the Great Salt Lake City. During this tour he discovered a valuable collection of state papers, originally Irish, belonging to the national archives of England, in the Public Library at Philadelphia. They had been missing since the time of James II, and upon Dixon's suggestion were restored to the British government. With them was found the original manuscript of the Marquis of Clanricarde's ‘Memoirs’ from 23 Oct. 1641 to 30 Aug. 1643, which were long supposed to have been destroyed, and of which especial mention had been made in Mr. Hardy's ‘Report on the Carte and Carew Papers.’ In 1867 Dixon published his ‘New America.’ It passed through eight editions in England, three in America, and several in France, Russia, Holland, Italy, and Germany. In the autumn of that year he travelled through the Baltic provinces. In 1868 he published two supplementary volumes entitled ‘Spiritual Wives.’ He was accused of indecency, and brought an action for libel against the ‘Pall Mall Gazette,’ which made the charge in a review of ‘Free Russia.’ He obtained a verdict for one farthing (29 Nov. 1872). His previous success had led him into grave error, though no man could be freer from immoral intention. At the general election of 1868 Dixon declined an invitation to stand for Marylebone. He shrank from abandoning his career as a man of letters, although he frequently addressed political meetings. In 1869 he brought out the first two volumes of ‘Her Majesty's Tower,’ which he completed two years afterwards by the publication of the third and fourth volumes. In August 1869 he resigned the editorship of the ‘Athenæum.’ Soon afterwards he was appointed justice of the peace for Middlesex and Westminster, and in the latter part of 1869 travelled for some months in the north, and gave an account of his journey in ‘Free Russia,’ 1870. During that year he was elected a member of the London School Board. In direct opposition to Lord Sandon he succeeded in carrying a resolution which thenceforth established drill in all rate-paid schools in the metropolis. During the first three years of the School Board's existence Dixon's labours were really enormous. The year 1871 was passed by him for the most part in Switzerland, and early in 1872 he published ‘The Switzers.’ Shortly afterwards he was sent to Spain upon a financial mission by a council of foreign bondholders. On 4 Oct. 1872 he was created a knight commander of the Crown by the Kaiser Wilhelm. While in Spain Dixon wrote the chief part of his ‘History of Two Queens,’ i.e. Catherine of Arragon and Anne Boleyn. The work expanded into four volumes, the first half of which was published in 1873, containing the life of Catherine of Arragon, and the second half in 1874, containing the life of Anne Boleyn. Before starting upon his next journey he began a movement for opening the Tower of London free of charge to the public. To this proposal the prime minister, Mr. Disraeli, at once assented, and on public holidays Dixon personally conducted crowds of working men through the building. In the September of 1874 he travelled through Canada and the United States. In March 1875 he gave the results in ‘The White Conquest.’ In the latter part of 1875 he travelled once more in Italy and Germany. During the following year he wrote in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ ‘The Way to Egypt,’ as well as two other papers in which he recommended the government to purchase from Turkey its Egyptian suzerainty. In 1877 he published his first romance, in 3 vols., ‘Diana, Lady Lyle.’ Another work of fiction followed it in 1878, in ‘Ruby Grey,’ in 3 vols. In 1878 appeared the first two volumes of his four-volumed work, ‘Royal Windsor.’ Before the close of 1878 he visited the island of Cyprus. There a fall from his horse broke his shoulder-bone, and he was thenceforth more or less of an invalid. ‘British Cyprus’ was published in 1879. His health was further injured by the loss of most of his savings, imprudently invested in Turkish stock. On 2 Oct. 1874 his house near Regent's Park, 6 St. James's Terrace, was completely wrecked by an explosion of gunpowder on the Regent's Canal. He was saddened by the death of his eldest daughter and the sudden death at Dublin, on 20 Oct. 1879, of his eldest son, William Jerrold Dixon. He was revising the proof sheets of the concluding volumes of ‘Royal Windsor,’ and on Friday, 26 Dec. 1879, made a great effort to finish the work. He died in his bed on the following morning from an apoplectic seizure. On 2 Jan. 1880 he was buried in Highgate cemetery. If occasionally deficient in tact, he was looked upon by those who knew him best as faultless in temper. His sympathies were with the people, and he took a leading part in establishing the Shaftesbury Park and other centres of improved dwellings for the labouring classes. Although a student of state papers and other original authorities, Dixon was no scholar. He was always lively as a writer, and therefore popular, but inaccuracies and misconceptions abound in his work. He was a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, of the Society of Antiquaries, of the Pennsylvania Society, and of several other learned associations
