In 1873 President Grant nominated him for chief justice of the United States, but in spite of his great learning and eminence at the bar, his ante-war record and the feeling of distrust experienced by many members of the senate on account of his inconsistency, aroused such vigorous opposition that his nomination was soon withdrawn. From 1874 to 1877 Cushing was United States minister to Spain. He died at Newburyport, Mass., on the 2nd of January 1879. He published History and Present State of the Town of Newburyport, Mass. (1826); Review of the late Revolution in France (1833); Reminiscences of Spain (1833); Oration on the Growth and Territorial Progress of the United States (1839); Life and Public Services of William H. Harrison (1840); and The Treaty of Washington (1873).
CUSHING, WILLIAM BARKER (1842–1874), American naval
officer, was born in Delafield, Wisconsin, on the 4th of November
1842. He entered the Naval Academy from New York in 1857,
but resigned in March 1861. When, however, the Civil War
began, he volunteered into the navy, was rated acting master’s
mate, and became a midshipman in October 1861, and a lieutenant
in July 1862, serving in the North Atlantic blockading squadron.
The work of blockade, and of harassing the Confederates on the
coast and the rivers of the Atlantic seaboard, called for much
service in boats, and entailed a great deal of exposure. Cushing
was distinguished by his readiness to volunteer, his indefatigability,
and by his good fortune, the reward of vigilance and
intelligence. The feat by which he will be remembered was the
destruction of the Confederate ironclad “Albemarle” in the
Roanoke river on the 27th of October in 1864. The vessel had
done much damage to the Federal naval forces, and her destruction
was greatly desired. She was at anchor surrounded by
baulks of timber, and a cordon of boats had been stationed to
row guard against an expected Federal attack. Lieutenant
Cushing undertook the attack on her with a steam launch carrying
a spar-torpedo and towing an armed cutter. He eluded the
Confederate lookout and reached the “Albemarle” unseen.
When close to he was detected, but he had time to drive the
steam launch over the baulks and to explode the torpedo against
the “Albemarle” with such success that a hole was made in her
and she sank. Cushing’s own launch was destroyed. He and
the few men with him were compelled to take to the water;
one was killed, another was drowned, Cushing and one other
escaped, and the rest were captured. Cushing himself swam to
the swamps on the river bank, and after wading among them
for hours reached a Federal picket boat. For destroying the
“Albemarle” he was thanked by Congress and was promoted
to be lieutenant-commander. On the 15th of January 1865 he
took a conspicuous part in the land attack on the sea-front wall
of Fort Fisher. After the war he commanded the “Lancaster”
(1866–1867) and the “Maumee” (1868–1869) in the Asiatic
Squadron. In 1872 he was promoted commander at what was
an exceptionally early age, but he died on the 17th of December
1874 of brain fever. He had suffered extreme pain for years
before his death, and in fact broke down altogether under disease
contracted in the discharge of his duty.
CUSHION (from O. Fr. coisson, coussin; according to the New English Dict., from Lat. coxa, a hip; others say from Lat. culcita, a quilt), a soft bag of some ornamental material, stuffed
with wool, hair, feathers, or even paper torn into fragments. It may be used for sitting or kneeling upon, or to soften the hardness or angularity of a chair or couch. It is a very ancient article of furniture, the inventories of the contents of palaces and great houses in the early middle ages constantly making mention of it. It was then often of great size, covered with leather, and firm enough to serve as a seat, but the steady tendency of all furniture has been to grow smaller. It was, indeed, used as a seat, at all events in France and Spain, at a very much later period, and in Saint-Simon’s time we find that at the Spanish court it was still
regarded as a peculiarly honourable substitute for a chair. In France the right to kneel upon a cushion in church behind the king was jealously guarded and strictly regulated, as we may learn again from Saint-Simon. This type of cushion was called a carreau or square. When seats were rude and hard the cushion may have been a necessity; it is now one of the minor luxuries of life.
The term “cushion” is given in architecture to the sides of the Ionic capital. It is also applied to an early and simple form of the Romanesque capitals of Germany and England, which consist of cubical masses, square at the top and rounded off at the four corners, so as to reduce the lower diameter to a circle of the same size as the shaft.
CUSHMAN, CHARLOTTE SAUNDERS (1816–1876), American
actress, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on the 23rd of July
1816. Her father, a West India merchant, left his family in
straitened circumstances, and Charlotte, who had a fine contralto
voice, went on the operatic stage. In 1835 she successfully
appeared at the Tremont theatre as the countess Almaviva in
The Marriage of Figaro. But her singing voice failing her she
entered the drama, and played Lady Macbeth in the same year.
She then engaged herself as a stock actress, but was soon given
leading parts. In 1842 she managed and played in the Walnut
Street theatre in Philadelphia. She accompanied Macready on
an American tour, winning a great reputation in tragedy, and in
1845 and in 1854–1855 she fulfilled successful engagements in
London. She was a keen student, and acquired a large range of
classic rôles. Her best parts were perhaps Lady Macbeth and
Queen Katherine, her most popular Meg Merrilies, in a dramatization
of Scott’s Guy Mannering. Her figure was commanding
and her face expressive, and she was animated by a temperament
full of vigour and fire. These qualities enabled her to play with
success such male parts as Romeo and Cardinal Wolsey. During
her later years Miss Cushman worked hard as a dramatic reader,
in which capacity she was much appreciated. Her last appearance
on the stage took place on the 15th of May 1875, at the
Globe theatre, Boston, in which city she died on the 18th of
February 1876.
See Emma Stebbins’s Charlotte Cushman, her Letters and Memories of her Life (Boston, 1878); H. A. Clapp’s Reminiscences of a Dramatic Critic (Boston, 1902); and W. T. Price, A Life of Charlotte Cushman (New York, 1894).
CUSP (Lat. cuspis, a spear, point), a projecting point, or pointed
end. In architecture (Fr. feuille, Ital. cuspide, Ger. Knöpfe),
a cusp is the point where the foliations of tracery intersect.
The earliest example of a plain cusp is probably that at Pythagoras
school, at Cambridge,—of an ornamented cusp at Ely
cathedral, where a small roll, with a rosette at the end, is formed
at the termination of a cusp. In the later styles the terminations
of the cusps were more richly decorated; they also sometimes
terminate not only in leaves or foliages, but in rosettes, heads and
other fanciful ornaments. The term “feathering” is used of
the junction of the foliated cusps in window tracery, but is
usually restricted to those cases where it is ornamented with
foliage, &c.
CUSTARD[1] APPLE, a name applied to the fruit of various species of the genus Anona, natural order Anonaceae. The
members of this genus are shrubs or small trees having alternate,
exstipulate leaves, and flowers with three small sepals, six petals
arranged in a double row and numerous stamens. The fruit of A. reticulata, the common custard apple, or “bullock’s heart” of the West Indies, is dark brown in colour, and marked with depressions, which give it a quilted appearance; its pulp is reddish-yellow, sweetish and very soft (whence the name); the kernels of the seeds are said to be poisonous. The sour-sop is the fruit of A. muricata, native of the West Indies. The plant, which is a small tree, has become naturalized in some parts of India where it is extensively cultivated, as elsewhere in the tropics. It is covered with soft prickles, is of a light-greenish hue, and has a peculiar but agreeable sour taste, and a scent resembling that of black currants. The sweet-sop is produced by A. squamosa, also a native of the West Indies and widely cultivated
- ↑ The term “custard,” now given to a dish made with eggs beaten up with milk, &c., and either served in liquid form or baked to a stiff consistency, originally denoted a kind of open pie. It represents the older form “crustade,” Fr. croustade, Ital. crostata, from crostare, to encrust.