Page:A cyclopaedia of female biography.djvu/546

This page has been validated.
524
MAR.

which were followed by a single volume tale, called "The Billow and the Rock."

In 1846; Miss Martinean, in company with intelligent friends, made a journey through Egypt, to Palestine. Greece, Syria, and Arabia. She has Riven her impressions of those countries in her work, "Eastern Life; Present and Past," published in 1848. That she is an intelligent traveller, and knows "how to observe," better than almost any tourist who had preceded her, there is no doubt. Her work is exceedingly interesting; but it is marred by the mocking infidelity which she allows for the first time to darken her pages, and testify to the world her disbelief in divine revelation!

A new work from the pen of Miss Martineau, "Letters on Man's Nature and Developments," appeared in London in 1851; it is decidedly atheistic in its tone; the only foundation of morality, the belief in God, is disavowed, and his Holy word derided as 'a book of fables, unworthy the study of rational beings. There is something in this avowal by a woman of utter unbelief in Christianity which so shocks the mind, that we are troubled to discuss it; we draw back, as from a pit of destruction, into which to gaze, even, is to sin.

Besides the works above enumerated, this volummous author has written "A History of England during the Thirty years War," which is generally commended for its vigour and impartiality. She has also given a free and condensed translation of "Compters Positive Philosophy,"and produced a great number of phamplets on various social and political questions. She is now residing at Ambleside, in Westmoreland, where she is actively engaged in cultivating her little farm with great energy and success.

MARTINEZ, MARIANNE,

Was the daughter of a gardener of Vienna. One day the poet Metastasio met her in the street, when she was a very little child; she was singing some popular air. Her voice and her vivacity pleased the poet, and he offered her parents to educate her. They accepted his proposals, and he kept his promises. Nothing was neglected to make the young girl an artist. She had the good fortune to receive lessons in music, and on the harpsichord, from Haydn, whose genius was not yet famous; and Porpora taught her the art of singing, and the science of composition. Her progress was rapid; she played with neatness and grace; she sang beautifully, and her compositions showed a vigour of conception together with extensive learning. She reunited the qualities of many distinguished artists. Dr. Burney, who knew her at Venice, in 1772, speaks of her with admiration. Metastasio bequeathed to her all his property. In 1796 she lived at Vienna, in affluence, and gave weekly concerts at her house, where she received all the musical celebrities. Dr. Burney cites with high eulogy many of her sonatas, and her cantatas on words of Metastasio. She composed a miserere, with orchestral accompaniment. Gerbert had a mass and an oratorio written by her.

MARTINOZZI, LAURA.

Francesco the First, Duke of Modena, became possessed of the sovereignty, in 1629, by the resignation of his father, Alphonso the Third; who entered a convent of Capuchins, and, under the