agreed to admit Austria to the union, found themselves forced in 1853 to renew the old union, from which Austria was excluded. Delbrück now began, with the support of Bismarck, to apply the principles of free trade to Prussian fiscal policy. In 1862 he concluded an important commercial treaty with France. In 1867 he became the first president of the chancery of the North German Confederation, and represented Bismarck on the federal tariff council (Zollbundesrath), a position of political as well as fiscal importance owing to the presence in the council of representatives of the southern states. In 1868 he became a Prussian minister without portfolio. In October 1870, when the union of Germany under Prussian headship became a practical question, Delbrück was chosen to go on a mission to the South German states, and contributed greatly to the agreements concluded at Versailles in November. In 1871 he became president of the newly constituted Reichskanzleramt. Delbrück, however, began to feel himself uneasy under Bismarck’s leanings towards protection and state control. On the introduction of Bismarck’s plan for the acquisition of the railways by the state, Delbrück resigned office, nominally on the ground of ill-health (June 1, 1876). In 1879 he opposed in the Reichstag the new protectionist tariff, and on the failure of his efforts retired definitely from public life. In 1896 he received from the emperor the order of the Black Eagle. He died at Berlin on the 1st of February 1903.
DELCASSÉ, THÉOPHILE (1852– ), French statesman, was
born at Pamiers, in the department of Ariège, on the 1st of March
1852. He wrote articles on foreign affairs for the République
française and Paris, and in 1888 was elected conseiller général of
his native department, standing as “un disciple fidèle de Gambetta.”
In the following year he entered the chamber as deputy
for Foix. He was appointed under-secretary for the colonies in
the second Ribot cabinet (January to April 1893), and retained
his post in the Dupuy cabinet till its fall in December 1893.
It was largely owing to his efforts that the French colonial office
was made a separate department with a minister at its head, and
to this office he was appointed in the second Dupuy cabinet (May
1894 to January 1895). He gave a great impetus to French
colonial enterprise, especially in West Africa, where he organized
the newly acquired colony of Dahomey, and despatched the
Liotard mission to the Upper Ubangi. While in opposition he
devoted special attention to naval affairs, and in speeches that
attracted much notice declared that the function of the French
navy was to secure and develop colonial enterprise, deprecated
all attempts to rival the British fleet, and advocated the construction
of commerce destroyers as France’s best reply to England.
On the formation of the second Brisson cabinet in June 1898 he
succeeded M. Hanotaux at the foreign office, and retained that
post under the subsequent premierships of MM. Dupuy, Waldeck-Rousseau,
Combes and Rouvier. In 1898 he had to deal with the
delicate situation caused by Captain Marchand’s occupation of
Fashoda, for which, as he admitted in a speech in the chamber on
the 23rd of January 1899, he accepted full responsibility, since it
arose directly out of the Liotard expedition, which he had himself
organized while minister for the colonies; and in March 1899 he
concluded an agreement with Great Britain by which the difficulty
was finally adjusted, and France consolidated her vast colonial
empire in North-West Africa. In the same year he acted as
mediator between the United States and Spain, and brought
the peace negotiations to a successful conclusion. He introduced
greater cordiality into the relations of France with Italy:
at the same time he adhered firmly to the alliance with Russia,
and in August 1899 made a visit to St Petersburg, which he
repeated in April 1901. In June 1900 he made an arrangement
with Spain, fixing the long-disputed boundaries of the French
and Spanish possessions in West Africa. Finally he concluded
with England the important Agreements of 1904 covering colonial
and other questions which had long been a matter of dispute,
especially concerning Egypt, Newfoundland and Morocco.
Suspicion of the growing entente between France and England
soon arose on the part of Germany, and in 1905 German assertiveness
was shown in a crisis which was forced on in the matter of
the French activity in Morocco (q.v.), in which the handling of
French policy by M. Delcassé personally was a sore point with
Germany. The situation became acute in April, and was only
relieved by M. Delcassé’s resignation of office. He retired into
private life, but in 1908 was warmly welcomed on a visit to
England, where the closest relations now existed with France.
DEL CREDERE (Ital. “of belief” or “trust”). A “del
credere agent,” in English law, is one who, selling goods for his
principal on credit, undertakes for an additional commission to
sell only to persons who are absolutely solvent. His position
is thus that of a surety who is liable to his principal should the
vendee make default. The agreement between him and his
principal need not be reduced to or evidenced by writing, for
his undertaking is not a guarantee within the Statute of Frauds.
See also Broker; Guarantee.
DELESCLUZE, LOUIS CHARLES (1809–1871), French
journalist, was born at Dreux on the 2nd of October 1809.
Having studied law in Paris, he early developed a strong democratic
bent, and played a part in the July revolution of 1830.
He became a member of various republican societies, and in
1836 was forced to take refuge in Belgium, where he devoted
himself to republican journalism. Returning in 1840 he settled
in Valenciennes, and after the revolution of 1848 removed to
Paris, where he started a newspaper called La Révolution démocratique
et sociale. His zeal so far outran his discretion that he
was twice imprisoned and fined, his paper was suppressed and
he himself fled to England, where he continued his journalistic
work. He was arrested in Paris in 1853, and deported to French
Guiana. Released under the amnesty of 1859, he returned
to France with health shattered but energies unimpaired. His
next venture was the publication of the Réveil, a radical organ
upholding the principles of the Association internationale des
travailleurs, known as the “Internationale.” This journal,
which brought him three condemnations, fine and imprisonment
in one year, shared the fate of his Paris sheet, and its founder
again fled to Belgium. In 1871 he was elected to the National
Assembly, becoming afterwards a member of the Paris commune.
At the siege of Paris he fought with reckless courage, and met
his death on the last of the barricades (May 1871). He wrote an
account of his imprisonment in Guiana, De Paris à Cayenne,
Journal d’un transporté (Paris, 1869).
DELESSE, ACHILLE ERNEST OSCAR JOSEPH (1817–1881),
French geologist and mineralogist, was born at Metz on the 3rd
of February 1817. At the age of twenty he entered the École
Polytechnique, and subsequently passed through the École des
Mines. In 1845 he was appointed to the chair of mineralogy
and geology at Besançon; in 1850 to the chair of geology at the
Sorbonne in Paris; and in 1864 professor of agriculture at the
École des Mines. In 1878 he became inspector-general of mines.
In early years as ingénieur des mines he investigated and described
various new minerals; he proceeded afterwards to the study of
rocks, devising new methods for their determination, and giving
particular descriptions of melaphyre, arkose, porphyry, syenite,
&c. The igneous rocks of the Vosges, and those of the Alps,
Corsica, &c., and the subject of metamorphism occupied his
attention. He also prepared in 1858 geological and hydrological
maps of Paris—with reference to the underground water, similar
maps of the departments of the Seine and Seine-et-Marne, and an
agronomic map of the Seine-et-Marne (1880), in which he showed
the relation which exists between the physical and chemical
characters of the soil and the geological structure. His annual
Revue des progrès de géologie, undertaken with the assistance
(1860–1865) of Auguste Laugel and afterwards (1865–1878) of
Albert de Lapparent, was carried on from 1860 to 1880. His
observations on the lithology of the deposits accumulated beneath
the sea were of special interest and importance. His separate
publications were: Recherches sur l’origine des roches (Paris,
1865); Étude sur le métamorphisme des roches (1869); Lithologie
des mers de France et des mers principales du globe (2 vols. and
atlas, 1871). He died at Paris on the 24th of March 1881.
DELESSERT, JULES PAUL BENJAMIN (1773–1847), French
banker, was born at Lyons on the 14th of February 1773, the
son of Étienne Delessert (1735–1816), the founder of the first