HICKSITES
873
HILL
Oxford, and in 1864 became a member of Parliament. During the first ten years of his political life, when his party (the Conservatives) were out of power, Sir Michael filled subordinate posts, as secretary to the Poor Law Board and under-secretary for the Home Department. In 1874, when the Conservatives gained office, he was appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, and three years later he was admitted to a seat in the cabinet. From 1878 to 1880 he acted as Secretary of State for the Colonies. He went out of office with his party. When Lord Salisbury succeeded to power, in 1885, he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer and became leader in the house of commons. He resigned with his party in February, 1886, when Gladstone and the Liberals gained power for a few months, but in August of that year he took office once more under Salisbury, becoming Chief Secretary for Ireland. This post he resigned in March, 1887, when he was succeeded by Balfour. He served a second time as chancellor of exchequer (1895 to 1902), and he has subsequently acted on various committees of the house and repeatedly acted on important arbitrations. Nominally, he is a free trader, but has/ favored Balfour's proposals for retaliation, while he has condemned financial extravagance. In 1905 he was created Viscount St. Aldwyn.
Hick'sites. See (JUAKERS.
Hides, the commercial term for skins of the larger animals, as domestic cattle or horses, and of bison, buffaloes etc. The term always means the skin before it has been made into leather. Hides appear as an article of commerce either "green," dried or salted, and are used almost exclusively for manufacturing into leather. The hides of smaller animals, as sheep, goats, deer etc. are known as "skins."
Hieroglyphics, the name given to various kinds of picture-writing, but chiefly to that of the ancient Egyptians. Hieroglyphs, the characters used, had their origin in the want of an alphabet in times when spelling by means of specific characters — letters — was unknown. Emblematic writing, the attempt to represent an objsct by making a picture of it, the picture being after a time made always in the same way and becoming a hieroglyph, is the origin of all alphabets. Hieroglyphics among the Egyptians had gone far toward what we call a written language when the inscriptions now deciphered by scholars were made. Symbols formed the syllables of a word or the letters that spelled a word. Many of the ancient people wrote with hieroglyphics, the most prominent instance of the kind in America being the picture-writing of the ancient Mexicans, by which they^ depicted, rather than wrote of, the affairs of common life.
Hig'glnson, Thomas Wentworth, an
American author, essayist and lecturer, was
born at Cambridge, Mass., Dec. 22, 1823. He graduated from Harvard and entered the ministry, but abandoned it in 1858. He was an active antislavery agitator, and in the Civil War was the commander of the first re giment made up of former slaves. Among his books are Outdoor Papers; Harvard Memorial Biographies; Army Life in a Black Regiment; Young Folk's History of the United States; Short Studies of American Authors; Poems and Translations; Larger History of the United States; Old Cambridge; and Contemporaries. Higginson's Collected Writings, appeared in 1900. He died May 9, 1911.
Hil'dreth, Richard, an American writer, was born at Deerfield, Mass., June 22, 1807. He graduated at Harvard in 1826, was admitted to the bar in 1832, and became editor of the Boston Atlas. He was an early resident of Florida, where in 1837 he wrote Archy Moore,an antislavery tale, later repub-lished as The White Slave. Among his works are History of Banks; Despotism in America, an antislavery work; Theory of Morals and Theory of Politics. His greatest literary task, however, was his History of the United States He died at Florence, Italy, July n, 1865. Hill, Ambrose Powell, a Confederate general, was born in Culpeper County, Va., Nov. 9, 1825. He served in the Mexican and Seminole Wars. In 1861 he joined the Confederate army, becoming successively colonel, brigadier-general and major-general. He was in the battles of Bull Run, Cedar Mountain, Antietam, Chancellors-ville and Petersburg. He received the surrender of Harper's Ferry, and at Chan-cellorsville succeeded to the command after the death of Jackson. He was in command of a corps in the army of northern Virginia, when at the battle of Petersburg on April 2, 1865, he was killed.
Hill, Benjamin Harvey, an American statesman, was born in Georgia on Sept. 14, 1823. He became distinguished as a lawyer, and in 1861 was elected to the Confederate senate, where he served until the close of the war. He ably served his state and section during the reconstruction period, being elected to Congress in 1875 and to the United States senate in 1877. He died at Atlanta, Ga., Aug. 19, 1882.
Hill, Daniel Harvey, an American general, was born in South Carolina on July la,
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THOMAS W. HIGGINSON
