the later plays are printed in the fifth volume of Mrs. Inchbald's ‘Modern Theatre’ (1811). An engraving of a portrait by Clover is prefixed to his ‘Memoirs.’

[Memoirs of Richard Cumberland, written by himself, 2 vols. 1807 (a very loose book, dateless, inaccurate, but with interesting accounts of Bentley, Dodington, Lord G. Germaine, and other men of note); Critical Examination of the writings of R. Cumberland, by William Mudford, 2 vols. 1812 (an impudent piece of bookmaking, founded upon the last to such an extent that an injunction was procured for the suppression of many appropriated passages); Davies's Life of Garrick (1808), ii. 289–304; Garrick Correspondence, i. 380–2, 387, 425, 427, 551–2, ii. 126, 282–286; Notes and Queries, 5th ser. xi. 504.]

L. S.

CUMBERLAND, RICHARD FRANCIS G. (1792–1870), captain, grandson of Richard Cumberland (1731–1811) [q. v.], was son of Richard Cumberland, once an officer in the 3rd foot guards, who died in the island of Tobago when awaiting a civil appointment there, and his wife, Lady Albinia Hobart, daughter of the third earl of Buckinghamshire, who died in 1853. He was born in 1792. Through his mother, who was one of the ladies of Queen Charlotte's suite, he became a page of honour, and on 27 Jan. 1809 was appointed to an ensigncy in the 3rd foot guards, in which he became lieutenant and captain in 1814. He served as aide-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington, of whose personal staff he was one of the last survivors, in the principal actions in the Peninsular war in 1812–14, and was wounded at the repulse of the French sortie from Bayonne. He left the army after the war. He died at the Royal Mint 9 March 1870.

[Foster's Royal Lineage, p. 180; Memoirs of Richard Cumberland (London, 1804); Times, 14 March 1870.]

H. M. C.

CUMINE AILBHE or FINN (657?–669?), seventh abbot of Hy, was son of Ernan, son of Fiachna, of the race of Conall Gulban. The term ‘ailbhe’ is explained as albus, or fair, in the ‘Annals of Ulster,’ and more fully in an ancient poem quoted in Reeves's ‘Adamnan,’ where he is referred to as ‘Cumine of fair hair.’ Cathal Maguir, cited by Colgan, notices him as ‘Cumineus, abbot of Hy, son of Dunertach. It is he who brought the relics of St. Peter and St. Paul to Disert Cumini in the district of Roscrea.’ But this is an error into which Cathal seems to have been led by the scholiast on the ‘Calendar of Œngus.’ Cumine Ailbhe was the author of a life of St. Columba, which was discovered at Compiègne and published by Mabillon in his ‘Acta Sanctorum,’ in 1733, under the author's name. When this work appeared it was seen to be identical with the first life in Colgan, which he took from a manuscript at Antwerp, and printed without knowing the author. It forms the groundwork of the third book of Adamnan's ‘Life of St. Columba.’ In the preface to Dr. Reeves's edition (p. vi) will be found a table of references to the passages thus incorporated by St. Adamnan. A composition of still greater interest is the letter on the Paschal controversy addressed to ‘Segienus, abbot of Hy, and Beccan the Solitary with his wise men,’ and written by a Cumean who, according to Colgan, the Bollandists, and Dr. O'Donovan, was Cumine Ailbhe. Dr. Lanigan, on the contrary, believes the writer to have been another of the name known as Cumine fota. This, however, is inconsistent with the fact that Cumine fota was a bishop, as is proved by his being so termed in the ‘Calendar of Œngus,’ the ‘Annals of the Four Masters,’ and the ‘Martyrology of Donegal.’ Dr. Lanigan objects again that it is improbable that the monks of Hy would [afterwards] choose for their abbot ‘so great a stickler for the Roman cycle.’ But ‘in the Irish monastic system the free election of an abbot by monks was unknown, and the law of succession involved numerous and complicated rules to determine the respective rights of the church and the lay tribe’ (Anc. Laws of Ireland, pref.) The latter, in fact, seem to have had rights resembling the right of nomination to a church or parish enjoyed by the original benefactor and his