mother sprang from an ancient and illustrious family; hence Redschid had the title of nobility, bei, from his birth. The mother was left early a widow, with four very young children, two sons and two daughters. Her circumstances were exceedingly embarrassed; but generous friends were ready with counsel and with help, and enabled her to give a good education to her son Redschid, who was notable among other things for the faculty of elegant expression. One of Redschid's sisters married Ispartali-Ali-Pasha, governor of Morea, who is supposed, as Ispartali signifies Spartan, to have been a Greek renegade. Ispartali appointed Redschid his secretary when the latter was between fifteen and sixteen years of age. For a short time Ispartali was grand vizier, and afterwards commanded the whole of the Turkish troops in the war with the Greeks. Till the death of his brother-in-law Redschid stood faithfully by his side. The intelligence and activity which Redschid had displayed in the Morea, procured him the situation of chief secretary in one of the government bureaus at Constantinople. In this and other subordinate offices he showed himself zealous for those reforms which ended in the annihilation of the janissaries and wrenched the Turkish empire from the mediæval relations of a feudal state; with what result has yet to be seen. In 1828, when the war with Russia broke out, Redschid was intrusted with a mission to Bulgaria; and the conciliatory temper which he manifested toward the christian part of the population was so offensive to the Turks of the old school, that they continued thenceforth to call him Devil and Good-for-nothing. When, at the conclusion of the second campaign, the Turkish negotiators met at Adrianople, Redschid exercised considerable influence on the drawing up of the articles of peace. After the fulfilment of various delicate and important trusts, Redschid was sent as ambassador to the courts of England and France. Besides discharging ably his duties as ambassador, Redschid used his time diligently in acquiring the European languages and studying the European institutions. In the summer of 1837 news reached Redschid that his friend Pertew Pasha had been named grand vizier and himself minister for foreign affairs. Journeying homeward by the land route, Redschid heard to his horror and dismay that Pertew Pasha had been overthrown by a seraglio intrigue and beheaded. With a boldness which was wisdom, Redschid determined to oppose the reactionaries then in power. With this purpose he entered Constantinople on the 19th November, 1837. From that time till August, 1838, Redschid was the foremost man in Constantinople. This authority was ascribed as much to his extraordinary eloquence, charming the monarch's ear, as to his real ability as a statesman; and it became a saying among the mass of the Turks who disliked him, but who could never believe in his permanent disgrace, "The Devil always comes up again, for he has an oily tongue." Redschid's enlightened and patriotic endeavours to transform Turkey from a feudal into a centralized state, provoked the anger both of the ignorant and the selfish. He saw himself menaced with a doom as terrible as that of Pertew Pasha. A retreat from the peril was opened to him by the sultan. He was created pasha, and received again the post of ambassador to the Western courts. Nearly a year was devoted by Redschid to travelling in Italy, Austria, Prussia, and Belgium. No sooner in Paris did Redschid learn that Sultan Mahmoud was dead, than he returned to Constantinople, and took, in September, 1839, the oath of allegiance to Abd-ul Meschid. Redschid was reinstated as minister of foreign affairs; but malignity and machination were more busy against him than ever. Nevertheless, he succeeded in persuading the sultan to pass, amid circumstances of singular pomp, what is famous as the Imperial Decree from the Rose Garden—an emphatic law and comprehensive plan of internal organization and improvement. But foreign affairs could not be neglected at a moment when for Turkey they were so entangled and troubled; and by Redschid sagacity and valour the foreign difficulties were resolutely met. But when at the summit of his triumph he was without warning, in March, 1844, dismissed. He went back as ambassador to the Western powers. Minister for foreign affairs once more in 1845, he rose to be grand vizier in September, 1846, an office which, with brief breaks, he held till the autumn of 1852, when he was displaced. Just one year after this date, the viziership was confided to the strong grasp of him who was alone deemed capable of thwarting the insolent Russian. In 1854 Redschid fell; but in October, 1856, he ascended for the fifth time to the chief place in the ministry. Through the trickery and malice of his old enemies at home, and through the vindictiveness of the French government, Redschid, in July, 1857, was driven to resign. Yet in October of the same year he was for the sixth time vizier—only, however, for a month or two. On the 7th January, 1858, he died when dreaming of, hoping for, his seventh viziership.—W. M—l.
REED, Andrew, a nonconformist minister greatly distinguished for his philanthropical activity, was born in St. Clement's Danes parish, London, on the 27th of November, 1787, educated at Hackney, and in 1811 appointed minister of Wycliffe chapel, Stepney, where he preached for fifty years. In 1819 he published anonymously a religious novel, entitled "No Fiction," which ran through several editions. He subsequently published an account of a mission to the United States, in which he was engaged with Mr. Cox in 1834. His strongest claims to the grateful remembrance of posterity are due to his exertions in founding the London Orphan asylum at Clapton in 1813, the Infant orphan asylum in 1827, and the asylum for Fatherless Children at Croydon in 1847. To these noble labours were added the establishment of an asylum for idiots, and the Royal hospital for Incurables. He died at Hackney on the 25th of February, 1862.—R. H.
REED, Henry, an accomplished American professor and writer, was born in Philadelphia in 1808. He was educated at the university of Pennsylvania, where he graduated as bachelor of arts in 1825. Having made choice of the legal profession, he was admitted in 1829 to practice in the district court of the city and county of Philadelphia. But in September, 1831, he relinquished the practice of his profession, and was elected assistant professor of English literature in the university of Pennsylvania. In November of the same year, he was chosen assistant professor of moral philosophy; and in 1835, he was appointed professor of rhetoric and English literature. After discharging for twenty-three years his professional duties with great fidelity and acceptance, he obtained leave of absence from the college trustees, and visited Europe, in May, 1854. He received a most cordial welcome from Wordsworth, Earl Stanhope, Babbage, Thackeray, and other eminent men of letters; and after spending some months in England and on the continent, he embarked on the 26th September for New York, in the United States steamship the Arctic, which on the 27th came into collision with another vessel and was lost. Professor Reid, along with other three hundred passengers, perished in the wreck. "In all the history of wanton and unnecessary shipwreck," says his brother, and biographer, "no greater scandal to the science of navigation or to the system of marine discipline ever occurred, than the loss of this ill-fated vessel." The news of Professor Reed's death was received with deep and intense feeling in America. The lectures of this amiable and accomplished scholar have since been published. They are elegantly written, and are distinguished by good sense, candour, high principle, and a thorough knowledge of the subjects discussed in them.—J. T.
REED, Isaac, the well known commentator upon Shakspeare, was born in London in 1742, the son of a baker. He was educated for the law, and became a solicitor and conveyancer. His love for ancient English literature, and perhaps his friendship with Mr. Nichols the printer, induced him to collect, arrange, and annotate many literary productions that might otherwise have soon disappeared from view. He prepared a new edition of Dodsley's Old Plays, Dodsley's Collection of Poems, Pearch's Collection of Poems, and another collection of verses entitled The Repository. He recast and enlarged Baker's Biographia Dramatica. "He was more satisfied," says Nichols, "with being a faithful editor, than ambitious of being an original composer." With the assistance of Dr. Farmer and Mr. Steevens he undertook to edit Shakspeare's works, which he published in twenty-one volumes in 1803. "Honest Mr. Reed," as he was called, was beloved by a large circle of friends, of whom Nichols gives an account (vol. ii., 670). He would take long walks to their country houses, and con over their books and manuscripts with keen interest and a practised eye. His own library, which Dibdin says was to him "parlour, kitchen, and hall," abounded in literary curiosities. He died on the 5th of January, 1807, at his chambers in Staple inn, of which society he had long been one of the ancients. He left considerable property, including the library, which was sold shortly after his death.—(Nichols' Literary Anecdotes.)—R. H.
REES, Abraham, D.D., a celebrated cyclopædist and learned
