Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/597

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

GALTON GALVANISM 585 Lost Child." He died after 14 strokes of paral- ysis, having dictated compositions long after losing the use of every limb. His works are of very unequal merit, but are usually marked by an original quaintness and vigor and by defects of taste. II. Sir Alexander Tilloch, a Canadian financier, son of the preceding, born in Chel- sea, England, Sept. 6, 1817. At the age of 16 he entered as a junior clerk the service of the British American land company, of whose es- tates he was sole manager from 1844 to 1856, raising the company from a condition of insol- vency to one of prosperity. In conjunction with the Hon. A. N. Morin he established the Montreal and Portland railway, and was one of its chief managers until its union with the Grand Trunk railway. He has represented the city of Sherbrooke in the Canadian parlia- ment since 1853. From the beginning of his political career he advocated the confederation of the British North American provinces and the establishment of an intercolonial railway. He entered the Cartier cabinet as minister of finance in 1858, after having declined the pre- miership, established a tariff which raised the provincial credit, negotiated in England th'e Canadian loan, and consolidated the debt. In 1860 he advocated the establishment of a bank of issue, but afterward withdrew his scheme, and succeeded in opening free ports at Gaspe and Sault Ste. Marie. He resigned with the Cartier ministry in 1862, returned to office with them in 1864, and retired in 1866. He was one of the commissioners sent to London to pro- mote the confederation of the provinces, and was created in 1869 a knight commander of the order of Sts. Michael and George. GALTON, Francis, an English traveller and au- thor, born at Dudderton, near Birmingham, in 1822. He studied medicine at Birmingham, and afterward at King's college, London, and graduated at Trinity college, Cambridge, in 1844. In 1846 he travelled in north Africa and on the White Nile, and subsequently made a journey of exploration from Walfish bay through the western regions of south Africa. For his account of this journey he received the gold medal of the royal geographical society in 1852, and subsequently became secretary and later vice president of that society. From 1863 to 1868 he was general secretary of the Brit- ish association, and he is now (1874) one of the managing committee of the meteorological office. He has published " Travels in Tropi- cal South Africa" (1853); " Meteorographica, or Methods of Mapping the Weather" (1863); " Art of Travel, or Shifts and Contrivances available in Wild Countries " (1867); and "He- reditary Genius, its Laws and Consequences" (1869). He has also edited " Vacation Tour- ists and Notes of Travel in 1860-'63 " (3 vols., Cambridge, 1861-'4). GALIIPPI, Baldassare, an Italian musician, sur- named BURANELLO, born on the island of Bu- rano, near Venice, in 1703, died there in Janu- ary, 1785. He received instruction from his father and from the composer Lotti, became chapelmaster of the church of St. Mark and president of the conservatory of the incurabili, and spent some time in St. Petersburg. He produced his first comic opera in 1721 without success, but applied himself with greater zeal to composition, and his opera Lafede neW in- constanza, performed in 1729, made him famous. He composed more than 70 operas, and has been called the father of Italian comic opera ; he also composed many masses, oratorios, &c. GALUPPI, or Galluppi, Pasqnale, an Italian philosopher, born at Tropea, Calabria, April 2, 1770, died in Naples, Dec. 13, 1846. He- studied at the university of Naples, and was professor of philosophy there for many years. He was a spiritualist in psychology, and was the first among the modern philosophers of Italy to coincide with Kant in considering the promptings of the moral law as paramount in ethical psychology. He rejected the doctrine of Helvetius, which bases morality on the de- sire for pleasure, and the theories of Wolf and Romagnosi, who find the essence of it in the yearning after perfection. His principal works are : Saggio filosofico sulla critica della cono- scenza (Naples, 1819-'32); Lettere filosofiche sulle mcende della filosofia intorno ai principii della conoscenza umana da Cartesiofina a Kant (1827 ; 2d ed., 1838) ; Elementi di filosofia (4th ed., 5 vols., 1835-'42) ; Lezioni di logica e di metafisica (5 vols., 1832-'6; new ed., 1842); Considerazioni sulV idealismo trascendentale e sul razionalismo assoluto (1841) ; and Elementi di teologia naturale (4th ed., 1844). GALVANI, Aloisio or Lnigi, an Italian physician, born in Bologna, Sept. 9, 1737, died there, Dec. 4, 1798. He was educated for the priest- hood ; but his tastes inclined toward the natu- ral sciences, and abandoning theology he took the degree of M. D. at the university of Bolo- gna in 1762. Soon afterward he was appointed medical lecturer at the institute of Bologna, and published treatises on the urinary organs and the organs of hearing in birds. In 1786 accident led him to his great discovery in phy- sical science (see ANIMAL ELECTEICITY, and GALVANISM), and in 1791 he published De Viri- fius Electricitatis in Motu Musculari Commen- tarius. Having refused to swear allegiance to the Cisalpine republic in 1797, he was deprived of his offices, and his health began to decline. The death of his wife also afflicted him greatly. Under the weight of these misfortunes he sank rapidly, and although his offices were subse- quently restored to him, he died before resu- ming their duties. GALVANISM, or Voltaie Electricity (so named from its discoverers, Galvani of Bologna and Volta of Pavia), that form of dynamical electri- city which is developed by chemical action. An account of the discovery of Galvani is given under ANIMAL ELECTRICITY, and also a notice of the controversy which was carried on be- tween these philosophers, Galvani maintaining that the peculiar phenomena which he produced