and exhibiting characters after types whose effectiveness on the stage had been proved by ample experience. He spoke the same language with the great dramatists, it is true, but this grand style is sometimes employed for the artificial elevation of commonplace thought. “Clear as day” becomes in this manner “day is not more conspicuous than this cunning”; while the proverb “Still waters run deep” is ennobled into—
“The shallow rivers glide away with noise—
The deep are silent.”
The violence and exaggeration of many of his contemporaries left him untouched. His scenes are ingeniously conceived, his characters boldly and clearly drawn; and he never falls beneath a high level of stage effect.
Shirley's tragedies are: The Maides Revenge (acted, 1626; printed, 1639); The Traytor (licensed, 1631; printed, 1635), which Dyce reckoned as Shirley's best tragedy; Love's Crueltie (1631; printed, 1640); The Duke's Mistris (acted, 1636; printed, 1638); The Polititian (acted, 1639; printed, 1655): The Cardinal (acted, 1641; printed, 1652), a good example of Shirley's later style, and characterized by Edmund Gosse as perhaps the last great play produced by the giants of the Elizabethan age. His comedies are: Love Tricks, or the School of Complement (licensed, 1625; printed under the latter title, 1631); The Wedding (licensed, 1626; printed, 1629); The Brothers (acted, 1626; printed, 1652); The Wittie Faire One (acted, 1628; printed, 1633); The Gratefull Servant (licensed in 1629 as The Faithful Servant; printed, 1630); Changes: Or Love in a Maze (acted and printed, 1632); Hide Parke (acted, 1632; printed, 1637); The Ball (acted, 1632; printed, 1639); The Bird in a Cage (acted and printed, 1633), ironically dedicated to William Prynne; The Young Admirall (licensed, 1633; printed, 1637); The Gamester (played at court, 1634; printed, 1637), executed at the command of Charles I. who is said to have invented or proposed the plot; The Example (acted, 1634; printed, 1637); The Opportunity (licensed, 1634; printed, 1640); The Coronation (licensed, 1635, as his, but printed, 1640, as by Fletcher); The Lady of Pleasure (licensed, 1635; printed, 1637); The Constant Maid, or Love will find out the Way, printed in 1640 under the former title with St Patrick for Ireland; The Royall Master (acted and printed, 1638), an excellent comedy of intrigue, with an epilogue addressed to Stratford; The Doubtfull Heir (printed, 1652), licensed as Rosania, or Love's Victory in 1640; The Gentleman of Venice (licensed, 1639; printed, 1655); The Imposture (acted, 1640; printed, 1652); The Sisters (licensed, 1642; printed, 1653); The Humorous Courtier (perhaps identical with The Duke, licensed, 1631), printed, 1640; The Court Secret (printed, 1653). Poems (1646), by James Shirley, contained “Narcissus,” and a masque dealing with the judgment of Paris, entitled The Triumph of Beautie. A Contention for Honour and Riches (1633) appeared in an altered and enlarged form in 1659 as Honoria and Mammon. In 1653 a selection of his pieces was published as Six New Playes. He wrote the magnificent entertainment presented by the members of the Inns of Court to the king and queen in 1633, entitled The Triumph of Peace, the scenery being devised by Inigo Jones and the music by W. Lawes and Simon Ives. In this kind of composition he had no rival but Ben Jonson. His Contention of Ajax and Ulysses (printed, 1659) closes with the well-known lyric, “The Glories of our Blood and State.”
The standard edition of Shirley's works is The Dramatic Works and Poems of James Shirley, with Notes by William Gifford, and Additional Notes, and some Account of Shirley and his Writings, by Alexander Dyce (6 vols., 1833). A selection of his plays was edited 1888) for the “Mermaid” series, with an introduction by Edmund Gosse.
SHIRLEY, WILLIAM (1694–1771), colonial governor of Massachusetts, was born at Preston in Sussex, England, on the 2nd of December 1694. He studied law, entered the Middle Temple, emigrated to Massachusetts in 1731, was appointed “the King's only advocate-general in America” (i.e. of all New England except Connecticut) in 1734, and in 1741, while representing Massachusetts in a boundary dispute with Rhode Island, was appointed governor. His efforts to secure a permanent fixed salary for himself (of £1000) were unsuccessful; and his attempt to prevent the further issue of paper money also involved him in a controversy with the General Court; but their relations were not unfriendly after 1743. The most important event of his administration was the conquest of Louisburg in 1745. The expedition was undertaken on his suggestion and its success was largely due to his energy and enthusiasm; in September 1749 £183,650 (English) in coin was brought to Boston to cover the outlay of Massachusetts, and largely through Shirley's influence this was used for the redemption of outstanding paper money, thus re-establishing the finances of the province, a subject to which Shirley had given much attention. Both in the colonies and in England, whither he returned in 1749 on leave of absence, Shirley kept up an active agitation for the expulsion of the French from the whole of Canada. He went back to Massachusetts as governor in 1753; led an unsuccessful expedition against Fort Niagara in 1755, and after the death of General Edward Braddock (1755) until June 1756 was commander-in-chief of all the British forces in America. In September 1756 he was recalled to England and was succeeded as governor by Spencer Phips. He was governor of the Bahamas until 1770, then again returned to Massachusetts and died at Roxbury on the 24th of March 1771. He published a Journal of the Siege of Louisbourg (1745), and The Conduct of General William Shirley Briefly Stated (1758).
SHIRREFF, EMILY ANNE ELIZA (1814–1897), English
pioneer in the higher education for women, was born on the 3rd
of November 1814, the daughter of a rear-admiral. Both she and
her sister Maria (Mrs William Grey) took a keen interest in
bettering women's equipment for educational work, and, in 1858,
she published Intellectual Education and its Influence on the
Character and Happiness of Women. Before that the sisters had
written in collaboration a novel, Passion and Principle (1841),
marked with that serious sense of the deficiencies in women's
education, to remedy which they did so much, and Thoughts
on Self-Culture addressed to Women (1850). In 1869 Emily
Shirreff was for a short time honorary mistress of Girton
College, and she served for many years on the council of that
institution and of the Girls' Public Day School Company. She
took a leading part in establishing and developing the Maria Grey
Training College for teachers and in the work of the Froebel
Society, of which she was the president. She was a firm believer
in Froebel's system and wrote a short memoir of him, and
several books on kindergarten methods. She died in London
on the 20th of March 1897.
SHIRT, an undergarment of linen, silk, cotton and flannel for
the upper part of the body, usually only applied to such a.
garment when worn by men, 'though the term is becoming
common as used of a plain form of blouse worn by women, the
American “ shirt-waist.” The word is apparently Scandinavian
in origin and is an adaptation of the Icel. skyrte, Dan. skiorte,
properly a short garment, and is derived from the root skar—to
cut off; it is cognate with Ger. Schurz, apron, and the same root
is seen in “short,” “shear” and “skirt”; the last word is now
used of that part of a woman's garment which reaches from the
waist to the feet, but properly means the lower part of the shirt,
hence, edge, border of anything.
SHIRVAN, a small district of the great province of Khorasan
in Persia, N.W. of Meshed and W. of Kuchan. It is under the
jurisdiction of Kuchan and comprises the town of the same name
and twelve villages with a population of 12,000. It produces
cotton, wheat and a little silk. Shirvan, the capital, is
situated on the river Atrek, in 37° 24′ N., 57° 56′ E. at an
elevation of 3500 ft. Its inhabitants are of the Turkish Garai'i
tribe and number about 7000. There are post and telegraph
offices.
SHOA, the southern of the three principal provinces of the Abyssinian empire. Shoa from about the middle of the 10th century till nearly the close of the 13th century was the residence of the Abyssinian sovereigns, who had been driven out of Axum, their former capital. About 1528 Shoa was conquered by Mahommedan invaders and was for over a century afterwards a prey to Galla raiders. In 1682 it was reconquered by an Abyssinian chief, but remained independent of northern Abyssinia until 1855 when the emperor Theodore reduced it to submission. In 1889 Menelek II., king of Shoa, on the death of the emperor John, made himself master of the whole of Abyssinia. The capital, Adis Ababa (q.v.), is the seat of government for the whole empire (see Abyssinia).
SHOCK, or Collapse, in surgery, the enfeebled condition of body which comes on after a severe physical injury, such as a blow upon the head or a kick in the abdomen, or as the result of grievous mental disturbance, as on seeing a ghastly sight or
