Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/587

JAMES mountains, and he embarked again for France. A Spanish expedition sent out in his behalf in 1718 under the direction of Alberoni was scattered by a tempest, only two frigates reaching the appointed rendezvous in the island of Lewis. In 1719 James was married at Avignon to the Princess Clementina of Poland, by whom he had two sons, Charles Edward, and Henry, afterwards Cardinal York. His licentious habits soon led to a separation from his wife, and his indolence and irresolution having completely unfitted him for the role of aspirant to the English throne, the hopes and affections of his adherents were gradually trans ferred to his son Charles Edward, of whose career an account is given in vol. v. p. 426-7. James spent the remainder of his years at Rome, where he was regarded with very little esteem both by the pope and the populace. The papal soldiers mounted guard at the Palazzo Muti, where he resided, and the pope issued an order that he should be styled king of England, but the Italians were in the habit of naming him the king here in contradistiuc- tion to the king there, that is, in England. Latterly his regular income was 12,000 scudi from the pope, which only was supplemented by the donations, probably not very large, of the adherents of the cause in England. Horace Walpole, writing in 1752, thus describes him, " He is tall, meagre, and melancholy of aspect. Enthu siasm and disappointment have stamped a solemnity on his person which rather awakens pity than respect. He seems the phantom which good nature divested of reflexion conjures up when we think of the misfortunes without the demerits of Charles the First. Without the particular features of any Stuart, the Chevalier has the strong lines and fatality of air peculiar to them all." For several of the last years of his life the Chevalier was so infirm in health that he was unable to leave his bed-chamber. He died at Homo, January 12, 1766, and was interred in the church of St Peter s. The Jacobite cause in Scotland has given rise to some of the finest specimens of national ballad literature. Two volumes of Jacobite EcUcs were published in 1819-1821, but the collection is very miscellaneous. An edition of Jacobite songs appeared at Glasgow in 1829, and a more complete collection was published in 1861, edited by Charles Mackay. See History of the Jacobite Club, London, 1712 ; Secret Memoirs of Bar-le-duc, 1716 ; Macpherson s Original Papers ; T/ie Decline of th-c Last Stuarts, printed for the Roxburghe Club, 1843 ; Chambers s History of the Rebellion, 1824 ; Jesse, The Pretenders and their Adherents, 1858 ; Thackeray, Henry E-smond ; Debrosse, L ltaUe il y a Cent Aiis, 1836 ; Lacroix de Maries, Histoire dn Chevalier de Sannt-Gcorgcs ct du Prince Charles Edouard, 1868 and 1876 ; Doran, Mann and Manners at, the Court of Florence, 1875 ; Id., London in the Jacobite Times, 1877. JAMES, GEORGE PAYNE RAINSFOKD (1801-1860), English novelist, was born in George Street, Hanover Square, London, in 1801, and was educated at Greenwich and afterwards in France. He began to write early, and had, according to his own account, composed the stories afterwards published as A String of Pearls before he was seventeen. Contributing plentifully to news papers and magazines, he came under the notice of Wash ington Irving, who is said to have encouraged him to produce (in 1822) his Life of Edward the Black Prince. His next attempt was Richelieu, which was finished in 1825, and was well thought of by Sir Walter Scott (who apparently saw it in manuscript), but was not brought out till 1829. Perhaps Irving and Scott, from their natural amiability and invariable habit of encouraging literary aspirants, were rather dangerous advisers for a writer so well inclined by nature to abundant production as James. But he took tip the ball of historical romance writing at a lucky moment. Scott had firmly established the popularity of the style, and James in England, like Dumas in France, reaped the reward of their masters labours as well as of their own. For thirty years the author of Richelieu continued to pour out novels of the same kind though of varying merit. The full list of his works in prose fiction, verse narrative, and history of an easy kind includes between seventy and eighty items, most of them being three-volume novels of the usual length. The best examples of his style are perhaps Richelieu, 1829; Philip Augustus, 1831 ; Henry Masterton (probably the best of all), 1832; Mary of Burgundy, 1833 ; Darnley, 1839; Corse de Leon, 1841 ; The, Smuggler, 1845. His poetry does not require special mention, nor does his history, though for a short time in the reign of William IV. he held the office of historiographer royal. After writing vigorously in all these styles for about twenty years, James in 1850 went to America with his family. He was appointed consul at Hichmond, Virginia, and held that post from 1852 to 1858. In September of the latter year he was appointed to a similar post at Venice, where he died May 9, 1860. James has been compared to Dumas, and the comparison holds good in respect of kind, though by no means in respect of degree of merit. Both had a certain gift of separating from the picturesque parts of history what could without much difficulty be worked up into picturesque fiction, and both were possessed of a ready pen. Here, I however, the likeness ends. Of purely literary talent James had little. His plots are poor, his descriptions weak, his dialogue often below even a fair average, and he was deplorably prone to repeat himself. His " two cavaliers " who in one form or another open most of his books have passed into a proverb, and Thackeray s good-natured but fatal parody of Barlazure is likely to outlast Richelieu and Darnley by many a year. Nevertheless, though James cannot be allowed any very high rank even among the second class of novelists, the generation that read him, and those chiefly youthful persons who read him now and will read him for some time to come so long as he is attainable on the bookstalls, are not wholly without excuse. He had a considerable portion of the narrative gift, and, though his very best books fall far below Les trois Mousquetaires and La Reine Ma-ryot, there is a certain even level of interest, such as it is, to be found in all of them. James never resorted to illegitimate methods to attract readers, and deserves such credit as may be due to a purveyor of amusement to the public who never caters for the less creditable tastes of his guests. JAMES, JOHN ANGELL (1785-1859), preacher and author, was born at Blandford, Dorsetshire, June 0, 1785. After obtaining at school a knowledge of reading, writing, ciphering, and a little Latin, he was at the age of thirteen bound to a seven years apprenticeship with a linendraper at Poole, with the view of assisting his father in his busi ness at Blandford; but about the close of his term of apprenticeship he began to form the resolution of becoming a preacher, and in 1802 he went to prosecute his studies at the theological college of Gosport. After remaining there for a year and a half, he happened to pay a visit to Birmingham, where his preaching was so highly esteemed by the congregation of Carr s Lane Independent chapel that they invited him to "exercise his ministry amongst them," and accordingly, after finishing his short theolo gical course, he was settled there in the beginning of September 1805, and ordained on the 8th May of the following year. For seven years his success as a preacher was comparatively small, but about 1814 his eloquence almost suddenly acquired for him a popularity which attracted large crowds wherever he officiated in England, and never faded during the long term of his subsequent ministry. At the same time his numerous religious writ ings, the best known of which .are The Anxious Inquirer and An Earnest Ministry, acquired a wide circulation both in England and in America. He died at Birmingham XIII. 71