Page:Cousins's Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature.djvu/88

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
76
Dictionary of English Literature

preacher, and lecturer in metaphysics. He also wrote spirited lyrics and four plays. He was the friend of Ben Jonson, H. Vaughan, and Izaak Walton. He d. at Oxf. of camp fever. Among his plays are The Royal Slave, The Siege, and The Lady Errant. His virtues, learning, and charming manners made him highly popular in his day.


Cary, Alice (1820-1871), and Phœbe (1824-1871).—Were the dau. of a farmer near Cincinnati. The former wrote Clovernook Papers and Clovernook Children, and other tales, and some poems. The latter wrote poems and hymns. Both sisters attained considerable popularity.


Cary, Henry Francis (1772-1844).—Translator, was b. at Gibraltar, and ed. at Oxf., where he was distinguished for his classical attainments. His great work is his translation of the Divina Commedia of Dante (1805-1814), which is not only faithful to the original, but full of poetic fire, and rendered into such fine English as to be itself literature apart from its merits as a translation. He also translated from the Greek. C., who was a clergyman, received a pension in 1841.


Catlin, George (1796-1872).—Painter and writer, b. at Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania, practised for some time as a lawyer, but yielding to his artistic instincts he took to painting. He spent the 7 years, 1832-39, among the Indians of North America, of whom he painted about 500 portraits. He became thoroughly acquainted with their life, and pub. an interesting work, Illustrations of the Manners, etc., of the North American Indians (1857). His later years were spent chiefly in Europe.


Cave, Edward (1691-1754).—Publisher, b. near Rugby, started in 1731 The Gentleman's Magazine, for which Dr. Johnson was parliamentary reporter from 1740. He pub. many of Johnson's works.


Cavendish, George (1500-1561).—Biographer, was Gentleman Usher to Cardinal Wolsey, to whom he was so much attached that he followed him in his disgrace, and continued to serve him until his death. He left in MS. a life of his patron, which is the first separate biography in English, and is the main original authority of the period. Admitting Wolsey's faults, it neverthe less presents him in an attractive light. The simple yet eloquent style gives it a high place as a biography.


Caxton, William (1422-1491).—Printer and translator, b. in the Weald of Kent, was apprenticed to a London mercer. On his master's death in 1441 he went to Bruges, and lived there and in various other places in the Low Countries for over 30 years, engaged apparently as head of an association of English merchants trading in foreign parts, and in negotiating commercial treaties between England and the Dukes of Burgundy. His first literary labour was a translation of a French romance, which he entitled The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye, and which he finished in 1471. About this time he learned the art of printing, and, after being in the service of