HARDICANUTE, or more properly, Hardeknud, King of England, was the son of Canute the Great, by his wife Emma, daughter of Richard, duke of Normandy, and widow of the Saxon Ethelred. Already, when Hardicanute was only a child, and during his father's prolonged residence in his English dominions, Ulf Jarl, Canute's brother-in-law, and regent in Denmark, conspired against the absent monarch, and, to serve the purposes of his own ambition, elevated his master's son to the Danish throne. But Ulf's scheme was soon defeated by the prompt measures of Canute, and his treason was signally punished; while to the boy, as the mere instrument in the hands of a designing traitor, the royal father at once extended his forgiveness. On Canute's death his territories were divided among his sons, Hardicanute receiving Denmark, while England fell to Harold Harefoot, one of Canute's illegitimate children. A strong party of the English, however, headed by Godwin, earl of Kent, supported the superior claims of Hardicanute, as the offspring of Emma, to the sceptre; and had the latter in the year 1036 hastened to England, he might have supplanted his half-brother, and ascended by common consent the vacant throne. But Hardicanute was possessed of little energy; and while he remained irresolute, the period favourable for his efforts passed away. During Harold's short reign of four years Hardicanute continued in Denmark, where he was engaged for some time in hostilities with Magnus surnamed the Good, king of Norway, and which were subsequently terminated by an amicable arrangement. Few records otherwise exist of Hardicanute's government in Denmark, where respect for his father's memory, rather than his own qualities, appears to have secured the obedience of his subjects. In 1040, on the death of Harold, he was called to England to assume the reins of power. The voice of the people had been expressed unanimously in his favour; but if we are to believe the old chronicles, the exactions and rapacity of the new sovereign soon caused the English to repent of their choice. Naturally relying more on the Danes among whom he had so long resided, than on the Saxons, he brought over a vast number of Danish chiefs and courtiers, and held in pay an expensive Danish army and navy. To support such numerous retainers and costly armaments, he was compelled to have frequent recourse to the levying of Danegelds, or compulsory tributes, that gave rise to repeated insurrections. At Worcester, especially, the payment of the tax was obstinately resisted. To punish the malcontents and strike terror into their ringleaders, Hardicanute ordered the town to be pillaged and burned, and great part of the surrounding district laid desolate. In spite, however, of his extortions, he was in certain respects far from being an unworthy ruler. His kindness, for example, to the son of his mother Emma by her first husband Ethelred—afterwards king of England, and known as Edward the Confessor—deserves very considerable praise. He recalled him to England from his exile in Normandy, received him with honour and affection, and gave him an establishment befitting his princely rank. The cares of government were generally left by Hardicanute to Earl Godwin and Emma the queen-mother, while he himself indulged at will his love of indolence and revelry. Immoderately addicted to the pleasures of the table, his death was characteristic of his life. In 1042 at the marriage-feast of one of his Danish nobles, which was celebrated near Lambeth, he suddenly fell down speechless with the wine-cup in his hand, and expired shortly afterwards. As he left no issue, the Danish dynasty in England became extinct. He was buried in the church of Winchester beside his father.—J. J.
HARDING, James Duffield, painter in water-colours, was born at Deptford, Kent, in 1798. The son of an artist, he learned drawing from his father, and received lessons in painting from Prout and, we believe, from Reinagle. At an early date Mr. Harding became a teacher of drawing, and when his rising celebrity rendered it unnecessary for him to continue the drudgery of rudimentary instruction, he still taught the higher branches of landscape. The want of good examples for pupils led him early to avail himself of the then comparatively new art of lithography, and he produced a very large number of drawing-books, which, at least as examples of foliage-drawing, have never been equalled, and have been of inestimable service to students and teachers of drawing. The great advance made in the lithographic art in this country, has been not a little due to the exertions and the example of Harding. He was one of the first to adopt the practice of using two or more stones for printing in tints, and to use the brush and stump as well as the crayon in drawing, so as to produce by means of lithography almost perfect facsimiles of original sketches. His series of "Sketches at Home and Abroad," was one of the first published in this manner; but its capabilities were more fully developed in his "Park and Forest," the work in which his remarkable manipulative dexterity was best shown. Besides these lesson books and studies, Harding also communicated the result of his knowledge and experience as a teacher, and his observation as an artist, in a valuable work entitled "Elementary Art, or the use of the lead pencil advocated and explained," fol. 1834, of which improved editions have since appeared; in the "Principles and Practice of Art," and one or two works of a more initiative character. As a landscape painter in water-colours, Harding occupied a place in the foremost rank of his profession. For many years his pictures were among the leading attractions of the exhibitions of the Society of Painters in Water-colours. His pictures embrace almost every variety of landscape, and include a wide range of foreign as well as native scenery. He made free use of body-colour—a practice he was, we believe, the first to adopt. About twenty years before his death, Harding exhibited at the Royal Academy some paintings in oil. He showed equal mastery in this vehicle as in that to which he had been so long accustomed, withdrew from the Society of Painters in Water-colours, and inscribed his name as a candidate for the honours of the Academy. But he returned with renewed zeal to water. He produced, in 1861, a lithographed work, "Selections from the Picturesque," in which the imitation of the original drawings is even closer than in the "Sketches." He died on the 4th of December, 1863.—J. T—e.
HARDING, John. See Hardyng.
HARDING, Karl Ludwig, a celebrated astronomer, was born at Bremen in 1775. While he was director of the observatory at Lilienthal, near his native city, the astronomical world was surprised by the discovery of two small new planets (afterwards called asteroids by Sir W. Herschel), Ceres and Pallas—the first by M. Piazzi in 1800, and the second by Dr. Olbers of Bremen in 1803. He was thus led to construct charts of the stars in that region of the heavens in which the two new planets moved; and while he was thus occupied he discovered a third new planet, to which he gave the name of Juno. In the same region Dr. Olbers discovered Vesta in 1807, and since that time the number of these asteroids has increased to upwards of sixty, and will certainly amount to many more. The merit of discovering a new planet when only two had been found was considered so great, that Harding was admitted into most of the learned societies in Europe, and received the medal given by Lalande for the most important astronomical discovery in 1803. In the same year he was appointed professor of astronomy and director of the observatory in the university of Göttingen. M. Harding is the author of several memoirs on mathematical subjects in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Göttingen. He died at Göttingen 15th July, 1834.—D. B.
HARDING, Thomas, D.D., born in 1512, is indebted for his reputation to the part he took against Bishop Jewel in the great theological controversy of the sixteenth century. The two antagonists were born in Devonshire, not far from each other, and were educated together for a time in a school at Barnstaple. Harding was removed to Winchester school, and thence proceeded to Oxford. He became a fellow of New college, took his M.A. degree in 1542, and about the same time was appointed professor of Hebrew in the university. On the accession of Edward VI. Harding showed himself an ardent protestant, and was recommended by his zeal to the duke of Suffolk, who made him his domestic chaplain, an office which gave him some influence with the duke's celebrated daughter, Lady Jane Grey. When the death of Edward brought Queen Mary to the throne he became a zealous papist, and incurred the displeasure of many former friends, but especially of Lady Jane, who wrote him a letter severely rating him for his apostasy. Harding was consoled under the loss of friendships by being made a prebendary at Winchester, doctor of divinity at Oxford, and treasurer of the church at Salisbury. His fair prospects of preferment vanished when Elizabeth became queen. The treasurership was taken from him; and he consulted his safety by flight into Brabant, settling at Louvain. There he brought out his replies and rejoinders to Jewel's able works, whose learning, though learned himself, he could not overmatch. Though he survived his exile
