fliuch, wet), was the gillie whose duty it was to carry his master over streams. It became a term of contempt among the Lowlanders for the “tail” (as his attendants were called) of a Highland chief.
GILLIES, JOHN (1747–1836), Scottish historian and classical scholar, was born at Brechin, in Forfarshire, on the 18th of January 1747. He was educated at Glasgow University, where, at the age of twenty, he acted for a short time as substitute for the professor of Greek. In 1784 he completed his History of Ancient Greece, its Colonies and Conquests (published 1786). This work, valuable at a time when the study of Greek history was in its infancy, and translated into French and German, was written from a strong Whig bias, and is now entirely superseded (see Greece: Ancient History, “Authorities”). On the death of William Robertson (1721–1793), Gillies was appointed historiographer-royal for Scotland. In his old age he retired to Clapham, where he died on the 15th of February 1836.
Of his other works, none of which are much read, the principal are: View of the Reign of Frederic II. of Prussia, with a Parallel between that Prince and Philip II. of Macedon (1789), rather a panegyric than a critical history; translations of Aristotle’s Rhetoric (1823) and Ethics and Politics (1786–1797); of the Orations of Lysias and Isocrates (1778); and History of the World from Alexander to Augustus (1807), which, although deficient in style, was commended for its learning and research.
GILLINGHAM, a market town in the northern parliamentary division of Dorsetshire, England, 105 m. W.S.W. from London by the London & South-Western railway. Pop. (1901) 3380. The church of St Mary the Virgin has a Decorated chancel. There is a large agricultural trade, and manufactures of bricks and tiles, cord, sacking and silk, brewing and bacon-curing are carried on. The rich undulating district in which Gillingham is situated was a forest preserved by King John and his successors, and the site of their lodge is traceable near the town.
GILLINGHAM, a municipal borough of Kent, England, in the parliamentary borough of Chatham and the mid-division of the county, on the Medway immediately east of Chatham, on the South-Eastern & Chatham railway. Pop. (1891) 27,809; (1901) 42,530. Its population is largely industrial, employed in the Chatham dockyards, and in cement and brick works in the neighbourhood. The church of St Mary Magdalene ranges in date from Early English to Perpendicular, retaining also traces of Norman work and some early brasses. A great battle between
Edmund Ironside and Canute, c. 1016, is placed here; and there was formerly a palace of the archbishops of Canterbury. Gillingham was incorporated in 1903, and is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. The borough includes the populous districts of Brompton and New Brompton. Area, 4355 acres.
GILLOT, CLAUDE (1673–1722), French painter, best known as the master of Watteau and Lancret, was born at Langres. His sportive mythological landscape pieces, with such titles as “Feast of Pan” and “Feast of Bacchus,” opened the Academy of Painting at Paris to him in 1715; and he then adapted his art to the fashionable tastes of the day, and introduced the
decorative fêtes champêtres, in which he was afterwards surpassed by his pupils. He was also closely connected with the opera and theatre as a designer of scenery and costumes.
GILLOTT, JOSEPH (1799–1873), English pen-maker, was born at Sheffield on the 11th of October 1799. For some time he was a working cutler there, but in 1821 removed to Birmingham, where he found employment in the “steel toy” trade, the technical name for the manufacture of steel buckles, chains and light ornamental steel-work generally. About 1830 he turned
his attention to the manufacture of steel pens by machinery, and in 1831 patented a process for placing elongated points on the nibs of pens. Subsequently he invented other improvements, getting rid of the hardness and lack of flexibility, which had been a serious defect in nibs, by cutting, in addition to the centre slit, side slits, and cross grinding the points. By 1859 he had built up a very large business. Gillott was a liberal art-patron, and one of the first to recognize the merits of J. M. W. Turner. He died at Birmingham on the 5th of January 1873. His collection of pictures, sold after his death, realized £170,000.
GILLOW, ROBERT (d. 1773), the founder at Lancaster
of a distinguished firm of English cabinet-makers and furniture designers whose books begin in 1731. He was succeeded by his eldest son Richard (1734–1811), who after being educated at the Roman Catholic seminary at Douai was taken into partnership about 1757, when the firm became Gillow & Barton, and his younger sons Robert and Thomas, and the business was continued by his grandson Richard (1778–1866). In its early days the firm of Gillow were architects as well as cabinet-makers, and the first Richard Gillow designed the classical Custom House at Lancaster. In the middle of the 18th century the business was extended to London, and about 1761 premises were opened in Oxford Street on a site which was continuously occupied until 1906. For a long period the Gillows were the best-known makers of English furniture—Sheraton and Heppelwhite both designed for them, and replicas are still made of pieces from the drawings of Robert Adam. Between 1760 and 1770 they invented the original form of the billiard-table; they were the patentees (about 1800) of the telescopic dining-table which has long been universal in English houses; for a Captain Davenport they made, if they did not invent, the first writing-table of that name. Their vogue is indicated by references to them in the works of Jane Austen, Thackeray and the first Lord Lytton, and more recently in one of Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic operas.
GILLRAY, JAMES (1757–1815), English caricaturist, was born at Chelsea in 1757. His father, a native of Lanark, had served as a soldier, losing an arm at Fontenoy, and was admitted first as an inmate, and afterwards as an outdoor pensioner, at Chelsea hospital. Gillray commenced life by learning letter-engraving, in which he soon became an adept. This employment, however, proving irksome, he wandered about for a time with a company of strolling players. After a very checkered experience he returned to London, and was admitted a student in the Royal Academy, supporting himself by engraving, and probably issuing a considerable number of caricatures under fictitious names. Hogarth’s works were the delight and study of his early years. “Paddy on Horseback,” which appeared in 1779, is the first caricature which is certainly his. Two caricatures on Rodney’s naval victory, issued in 1782, were among the first of the memorable series of his political sketches. The name of Gillray’s publisher and printseller, Miss Humphrey—whose shop was first at 227 Strand, then in New Bond Street, then in Old Bond Street, and finally in St James’s Street—is inextricably associated with that of the caricaturist. Gillray lived with Miss (often called Mrs) Humphrey during all the period of his fame. It is believed that he several times thought of marrying her, and that on one occasion the pair were on their way to the church, when Gillray said: “This is a foolish affair, methinks, Miss Humphrey. We live very comfortably together; we had better let well alone.” There is no evidence, however, to support the stories which scandalmongers invented about their relations. Gillray’s plates were exposed in Humphrey’s shop window, where eager crowds examined them. A number of his most trenchant satires are directed against George III., who, after examining some of Gillray’s sketches, said, with characteristic ignorance and blindness to merit, “I don’t understand these caricatures.” Gillray revenged himself for this utterance by his splendid caricature entitled, “A Connoisseur Examining a Cooper,” which he is doing by means of a candle on a “save-all”; so that the sketch satirizes at once the king’s pretensions to knowledge of art and his miserly habits.
The excesses of the French Revolution made Gillray conservative; and he issued caricature after caricature, ridiculing the French and Napoleon, and glorifying John Bull. He is not, however, to be thought of as a keen political adherent of either the Whig or the Tory party; he dealt his blows pretty freely all round. His last work, from a design by Bunbury, is entitled “Interior of a Barber’s Shop in Assize Time,” and is dated 1811. While he was engaged on it he became mad, although he had occasional intervals of sanity, which he employed on his last work. The approach of madness must have been hastened by his intemperate habits. Gillray died on
