and mind. The duchess cultivated literary composition with exuberant fervour, and kept a bevy of maids of honour obliged to be ready at all hours “to register her Grace’s conceptions.” Walpole speaks of her as a “fertile pedant” with an “unbounded passion for scribbling”; and, although giving evidence of learning, ingenuity and imagination, her writings are fatally marred by a deficiency in judgment and self-restraint. She is best known by the Life she wrote of her husband, originally printed by A. Maxwell at London in 1667. She also published Philosophical Fancies (1653); Poems and Fancies (1653); The World’s Olio (1655); Nature’s Picture drawn by Fancie’s Pencil to the Life, which includes an autobiography (1656); Philosophical and Physical Opinions (1655); Orations (1662); Plays (1662); Sociable Letters (1664); Observations upon Experimental Philosophy (1666); Letters and Poems (1676).
The Life of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, by Margaret, duchess of Newcastle, has been edited by C. H. Firth (1886); it was criticized by Pepys as “the ridiculous history of my Lord Newcastle writ by his wife, which shows her to be a mad, conceited, ridiculous woman, and he an ass to suffer her to write what she writes to him and of him,” but on the other hand eulogized by Charles Lamb as a work for which “no casket is rich enough, no case sufficiently durable to honour and keep soft such a jewel.” See also La Duchesse et le Duc de Newcastle, by Émile Montégut (1895). The duchess’s Select Poems were edited by Brydges in 1813, and her Autobiography in 1814. The latter, edited by Lower, was published along with her Life of the Duke of Newcastle in 1872.
2. Thomas Pelham Holles, duke of Newcastle (1693–1768), whose official life extended throughout the Whig supremacy of the 18th century, was the elder son of Thomas, first Lord Pelham, by his second wife Lady Grace Holles, younger sister of John Holles, duke of Newcastle-on-Tyne, who died in 1711, and left the whole of his vast estates to him. In 1712 he also succeeded his father in his peerage and estates, and in 1714, when he came of age, was one of the greatest landowners in the kingdom. He vigorously sustained the Whig party at Queen Anne’s death, and had much influence in making the Londoners accept King George. His services were too great to be neglected, and in 1714 he was created earl of Clare, and in 1715 duke of Newcastle-on-Tyne. He also became lord-lieutenant of the counties of Middlesex and Nottingham and a knight of the Garter in 1718, in which year he increased his Whig Connexion by marrying Lady Henrietta Godolphin, granddaughter of the great duke of Marlborough. In 1717 he first held political office as lord chamberlain of the household, and in 1724 was chosen by Sir Robert Walpole to be secretary of state in place of Lord Carteret. This office he held continuously for thirty years (1724–1754), and only changed it for the premiership on his brother’s death. His long tenure of office has been attributed to his great Whig connexions and his wealth, but some praise must be given to his inexhaustible activity and great powers of debate. He was a peculiarly muddle-headed man, and unhappy if he had not more to do than he could possibly manage, but at the same time he was a consummate master of parliamentary tactics, and knew how to manage the Houses of Lords and Commons alike. Lord Hervey (Memoirs) compares him with Walpole in 1735, and says: “We have one minister that does everything with the same seeming ease and tranquillity as if he were doing nothing; we have another that does nothing in the same hurry and agitation as if he did everything.” He continued in office on Walpole’s fall in 1742, and became more powerful on his younger brother Henry becoming prime minister in 1743. On Henry Pelham’s death in March 1754, Newcastle succeeded him as premier; but people who had been accustomed to him as secretary of state would not stand him as premier, and in November 1756 he gave place to the duke of Devonshire. For his long services he was created duke of Newcastle-under-Lyme, with remainder to Henry Fiennes Clinton, 9th earl of Lincoln, who had married his niece Catherine Pelham. In July 1757 he again became prime minister—for Pitt, though a great statesman, was a bad party leader—on the understanding, according to Horace Walpole, that “Mr Pitt does everything, the duke gives everything.” Under this ministry England became famous abroad, but it gradually fell before the young king’s affection for Lord Bute) who, after supplanting Pitt, became prime minister in the room of Newcastle in May 1762. The duke went into strong opposition, and lost his two lord-lieutenancies for opposing the peace of 1763. In 1765 he became lord privy seal for a. few months, but his health was fast giving way, and he died in November 1768. The duke was certainly not a great man, but he was industrious and energetic, and to his credit be it said that the statesman who almost monopolized the patronage of office for half a century twice refused a pension, and finally left office £300,000 poorer than he, entered it.
See Memoirs of the Administration of the Right Hon. H. Pelham, by W. Coxe (1829).
3. Henry Pelham Fiennes Pelham Clinton, 5th duke of Newcastle (1811–1864), the eldest son of Henry, the 4th duke, was educated at Eton and at Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated in 1832. He was member of parliament for South Nottinghamshire from 1832 to 1846, when he became member for the Falkirk Burghs, retaining this seat until he became duke of Newcastle in January 1851. As earl of Lincoln he was first commissioner of woods and forests from 1841 to February 1846, when he was appointed chief secretary to the lord-lieutenant of Ireland, but the ministry fell in June of the same year. In 1852 Newcastle became secretary for war and the colonies under the earl of Aberdeen, and when, after the outbreak of the Crimean War, a separate war department was constituted, he was placed in charge of it. As secretary for war he was regarded as being largely responsible for the terrible hardships which befell the British troops in the Crimea in the winter of 1854, and as the result of a vote of censure he left office with his colleagues in January 1855. He was secretary for the colonies from 1859 to 1864, and died on the 18th of October 1864, being succeeded as 6th duke by his eldest son, Henry Pelham Alexander.
See J. Martineau, The Life of Henry Pelham, 5th Duke of Newcastle (1908).
NEWCASTLE, a seaport of Northumberland county, New South Wales, Australia, at the mouth of the Hunter river, 102 m. by rail and 62 m. by sea N. by E. of Sydney, in 32° 55′ S., 151° 49′ E. Newcastle is the second city in New South Wales, the fourth port of Australia, and the seat of an Anglican bishop. The city rises steeply from the sea, and possesses numerous fine buildings, among which may be mentioned the railway station, post office, custom-house, the cathedral of Christ Church, the school of art with its large library, and the Victoria Theatre. There are also two state-subsidized hospitals, a college, a school of mines, a technological museum, several large and handsome churches, and numerous subsidized charitable institutions. Communication between the different parts is maintained by tramways, and steam ferry-boats ply between the city and its suburbs on the shores of the harbour. The industries include brewing, shipbuilding, copper and iron-founding, carriage-building and fellmongery; there are boot factories, engineering works, biscuit factories and smelting works at Cockle Creek. There is also a large trade in frozen meat. There are numerous coal mines in the vicinity, yielding coal of the finest quality. Newcastle has a fine harbour, with an area of 540 acres, protected by two breakwaters; the breadth of the channel at its entrance is 1200 ft., and the depth at the bar is 2512 ft. Vessels of the largest tonnage can enter and lie alongside of the wharves, which are 5 m. in extent, equipped with travelling cranes, hydraulic and steam cranes, lighted by electric light and connected with the Great Northern railway by a branch line. There is a floating dock to lift 2000 tons, and at Stockton there is a patent slip to take large vessels for repair. The facilities for the shipment of coal are excellent, and Newcastle is the chief coaling port in the southern hemisphere. The harbour is protected by two forts, Fort Scratchley, the strongest in Australia, and Shepherd’s Hill Fort. The city exports coal, wool, coke, horses, cattle, frozen meat, silver, lead, copper, tallow, hides and country produce. Newcastle returns three members to the legislative council and six members to the legislative assembly. Most of the suburbs are separate municipalities, namely, Stockton, Carrington, Wickham, Hamilton, Merewether, Adamstown, Waratah, New
