Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 1).djvu/595

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the country as a French possession, in accordance with the preliminaries of peace signed six months before. They buried in different places six leaden tablets, with inscriptions recording the formal oc- cupation in the name of the French king. They descended the Ohio to the mouth of the Great Mi- ami, and thence crossed by land to Lake Erie, and reached Fort Niagara on 19 Oct., 1749.


CENTENO, Diego (then-tay'-no), Spanish sol- dier, b. in 1505; d. in 1549. He accompanied Pi- zarro as an officer in the conquest of Peru and amassed a very large fortune. Centeno distin- guished himself in the battle of Chupas, gained by Vaca de Castro in 1542 against young Almagro, the assassin of Francisco Pizarro. Afterward he made war against Gonzalo Pizarro for the posses- sion of Peru, but was utterly routed at Guarina, or Huarina, in 1547. Four years later he died from the effects of poison given to him at a banquet.


CEPEDA, Fernando de (thay-pay'-da), author, b. near the end of the 16th century. He published in Mexico, in 1637, an account in Spanish of the foundation of that city, of the great inundations that it suffered, and of the canals designed and executed between the years 1553 and 1637. Its title is " Relacion del Sitio en que esta fundada la Ciudad de Mexico." Leon, in his " Bibliotheca Indica," says that it was probably the same author that wrote a useful work entitled " De la Plata Ensayada, y Barras de las Indias."


CERACHI, Giuseppe (eher-rah'-kee). Italian sculptor, b. in 1740; executed January, 1801. He came to Philadelphia in 1791 and made busts of Washington, Hamilton, and other eminent men. He also made a bust of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1796, when Italy was invaded by that general. In 1800, having formed with Arena and others a de- sign to assassinate the first consul, he, with the intention (as is supposed) of carrying out this de- sign, proposed to uiidei'take another statue of him ; but the plot was detected and he was guillotined.


CERDA, Alfonso de la, Peruvian R. C. bishop, b. ia Caeeres, Spain ; d. in Chuquisaca, Peru, in 1592. He emigrated to America, seeking his for- tune ; but the crimes of his fellow-adventurers disgusted him with the world, and he entered the convent of San Ilosario in Lima, and took the habit of the Dominican order in 1545. He was elected successively prior of the convents of Porto Bello, Arequipa, and Lima, then preacher-general, and finally provincial. In this latter capacity he made a thorough visitation of his province, and established a rule that all candidates for missionary duty who had not a knowledge of the Indian lan- guages should be rejected. In 1573 he was deputed by the Dominicans of Peru to defend their inter- ests at Rome. He was successful in his mission, and returned to Spain. He was on the point of embarking for Peru when news arrived of the death of the bishop of Honduras. Philip II. nomi- nated Father de la Cerda to the vacant see, and he was consecrated before his departure for America. He did not remain long in Honduras, as the bish- opric of Chuquisaca fell vacant and he was trans- ferred to it. Shortly after his elevation he found- ed a convent of his order in Chuquisaca.


CESNOLA, Luigi Palma di (ches-no'-la), archæologist, b. near Turin, Italy, 29 July, 1832. He was educated at the Royal military academy, and served in the Sardinian army during the war in 1849, and also was engaged in the Crimean war. In 1860 he came to the United States and volunteered in the military service, becoming colonel of the 4th New York cavalry. He was in the battle of Aldie, in June, 1862, where he was wounded and captured. Afterward he was appointed U.S. consul at Cyprus, where he made extensive archæological examinations and acquired a large collection of antiquities, which in 1873 became the property of the Metropolitan museum of art. During the latter part of 1873 he again visited Cyprus, and added much to the collections already gathered, and on his return to New York in 1877 was made director of the museum. About 1879 many adverse judgments by eminent art critics, reflecting on the integrity of his collections, appeared in the New York art journals and in the daily press. These charges were referred to a committee of five well-known gentlemen, who, after careful examination, declared them groundless. The matter was afterward brought into the courts, and a libel suit against Col. Cesnola was instituted by Gaston L. Feuardent, which, after a prolonged trial, resulted in a disagreement of the jury. This case attracted great attention on account of the extreme partisanship shown by the newspapers during the trial. He married a daughter of Capt. Samuel C. Reid, who repelled with great loss to the enemy the British attack on his ship, the “General Armstrong,” in the harbor of Fayal, in September, 1814. Columbia college conferred on Col. Cesnola the degree of LL. D. in 1880. he is the author of “Researches and Discoveries in Cyprus” (New York, 1878).


CESPEDES, Carlos Manuel de (thes'-pay-des), Cuban revolutionist, b. in Bavamo, Cuba, 18 April, 1819; d. 22 March, 1874. He studied in Havana and in Spain, and was admitted to the bar in Ma- drid in 1842. After being implicated with Gen. Prim in a conspiracy for the overthrow of the gov- ernment, he returned, in 1844, to his native city, where he practised his profession and cultivated literature. He wrote a comedy, " Las dos Dianas," and made a metrical translation of several books of Virgil's "^neid." In 1852, on account of political disturbances, he was confined for some time in a Spanish man-of-war at Santiago de Cuba, and then banished to a small inland town. He was allowed to return to Bayamo, where he resided until October, 1868. On the 9th of this month he headed an insurrection in the town of Yara against the Spanish government, and published a manifesto in justification of his course. Soon the whole eastern part of the island was in arms. On 18 Oct., Cespedes entered Bayamo, which became the seat of the revolutionary government ; but on 16 Jan., 1869, he had to abandon it at the approach of a strong force imder Gen. Valmaseda, and burned the city before the arrival of the Spanish troops, Cespedes went then to the Camagiiey district, and established the seat of the rerolutionary govern- ment in Guaimaro. On 10 April, 1869, a Cuban congress assembled there and framed a constitu- tion for the republic they were trying to found. Cespedes was made president by acclamation, and remained with his cabinet in Guaimaro until 1870, when he was dislodged by the Spanish forces under Gen. Puello. He then retired to a more secluded and safe place, lost much of his prestige, and in October, 1873, was deposed from the presidency bv the Cuban congress after a short trial. The man- ner of his death has never been explained.


CHABANEL, Natalis, missionary, b. in France in 1613. He was ordained priest, and acted as professor of rhetoric in several colleges of the province of Toulouse. He was sent to Canada in 1643, where he studied the Algonquin language, and settled as a missionary among the Hurons, As he felt a strong repugnance to the habits of the Indians, and fearing that this disgust might result