Page:A cyclopaedia of female biography.djvu/609

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NOR. NOV.
587

weak and the wronged, a nobler eloquence in appeals for freedom, truth, and general justice."

In 1843, appeared her noble poem, "The Child of the Islands;" the nominal hero was the then baby Prince of Wales, but the real purpose of Mrs. Norton was to pourtray the condition of the poor in England. The philanthropy which prompted the poem is as warm and holy as her genius is pure and fervid. The production was received with favour, and has, no doubt, been of essential service in awakening the public mind to the cause of suffering humanity.

In 1847 appeared "Aunt Carry's Ballads," a volume of juvenile poems, very gracefully written; and in 1851, "Music upon the Wave" gave evidence of her varied talents; while "Stuart of Dunleath," her latest work, shewed that she possessed the power of depicting in prose the stronger passions and the sterner and sadder scenes in life.

Mrs. Norton has recently been before the public as a defender of the rights of her sex; beside the gifted Lady Dufferon, whom we have already mentioned, another sister of hers has become celebrated for her graces of both mind and person; this is Lady Seymour, now Duchess of Somerset.

NORTON, LADY FRANCES,

Was descended from the Frekes of Dorsetshire, and married Sir George Norton, of Somersetshire, by whom she had three children. On the death of her daughter, who had married Sir Richard Gethin, she wrote "The Applause of Virtue," and "Memento Mori, or Meditations on Death." She took for her second husband Colonel Ambrose Norton, and for her third Mr. Jones, and died in 1720, aged about seventy.

NOVELLA,

Daughter of John Andreas, a famous canonist of the fourteenth century, was born in Bologna, where her father was professor. He loved his daughter Novella extremely, and instructed her so well in all parts of learning, that when he was engaged in any affair that hindered him from reading lectures to his scholars, he sent his daughter in his stead; but lest her beauty should prevent the attention of her hearers, she had a little curtain drawn before her. She was married to John Caldesimus, a learned canonist, and did not long survive her marriage. To perpetuate her memory, her father, Andreas, entitled his commentary on the Decretals of Gregory the Tenth, "The Novellæ."

NOVELLO, CLARA ANASTASIA.

Countess Gioliucci is the real name of this lady, although she is generally known by her maiden name as above. She was born June 10th., 1818, and breathed from her earliest years an atmosphere of music; her father, Mr. Vincent Novello, being an eminent professor of that science. At nine years of age she commenced her course of preparatory studies, being placed under the care of Mr. Robinson, of York, from whence she returned to her father's root in about a year. Soon after this she became a candidate for a vacancy in the Conservatore de Musa Sacra, at Paris, which she gained, although there were many competitors. Here she studied