34-8 BROWNLOW BROWN-SEQUARD mirable acting of Macready, by whom the prin- cipal character was sustained, it met with very moderate success. In 1840 he published " Bor- dello," a poem, the subject of which was drawn from the supposed life of the Mantuan poet, who appears in the Cth canto of Dante's Pur- gatorie. The general public pronounced this work an unintelligible rhapsody, with no mean- ing at all, and Mr. Browning has judiciously omitted it in the collective edition of his poems. Between 1842 and 1840 there appeared from his pen several successive numbers of a collec- tion of dramatic and lyric poems, to which he gave the title of "Bells and Pomegranates;" an affected designation, and which had the further disadvantage of giving no hint as to the nature of the contents. Among these was a tragedy of striking poetical power, called "A Blot on the Scutcheon," which was produced in Drury Lane theatre in 1843, but without marked success. Another play of his, "The Duchess of Cleves," was subsequently brought out at the Haymarket, Miss Cushman person- ating the heroine. In 1849 his collective poems were published in London and Boston, which introduced him to a larger circle of readers than he had before enjoyed. In 1850 he pub- lished " Christmas Eve and Easter Day," a poem, in which a picture is presented from the author's point of view of some of the religious and spiritual aspects of the age, and some of his own convictions are expressed. In 1855 appeared his "Men and Women," a collection of poems. His latest publications are " The Ring and the Book," " Balaustion's Adven- ture " (1871), " Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society " (1871), " Fiflne at the Fair " (1872), and "Red Cotton Nightcap Country" (1873). In November, 1846, Mr. Browning was married to Elizabeth Barrett. Soon after her death he returned to England with their only child, a son, and now resides in or near London. BROWNLOW, William Gannaway, an Ameri- can clergyman, journalist, and politician, born in Wythe co., Va., Aug. 29, 1805. Left an orphan at an early age, he learned the trade of a carpenter. In 1826 he entered the Meth- odist ministry, and labored for ten years as an itinerant preacher. As early as 1828 he be- gan to take part in politics in Tennessee, advo- cating the reelection of John Quincy Adams to the presidency ; and while travelling a circuit in South Carolina in which John 0. Calhoun lived, he publicly opposed nullification. About 1837 he became editor of the "Knoxville Whig," apolitical newspaper. In consequence of his trenchant mode of expression, he became known as "the fighting parson." In 1856 he published " The Iron Wheel Examined and its Spokes Extracted," being a reply to attacks made upon the Methodist church. In 1858 he held a public debate in Philadelphia with the Rev. A. Pryne of New York, which was pub- lished in a volume entitled " Ought American Slavery to be Perpetuated?" Mr. Brownlow taking the affirmative. When the movement for secession took place, he advocated the pres- ervation of the Union as the best safeguard for southern institutions. In December, 1861, he was arrested on charge of treason against the confederacy, and detained till March, 1802, when he was sent within the Union lines. After this he made a tour through the northern states, delivering speeches in the principal cities, and published a book entitled "Sketches of the Rise, Progress, and Decline of Secession," &c. In 1864 he returned to Tennessee, of which he became governor in 1865 ; and in 1869 he was elected to the senate of the United States. BROWX-SIJQfiRD, Charles Edward, a French - American physiologist, born in the island of Mauritius in 1818. His father, Edward Brown, was a native of Philadelphia, and at one time commanded an American merchant vessel. He was lost at sea, in an attempt which he had volunteered in an old and badly found vessel to procure provisions for Mauritius, at that time suffering under famine. His mother, from whom he derives the name Sequard, was a French woman. Young Brown-S6quard was carefully educated in his native island. In 1838 he went to Paris to complete his studies, and received there the degree of M. D. in 1840. Since that time he has devoted his attention mainly to experimental physiology. He has had a prize awarded him live times by the French academy of sciences, and he has twice received a part of the queen's grant for the en- couragement of science from the royal society of London. He visited the United States sev- eral times, and delivered courses of lectures before various scientific bodies, illustrating his doctrines by the most delicate vivisections. II is experiments on the blood give great support to the doctrine that the fibrine of that fluid is an excrementitious product, and not subservient to nutrition. He has produced all the life-giv- ing effects of the natural blood by the trans- fusion of defibrinated blood. By the injection of oxygenated and defibrinated blood the irri- tability of the muscles was restored some time after the occurrence of post-mortem rigidity, and the blood returned by the veins venous in color and containing fibrine. Defibrinated and oxygenated, it was again injected by the artery, and thus the same blood was used for hours in maintaining the irritability of the muscles. Ar- terial blood, according to him, is subservient to nutrition, and maintains the irritability of the muscles ; venous blood is necessary to pro- duce muscular contraction. By his experi- ments on animal heat the temperature in man- kind is placed at 103 F., several degrees high- er than by previous observers. When animals are asphyxiated their temperature at the time exerts a great influence on the duration of life. Previous observers had noted that certain poisons cause a rapid diminution of the animal temperature; according to Brown-Sequard, when the animal heat is maintained by arti- ficial means, the toxic action is much diminished. The great discovery of Sir Charles Bell of the
Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/354
This page needs to be proofread.