Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 43.djvu/219

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library of Trinity College, Dublin, written in a St. Albans hand of the time of Matthew Paris, with rubrics in a later St. Albans hand, and illustrations. It has been edited, under its proper title, ‘Vie de Seint Auban,’ by Dr. Robert Atkinson, 4to, 1876.

[Chronica Majora, vols. i–vii., and specially Luard's Prefaces, Historia Anglorum, vol. i–iii., with Madden's Prefaces, Hardy's Cat. of Mat. passim, and specially Pref. to vol. iii., Gesta Abbatum Mon. S. Albani, i., ed. Riley, Amundesham, ii. 303 (all Rolls Ser.); Bale's Scriptt., cent. iv. 26; Strype's Parker, i. 220, 552–3, ii. 96, 500, 517, iii. 54. Dr. Jessopp's Studies by a Recluse contains an appreciative account of Paris.]

W. H.

PARISH, Sir WOODBINE (1796–1882), minister at Buenos Ayres, born 14 Sept. 1796, was eldest son of Woodbine Parish and Elizabeth, daughter of the Rev. H. Headley. After being educated at Eton, he received in 1812 his first appointment in the public service from John Charles Herries [q. v.], the commissary-in-chief, and was sent by him to Sicily in 1814. In 1815 he accompanied the expedition to Naples which restored the Bourbon dynasty after the fall of Murat, and, travelling home with despatches, crossed the field of Waterloo shortly after the battle. He was then ordered to Paris, where he was attached to Lord Castlereagh's extraordinary embassy for the settlement of the general peace of Europe upon the overthrow of Bonaparte. The treaty of peace, signed on the part of Great Britain on 20 Nov. 1815, is in his handwriting. Upon the return of Lord Castlereagh to England he was employed as assistant to his private secretary, Joseph Planta [q. v.] In 1816 he was sent to the Ionian Islands, and was employed by Sir Thomas Maitland, the lord high commissioner, with Mr. Cartwright (afterwards consul-general at Constantinople), in arranging with Ali Pasha of Yanina in Albania the cession of Parga and the indemnities for the Parganots.

Recalled to England in 1818, he was selected to accompany Lord Castlereagh to the meeting of the allied sovereigns and their ministers at Aix-la-Chapelle, when the treaty arrangements of 1815, particularly those regarding the continuance of the military occupation of France, were modified, and the allied armies withdrawn. In 1821, when Castlereagh attended George IV on a visit to Hanover, he was accompanied by Parish. In 1823 the government determined to send out political agents to the Spanish American States, and Parish was appointed commissioner and consul-general to Buenos Ayres. He sailed in H.M.S. Cambridge. After he had sent home a report upon the state of the people and their newly constituted government, full powers were sent to him in 1824 to negotiate with them a treaty of amity and commerce. This was concluded on 2 Feb. 1825 at Buenos Ayres, and was the first treaty made with any of the new states of America, and the first recognition of their national existence by any European power. When laid before parliament by Canning, secretary of state for foreign affairs, it was received with applause by both parties in the house. ‘As a mark of his majesty's gracious approbation, [Parish] was at once appointed his majesty's chargé d'affaires to the new republic.’ In 1825, by a timely representation to Doctor Francia, the despotic ruler of Paraguay, he obtained the release of a number of British subjects, as well as other foreigners, who had been detained for many years with their property in that country. He received not only the king's approval, but the thanks of other governments, especially of France and Switzerland. About the same time war broke out between Brazil and Buenos Ayres for the possession of Monte Video and the Banda Oriental. Parish was ordered to Rio de Janeiro and the River Plate in attendance on Lord Ponsonby, who had been directed to use his endeavours to restore peace. After a struggle of nearly three years the belligerents were brought to terms by the efforts of the British envoys, and in 1828 the Banda Oriental, the bone of contention, was declared an independent state. Lord Ponsonby thereupon became minister to Brazil, and Parish returned as chargé d'affaires to Buenos Ayres.

During nearly nine years' residence there he worked energetically in behalf of the interests of his countrymen, of whom five thousand were settled there. By the treaty of 1825 he obtained full security for their persons and property, exemption from forced loans and military service, and, what was more difficult to secure, the free and public exercise of their religious worship. Upon the conclusion of peace with Brazil, he obtained large indemnities for seizures of British vessels and cargoes which had been made by privateers of Buenos Ayres. He brought the importance of the Falkland Islands under the notice of his majesty's government, and in consequence was instructed to lay claim to them as a British possession. Upon finally quitting the River Plate in 1832, he received many proofs of the esteem in which both his countrymen and the local government held him. The latter presented him with letters of citizenship, and a diploma to take and bear the arms of the republic for himself and his