member for Corfe Castle. At Elizabeth's death he was instantly received with great favor by James I., and sent to Ireland as solicitor-general in 1603. On December 18 of that year he was knighted at Dublin. From this time forth he abandoned poetry in favor of the most active statesmanship. His activities in Ireland were almost ubiquitous. In 1606 he was further promoted to be attorney-general for Ireland, and created sergeant-at-arms. In the disordered condition of the country he was required to be stirring at all times, and his abilities seem to have been as conspicuous as his trustworthiness and uprightness. He married Eleanor, daughter of the earl of Castlehaven, but she unfortunately became insane. In 1612 Davies published his valuable prose work, A Discourse of the True Reasons why Ireland has never been entirely subdued. The same year he represented the county of Fermanagh in the Irish Parliament, and was elected speaker. In 1614 he represented Newcastle-under-Lyne in the English Parlia ment, and in 1619 he threw up his appointments in Ireland. In 1622 he issued a collected edition of his poetical works. In 1626 Davies was appointed lord chief justice of England, but ere he could enter on the office, he was found dead in his bed (December 8), the victim, it was supposed, of apoplexy. The prose writings of this remarkable man were mainly posthumous, and no attempt was made to collect them, until they were republished in four volumes by the Rev. A. B. Grosart, in 1876, with a full and interesting biography. The poetical works have often been reproduced since the author's lifetime. Sir John Davies is not to be confounded with JOHN DAVIES of Hereford, a contemporary author of a great quantity of verse, of which The Holy Roode (1609), The Scourge of Folly (1611), and The Muses' Sacrifice (1612) are fair typical examples. Gifted with extraordinary volubility and self-confidence, but with no delicacy or taste, the writings of this John Davies have survived more by reason of their bulk and their accidental interest of reference or dedication than from any intrinsic merit. DAVILA, HENRICO CATERINO (1576-1631), historian, was descended from a Spanish noble family. His immediate ancestors had been constables of the kingdom of Cyprus for the Venetian republic, from father to son, since 1464. But in 1570 the island was taken by the Turks; and Antonio Davila, the father of the historian, had to leave it, despoiled of all he possessed. He travelled into Spain and France, and finally returned to Padua, where, in 1756, his youngest son was born, whom he named Henrico Caterino, in gratitude for the kindness received from Catherine de' Medici at the French court. At the age of seven the father took this son to France, where he became a page in the service of Catherine. In due time he entered the service, and fought through the civil wars till the peace in 1598. He then returned to Padua, where, and subsequently at Parma, he led a studious life, till on the breaking out of war he entered the military service of the republic of Venice, in which he served with distinction. But during the whole of this active life-many details of which are very interesting as illustrative of the life and manners of the time, he never lost sight of a design which he had formed at a very early period, of writing the history of those civil wars in France, in which he had borne a part, and had so many opportunities of closely observing the leading personages and events. The manuscript of this work was completed in, or a little previous to, 1630, and was offered in vain by the author to all the publishers in Venice, and this city was then a great publishing centre. At last one Tommaso Baglioni, who had no work for his presses, undertook to print the manuscript on condition that he should be free to leave off if more promising work offered itself. The printing of the Istoria delle Guerre Civile di Francia was, however, completed, and the success and sale of the work were immediate and enormous. Many other editions rapidly followed, of which perhaps the best altogether is that of Milan, in 6 vols. 8vo, 1807. Davila was murdered, while on his way to take possession of the government of Crema for Venice in July, 1631, by a ruffian, with whom some dispute seems to have arisen as to the furnishing of the relays of horses ordered for his use by the Venetian Government. The Istoria was translated into French by J. Baudouin, Paris, 1642; into Spanish by Varen de Soto, Madrid, 1651, and Antwerp, 1686; twice into English by W. Aylesbury, London, 1647, 743 and by Charles Cotterel, London, 1666, and into Latin by Pietro Francesco Cornazzano, Rome, 1745. The best account edition of the history printed at Venice in 2 vols. fol. in 1733 of the life of Davila is that by Apostolo Zeno, prefixed to Tiraboschi may also be consulted with advantage. Bayle is true that Davila must be read with due remembrance of the fact severe on certain historical inaccuracies of Davila. And it is Catharine de' Medici. Also it is not to be forgotten that Bayle was so strongly Protestant. As to the literary merits of Davila, that he was not only a Catholic but the especial protegé of his lucidity, purity of style, abundance of information, there has never been, and never can be, any difference of opinion. DAVIN, FELIX, a French novelist of most brilliant promise, the fulfilment of which, however, was in a great in 1807; died in 1836. measure prevented by his early death. Born at St. Quentin considerable note in his day, was born in 1562, at CamDAVINI, GIOVANNI BATTISTA, an Italian physician of porgiano; died in 1633. 16th century. The date of his birth is unknown; the his Second Voyage in 1586, and a Report of Master John Davis indebted for an early emergence into publicity to the 1807, became the secretary. The most valuable of all his scientific writings are his communications to the Royal Society, scarcely one of which does not announce some new and important fact, or elucidate some principle of experimental philosophy. In February, 1803, he read to the society an essay "On Astringent Vegetables, and their Operation in Tanning;" and in 1805 “An Account of some Analytic Experiments on Wavellite," and a paper "On the Method of Analyzing Stones containing a Fixed Alkali, by Boracic Acid." This method is founded on the strong affinity of that acid for different substances at a high temperature, and on the ease with which borates are decomposed by mineral acids. In his first Bakerian lecture, delivered to the Royal Society in November, 1806, Davy showed that electrochemical phenomena were explicable by one general law, and illustrated his theory of voltaic action by numerous happily-devised experiments. After pointing out that in all voltaic decompositions acids appeared at the positive and bases at the negative pole, he generalized his results by stating that hydrogen, the alkalies, earth, metals, and certain oxides are attracted by negatively electrified and repelled by positively electrified metallic surfaces, and that oxygen and acids are attracted by positively and repelled by negatively electrified metallic surfaces. He then proceeded to investigate the law of electro-chemical action, and concluded that electro-chemical combinations and decompositions are referable to the law of electric attractions and repulsions, and that both "chemical and electrical attractions are produced by the same cause, acting in the one case on the particles, in the other on the masses." For these researches the French Institute awarded him the prize of 3000 francs offered by the first consul for the experiment most conducive to the progress of science. Davy's discovery of the production of potassium and sodium by the electrical decomposition of their alkalies was made in October, 1807, and an account of the new metals was given to the Royal Society on the 19th of November in the second Bakerian lecture. On the 23d of that month a severe fever attacked him, and he was unable to resume his professorial duties at the Royal Institution till March 12, 1808. In the meanwhile barium and calcium, the existence of which had been predicted by Davy, were discovered by Berzelius and Pontin. In 1808 Davy announced to the Royal Society his discovery of magnesium and strontium. Álumina, silica, and zirconia he was unable to decompose, but he showed it to be highly probable that they contained metallic bases. Various opinions as to the nature of the new metals of the alkalies and alkaline earths were at first entertained, some chemists considering them to be compounds of hydrogen with unknown bases. In the third Bakerian lec The ungainly exterior and peculiar manner of Davy on his first appearance in London prejudiced Rumford and others against him; when, however, he began to lecture, he won the approbation of all. His ingenuity and happy facility of illustration gained him a high reputation; his company was courted by the choicest society of the metropolis; and soon his presence was regarded as indispensable in the soirées of the fashionable world. His style of lecture, read in December, 1808, and its appendix of next turing was well adapted to command attention-it was animated, clear, and impressive, notwithstanding the naturally inharmonious tones of his voice; his experiments, moreover, were both ingeniously conceived and neatly executed. The young chemist was fortunate in the time in which he commenced his metropolitan career. Experimental chemistry was beginning to be the fashion of the day; and the discovery of the decomposition of chemical substances by voltaic electricity had excited the greatest interest amongst the votaries of science. The liberality of the committee of the Royal Institution supplied to Davy what few private individuals could afford-a battery of 400 five-inch plates, and one of 40 plates a foot in diameter. With these were conducted the brilliant investigations which resulted in his discovery of potassium and sodium. The earliest of Davy's communications to the Royal Society, and the first of his contributions to electro-cheinistry, was "An Account of some Galvanic Combinations formed by an arrangement of single Metallic Plates and Fluids," read in June, 1801. In all hitherto constructed piles, plates of two metals, or one plate of metal and another of charcoal, and some interposed fluid had been employed. Davy showed in this paper that a battery might be constructed of a single metal and two fluids, provided one of the fluids was capable of causing oxidation on one of the surfaces of the metal. In addition to the duties of his situation in the Royal Institution, to which those of joint editor of the Journal had been added, Davy for ten successive years gave courses of lectures for the Board of Agriculture on the connection between agriculture and chemistry. In 1803 he was admitted a member of the Royal Society, of which he, in January, spring, Davy adduced conclusive evidence of the elementary nature of potassium; he discussed also the nature of sulphur, phosphorus, and carbon, and described the preparation of boron, which he then regarded as a metal. The original galvanic batteries used by Davy having become unserviceable through wear, a liberal voluntary subscription among the members of the Royal Institution, in July, 1808, put him in possession of a battery of 2000 double plates, with a surface equal to 128,000 square inches. His electro-chemical discoveries had, however, all been made before this new power was provided. The fourth Bakerian lecture, read in November, 1809, brings forward proofs that oxymuriatic acid, contrary to Davy's previous supposition, is a simple body, termed by him chlorine (see vol. v. p. 589), and that muriatic acid is a compound of that element and hydrogen. Davy's reputation had now reached its zenith; and his audience in the theatre of the Royal Institution numbered little less than 1000. At the invitation of the Dublin Society he gave, in November, 1810, a course of lectures on electro-chemical science, and in the following year other courses on the elements of chemical philosophy and on geology. For the first of these he received £525, and for the two latter £750; and before he left Dublin, Trinity College conferred upon him the degree of LL.D. On the 8th of April, 1812, Davy was knighted by the Prince Regent; on the next day he gave his farewell lecture at the Royal Institution; and on the 11th he married Mrs. Appreece, daughter and heiress of Charles Kerr of Kelso, with whom he had a considerable fortune. His usual employments were in great measure suspended during the winter of 1812 in consequence of an injury to an eye, resulting from an explosion of chloride of nitrogen, which he had begun to experiment upon after receiving intelligence of its discovery by Dulong. The first and, as it proved, the only volume of Davy's Elements of Chemical Philosophy appeared in 1812; and in 1813 he published his Elements of Agricultural Chemistry, the substance of his lectures delivered to the Board of Agriculture. Having obtained from the French emperor permission to travel in France, Davy, on October 13, 1813, went thither with his wife and Faraday, the latter in the capacity of "assistant in experiments and writing." Faraday had been engaged on the 1st of March previous to help Davy in the laboratory of the Royal Institution. On the 29th of October, after a detention of six or seven days at Morlaix, Davy arrived in Paris, where he stayed two months, and began the course of investigation on iodine which enabled him to prove its elementary character. This body had hitherto been regarded as a compound by the French chemists. On the 13th of December Davy was elected a corresponding member of the first class of the Imperial Institute at Paris. From Paris he proceeded, in the end of December, to Montpellier, and thence to Italy. At Genoa and Florence he continued his experiments on iodine; and at the latter place he effected the combustion of the diamond by means of the great lens in the cabinet of natural history, and discovered that, when once ignited, it will continue to burn in pure oxygen. He next proceeded by Rome to Naples, where he collected specimens of the colors used by the ancients in their pictures, which formed the subject of a memoir presented to the Royal Society. After spending the winter in Italy, he returned to London on April 23, 1815. The year 1815 is memorable in the history of Davy, as that in which he turned his attention to the frequent occur. rence of accidents from explosions of fire-damp in coalmines. At his request specimens of the gas were sent from Newcastle to London for him to examine. He ascertained that it would not explode when mixed with less than six or more than fourteen times its volume of air, with oneseventh its volume of carbonic acid gas, or with one-sixth its volume of nitrogen; that in tubes one-seventh of an inch in diameter explosive mixtures of air and fire-damp could not be fired; and that metallic tubes prevented explosions better than glass tubes. On November 9, 1815, Davy made known to the Royal Society these results of his experiments; and before the close of the year he had completed the invention of what has since been known as the Davy safety-lamp (see p. 68 of the present volume). In this a cage of wire-gauze, by its cooling action, prevents the flame from igniting an explosive atmosphere exterior to the lamp, even though the flame reach as far as the gauze. Of this invaluable aid to the miner the coal-owners of Newcastle and its vicinity were not slow in availing themselves; and on the 11th of October, 1817, they testified their appreciation of the boon disinterestedly conferred upon them by Davy, who had taken out no patent for his invention, by presenting him with a suitably inscribed service of plate. In the succeeding year Davy was created a baronet. For his various communications to the Royal Society on the subject of fire-damp, and on the nature of flame, in 1815, 1816, and 1817, he received the Rumford medals. In 1818 and 1819 he produced four memoirs, "On the Fallacy of the Experiments in which Water is said to have been produced by the Decomposition of Chlorine," "On some Combinations of Phosphorus," "Observations on the Formation of Mists over Lakes and Rivers," and "On Electro-Magnetism." In 1818 he was sent by the British Government to examine the papyri of Herculaneum in the Neapolitan Museum, his remarks on which are contained in a paper in the Philosophical Transactions for 1821. In 1820 Davy returned to England, and on the death of Sir Joseph Banks, in that year, he was elected president of the Royal Society; in this position, however, it cannot be said that he always appeared to advantage, or on every occasion acted in a manner calculated to render himself popular amongst the members. In 1821 he busied himself with electrical experiments, and in 1822 with the investigation of the fluids contained in the cavities of crystals in rocks. In 1823 he read before the Royal Society a paper "On the Application of Liquids formed by the Condensation of Gases as Mechanical Agents." In the same year he investigated the cause of the rapid destruction of the copper sheathing of sea-going ships. It occurred to him that, as sea-water acts only on positively electrified copper, the sheathing would be protected if he could render it slightly negative. He found that plates of copper having portions of iron or zinc attached remained unchanged after prolonged immersion in sea-water. In consequence of this discovery directions were given by the Government, after some preliminary experiments, to apply plates of iron, or "protectors" as they were called, to several ships of the royal navy; many merchantmen also were supplied with them. Experience, however, showed that the bottoms of the protected ships soon became extremely foul-seaweed and shell-fish accumulating in such quantities as seriously to impede sailing; so that in June, 1825, much to the mortification of the inventor, orders were issued for the removal of the protectors. In 1826 Davy's health had so far declined that he was with difficulty able to indulge in his favorite sports of angling and shooting; and on returning to London from Somersetshire he was unable to attend the anniversary dinner of the Royal Society. In January, 1827, he published his six anniversary discourses, delivered on awarding the Royal and Copley medals. Early in 1827 he was seized with an apoplectic attack, which rendered his removal to the Continent advisable. After some short stay at Ravenna he removed to Salzburg, whence on account of the continuance of his illness, he sent in his resignation of the presidency of the Royal Society. At the end of autumn he returned to England, and in the winter he published his Salmonia, a book of some interest, written in imitation of Izaak Walton's Complete Angler. In 1828 Davy quitted England, and spent most of the summer and autumn at Laybach. In the winter he fixed his residence at Rome, whence he sent to the Royal Society "Remarks on the Electricity of the Torpedo," written in Illyria in October. This, with the exception of a posthumous work, entitled Consolations in Travel, or the Last Days of a Philosopher, was the final production of his pen. While at Rome, he was attacked by paralysis, from which he had already suffered. His wife and brother having hastened to his assistance, he left Rome for Geneva, where he died on the 29th of May, 1829. His remains were deposited on the 1st of June in the burying-ground outside the walls of that city. Davy was of a sanguine, somewhat irritable temperament. To all his pursuits he devoted himself with a characteristic enthusiasm and firmness of purpose. His tone of mind, as indicated by his poems, was highly imaginative. "I attend Davy's lectures," said Coleridge, "to increase my stock of metaphors." The power and perspicacity of his intellect is sufficiently attested by his numerous and brilliant discoveries. He was not 21 years of age when he wrote "It is only by forming theories, and then com paring them with facts, that we can hope to discover the true system of nature." As an experimenter he was remarkably quick; "with Davy," it has been remarked, "rapidity was power." Of the minor observances of etiquette he was careless, and his great frankness of disposition sometimes exposed him to annoyances which the exercise of tact and caution might have obviated. His manner in society, which gave to many the impression of a haughty consciousness of superiority, is ascribed by Dr. Paris to ungraceful timidity, which he could never conquer." See Dr. J. A. Paris, The Life of Sir Humphry Davy, 1831; Dr. J. Davy, Works of Sir Humphry Davy, 1839. The former (vol. ii. pp. 450-456) contains a list of Davy's publications. (F. L. B DAWLISH, a watering-place of England, on the south coast of Devonshire, situated a little beyond the mouth of the Exe, twelve miles south of Exeter. It lies in a cove of the English Channel formed by two projecting cliffs, and is admirably sheltered from the weather. A small stream, which flows through the town, is lined on both sides by pleasure-grounds. The town is much resorted to during spring and early summer by the seekers after health. The parish contains an area of 5512 acres, and a population (1871) of 4241 persons, 2492 of whom are females. DAX, formerly Ax, or Acqs, the ancient Aqua Tarbellica, a town of France, at the head of an arrondissement in the department of Landes, situated in a fertile plain on the left bank of the Adour, 28 miles north-east of Bayonne, and connected by a fine stone bridge with the suburb of Sablar. It is still partially surrounded by its old tower-flanked walls, which present, if not a genuine specimen, at least an interesting mediaval imitation, of Roman masonry; and it has a cathedral (rebuilt in the 18th century, but preserving a sculptured doorway and porch of the 13th), an old episcopal palace, a court-house, a prison, a mineralogical museum, and a training college. It manufactures earthenware, pitch, oil, chocolate, salt, and liqueurs, and carries on cork-cutting, ham-curing, and a trade in wine, brandy, grain, and timber. Its prosperity is further increased by its thermal springs, of which the most remarkable, rising in a great reservoir 20 feet deep in the Central Square, has a temperature of 155-166° Fahr., and sometimes discharges such volumes of steam as to envelop the whole town in a mist. Dax, as its ancient name implies, was the capital of the Tarbelii, and during the Roman period it ranked as the second town of Novem populonia. For some time it was the seat of a viscount, and its bishopric was preserved till the Revolution. The church of St. Vincent derives its name from the first occupant of the see, and is interesting for its connection with the more famous St. Vincent de Paul. Population in 1871, 8154. DAY. See ASTRONOMY and CALENDAR. DAY, JOHN, a lyrical dramatist of the age of Elizabeth, of whose life no particulars have been transmitted to us, except that he was a student of Caius College, Cambridge. The first work which he is known to have produced is The Isle of Gulls, printed in 1606, a comedy founded upon Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia. In 1607 he published a curious drama, written by him in conjunction with William Rowley and George Wilkins, The Travels of Three English Brothers, which detailed the adventures of Sir Thomas, Sir Anthony, and Robert Shirley. In the same year appeared The Parliament of Bees, the work on which Day's reputation mainly rests. This exquisite and unique drama, or rather masque, is entirely occupied with "the doings, the births, the wars, the wooings" of bees, expressed in a style at once most singular and most charming. In 1608 Day published two comedies, Law Tricks and Humor out of Breath. In 1610 there was licensed by him a comedy of The Mad Pranks of Merry Moll, which has not survived. It is not known when he died, but his works were frequently reprinted before the civil wars, and as late as 1659 one of them, The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green, first saw the light. The six dramas by John Day which we possess testify to a talent somewhat out of sympathy with the main poetic current of his day. Except The Parliament of Bees, which is all in rhyme, his plays are in prose, with occasional rhymed passages of great lyrical sweetness. He preserved, in a great measure, the dramatic tradition of John Lyly, and affected a kind of subdued euphuism. It is, indeed, not impossible that the Maid's Metamorphosis, 1600, wrongly supposed to be a posthumous work of Lyly's, may be attributable to the youth of Day. It possesses, at all events, many of his marked characteristics. The beauty and ingenuity of The Parliament of Bees were noted and warmly extolled by Charles Lamb; but no effort has been made in our generation to revive his fame, and the works of this writer of very distinct and peculiar genius remain still unedited. DAYTON, a city of the United States, the capital of Montgomery county, Ohio, situated on the east bank of the Great Miami, which is there joined by the Mad, 46 miles north of Cincinnati, and 135 miles south of Toledo. The Miami canal, which connects the Ohio river with Lake Erie, passes by the town; and this means of communication, along with that of the railroads which converge here from different points, has contributed greatly to the prosperity of the place. The city is very regularly laid out, and the houses and public edifices are better than in many other Western cities, partly owing to the comparatively moderate price of the white limestone, or marble, which abounds in its neighborhood. The principal public buildings are the county court-house-designed after the Parthenon at Athens, and erected at a cost of about £30,000-and the market-house, containing within its walls a city hall and the council chamber. There are, besides numerous churches, a high school, and the Cooper Acad· emy, belonging to the Presbyterian body, for the instruction of females. Of charitable institutions the orphan asylum, the alms-house, and a lunatic asylum may be mentioned, and in the vicinity there is the Central National Soldiers' Home. A considerable manufacturing industry is carried on, which is facilitated by a copious supply of water conveyed from the Mad. There are sev eral machine shops, and works for the manufacture of agricultural implements, railway carriages, paper, cotton, etc. The place, which was first settled in 1796, was incorporated as a town in 1805, and as a city in 1841. Population in 1850, 10,977; in 1860, 20,081; and in 1870 30,473. AND OF VOLUME SIXTH. |