in Paris on the 11th of August 1729, in the house of the prince de
Conti, to whom his father was valet. Young Lebrun had among his
schoolfellows a son of Louis Racine whose disciple he became. In 1755 he
published an _Ode sur les désastres de Lisbon_. In 1759 he married Marie
Anne de Surcourt, addressed in his _Élégies_ as Fanny. To the early
years of his marriage belongs his poem _Nature_. His wife suffered much
from his violent temper, and when in 1774 she brought an action against
him to obtain a separation, she was supported by Lebrun's own mother and
sister. He had been _secrétaire des commandements_ to the prince de
Conti, and on his patron's death was deprived of his occupation. He
suffered a further misfortune in the loss of his capital by the
bankruptcy of the prince de Guémené. To this period belongs a long poem,
the _Veillées des Muses_, which remained unfinished, and his ode to
Buffon, which ranks among his best works. Dependent on government
pensions he changed his politics with the times. Calonne he compared to
the great Sully, and Louis XVI. to Henry IV., but the Terror
nevertheless found in him its official poet. He occupied rooms in the
Louvre, and fulfilled his obligations by shameless attacks on the
unfortunate king and queen. His excellent ode on the _Vengeur_ and the
_Ode nationale contre Angleterre_ on the occasion of the projected
invasion of England are in honour of the power of Napoleon. This
"versatility" has so much injured Lebrun's reputation that it is
difficult to appreciate his real merit. He had a genius for epigram, and
the quatrains and dizaines directed against his many enemies have a
verve generally lacking in his odes. The one directed against La Harpe
is called by Sainte-Beuve the "queen of epigrams." La Harpe has said
that the poet, called by his friends, perhaps with a spice of irony,
Lebrun-Pindare, had written many fine strophes but not one good ode. The
critic exposed mercilessly the obscurities and unlucky images which
occur even in the ode to Buffon, and advised the author to imitate the
simplicity and energy that adorned Buffon's prose. Lebrun died in Paris
on the 31st of August 1807.
His works were published by his friend P. L. Ginguené in 1811. The
best of them are included in Prosper Poitevin's "_Petits poètes
français_," which forms part of the "_Panthéon littéraire_."
LE CARON, HENRI (whose real name was THOMAS MILLER BEACH) (1841-1894),
British secret service agent, was born at Colchester, on the 26th of
September 1841. He was of an adventurous character, and when nineteen
years old went to Paris, where he found employment in business connected
with America. Infected with the excitement of the American Civil War, he
crossed the Atlantic in 1861 and enlisted in the Northern army, taking
the name of Henri Le Caron. In 1864 he married a young lady who had
helped him to escape from some Confederate marauders; and by the end of
the war he rose to be major. In 1865, through a companion in arms named
O'Neill, he was brought into contact with Fenianism, and having learnt
of the Fenian plot against Canada, he mentioned the designs when writing
home to his father. Mr Beach told his local M.P., who in turn told the
Home Secretary, and the latter asked Mr Beach to arrange for further
information. Le Caron, inspired (as all the evidence shows) by genuinely
patriotic feeling, from that time till 1889 acted for the British
government as a paid military spy. He was a proficient in medicine,
among other qualifications for this post, and he remained for years on
intimate terms with the most extreme men in the Fenian organization
under all its forms. His services enabled the British government to take
measures which led to the fiasco of the Canadian invasion of 1870 and
Riel's surrender in 1871, and he supplied full details concerning the
various Irish-American associations, in which he himself was a prominent
member. He was in the secrets of the "new departure" in 1879-1881, and
in the latter year had an interview with Parnell at the House of
Commons, when the Irish leader spoke sympathetically of an armed
revolution in Ireland. For twenty-five years he lived at Detroit and
other places in America, paying occasional visits to Europe, and all the
time carrying his life in his hand. The Parnell Commission of 1889 put
an end to this. Le Caron was subpoenaed by _The Times_, and in the
witness-box the whole story came out, all the efforts of Sir Charles
Russell in cross-examination failing to shake his testimony, or to
impair the impression of iron tenacity and absolute truthfulness which
his bearing conveyed. His career, however, for good or evil, was at an
end. He published the story of his life, _Twenty-five Years in the
Secret Service_, and it had an immense circulation. But he had to be
constantly guarded, his acquaintances were hampered from seeing him, and
he was the victim of a painful disease, of which he died on the 1st of
April 1894. The report of the Parnell Commission is his monument.
LE CATEAU, or CATEAU-CAMBRÉSIS, a town of northern France, in the
department of Nord, on the Selle, 15 m. E.S.E. of Cambrai by road. Pop.
(1906) 10,400. A church of the early 17th century and a town-hall in the
Renaissance style are its chief buildings. Its institutions include a
board of trade-arbitration and a communal college, and its most
important industries are wool-spinning and weaving. Formed by the union
of the two villages of Péronne and Vendelgies, under the protection of a
castle built by the bishop of Cambrai, Le Cateau became the seat of an
abbey in the 11th century. In the 15th it was frequently taken and
retaken, and in 1556 it was burned by the French, who in 1559 signed a
celebrated treaty with Spain in the town. It was finally ceded to France
by the peace of Nijmwegen in 1678.
LECCE (anc. _Lupiae_), a town and archiepiscopal see of Apulia, Italy,
capital of the province of Lecce, 24 m. S.E. of Brindisi by rail. Pop.
(1906) 35,179. The town is remarkable for the number of buildings of the
17th century, in the rococo style, which it contains; among these are
the cathedral of S. Oronzo, and the churches of S. Chiara, S. Croce, S.
Domenico, &c., the Seminario, and the Prefettura (the latter contains a
museum, with a collection of Greek vases, &c.). Buildings of an earlier
period are not numerous, but the fine portal of the Romanesque church of
SS. Nicola e Cataldo, built by Tancred in 1180, may be noted. Another
old church is S. Maria di Cerrate, near the town. Lecce contains a large
government tobacco factory, and is the centre of a fertile agricultural
district. To the E. 7½ m. is the small harbour of S. Cataldo, reached by
electric tramway. Lecce is quite close to the site of the ancient
Lupiae, equidistant (25 m.) from Brundusium and Hydruntum, remains of
which are mentioned as existing up to the 15th century. A colony was
founded there in Roman times, and Hadrian made a harbour--no doubt at S.
Cataldo. Hardly a mile west was Rudiae, the birthplace of the poet
Ennius, spoken of by Silius Italicus as worthy of mention for that
reason alone. Its site was marked by the now deserted village of Rugge.
The name Lycea, or Lycia, begins to appear in the 6th century. The city
was for some time held by counts of Norman blood, among whom the most
noteworthy is Bohemond, son of Robert Guiscard. It afterwards passed to
the Orsini. The rank of provincial capital was bestowed by Ferdinand of
Aragon in acknowledgment of the fidelity of Lecce to his cause.
(T. As.)
See M. S. Briggs, _In the Heel of Italy_ (1910).
LECCO, a town of Lombardy, in the province of Como, 32 m. by rail N. by
E. of Milan, and reached by steamer from Como, 673 ft. above sea-level.
Pop. (1901) 10,352. It is situated near the southern extremity of the
eastern branch of the Lake of Como, which is frequently distinguished as
the Lake of Lecco. At Lecco begins the line (run by electricity) to
Colico, whence there are branches to Chiavenna and Sondrio; and another
line runs to Bergamo. To the south the Adda is crossed by a fine bridge
originally constructed in 1335, and rebuilt in 1609 by Fuentes. Lecco,
in spite of its antiquity, presents a modern appearance, almost the only
old building being its castle, of which a part remains. Its schools are
particularly good. Besides iron-works, there are copper-works,
brass-foundries, olive-oil mills and a manufacture of wax candles; and
silk-spinning, cotton-spinning and wood-carving. In the neighbourhood is
the villa of Caleotto, the residence of Alessandro Manzoni, who in his
_Promessi Sposi_, has left a full description of the district. A statue
has been erected to him.
In the 11th century Lecco, previously the seat of a marquisate, was
presented to the bishops of Como by Otto II.; but in the 12th century it
passed to the archbishops of Milan, and in 1127 it assisted the Milanese
in the destruction of Como. During the 13th century it was struggling
for its existence with the metropolitan city; and its fate seemed to be
sealed when the Visconti drove its inhabitants across the lake to
Valmadrera, and forbade them to raise their town from its ashes. But in
a few years the people returned; Azzone Visconti made Lecco a strong
fortress, and in 1335 united it with the Milanese territory by a bridge
across the Adda. During the 15th and 16th centuries the citadel of Lecco
was an object of endless contention. In 1647 the town with its territory
was made a countship. Morone, Charles V.'s Italian chancellor, was born
in Lecco.
See A. L. Apostolo, _Lecco ed il suo territorio_ (Lecco, 1855).
LECH (_Licus_), a river of Germany in the kingdom of Bavaria, 177 m.
long, with a drainage basin of 2550 sq. m. It rises in the Vorarlberg
Alps, at an altitude of 6120 ft. It winds out of the gloomy limestone
mountains, flows in a north-north-easterly direction, and enters the
plains at Füssen (2580 ft.), where it forms rapids and a fall, then
pursues a northerly course past Augsburg, where it receives the Wertach,
and joins the Danube from the right just below Donauwörth (1330 ft.). It
is not navigable, owing to its torrential character and the gravel beds
which choke its channel. More than once great historic events have been
decided upon its banks. On the Lechfeld, a stony waste some miles long,
between the Lech and the Wertach, the emperor Otto I. defeated the
Hungarians in August 955. Tilly, in attempting to defend the passage of
the stream at Rain against the forces of Gustavus Adolphus, was fatally
wounded, on the 5th of April 1632. The river was formerly the boundary
between Bavaria and Swabia.
LE CHAMBON, or LE CHAMBON-FEUGEROLLES, a town of east-central France in
the department of Loire, 7½ m. S.W. of St Étienne by rail, on the
Ondaine, a tributary of the Loire. Pop. (1906) town, 7525; commune,
12,011. Coal is mined in the neighbourhood, and there are forges, steel
works, manufactures of tools and other iron goods, and silk mills. The
feudal castle of Feugerolles on a hill to the south-east dates in part
from the 11th century.
Between Le Chambon and St Étienne is La Ricamarie (pop. of town 5289)
also of importance for its coal-mines. Many of the galleries of a number
of these mines are on fire, probably from spontaneous combustion.
According to popular tradition these fires date from the time of the
Saracens; more authentically from the 15th century.
LE CHAPELIER, ISAAC RENÉ GUY (1754-1794), French politician, was born at
Rennes on the 12th of June 1754, his father being _bâtonnier_ of the
corporation of lawyers in that town. He entered his father's profession,
and had some success as an orator. In 1789 he was elected as a deputy to
the States General by the Tiers-État of the _sénéchaussée_ of Rennes. He
adopted advanced opinions, and was one of the founders of the Breton
Club (see JACOBIN CLUB); his influence in the Constituent Assembly was
considerable, and on the 3rd of August 1789 he was elected its
president. Thus he presided over the Assembly during the important
period following the 4th of August; he took an active part in the
debates, and was a leading member of the committee which drew up the new
constitution; he further presented a report on the liberty of theatres
and on literary copyright. He was also conspicuous as opposing
Robespierre when he proposed that members of the Constituent Assembly
should not be eligible for election to the proposed new Assembly. After
the flight of the king to Varennes (20th of June 1792), his opinions
became more moderate, and on the 29th of September he brought forward a
motion to restrict the action of the clubs. This, together with a visit
which he paid to England in 1792 made him suspect, and he was denounced
on his return for conspiring with foreign nations. He went into hiding,
but was discovered in consequence of a pamphlet which he published to
defend himself, arrested and condemned to death by the Revolutionary
Tribunal. He was executed at Paris on the 22nd of April 1794.
See A. Aulard, _Les Orateurs de la constituante_ (2nd ed., Paris,
1905); R. Kerviler, _Récherches et notices sur les députés de la
Bretagne aux états généraux_ (2 vols., Rennes, 1888-1889); P. J.
Levot, _Biographie bretonne_ (2 vols., 1853-1857).
LECHLER, GOTTHARD VICTOR (1811-1888), German Lutheran theologian, was
born on the 18th of April 1811 at Kloster Reichenbach in Württemberg. He
studied at Tübingen under F. C. Baur, and became in 1858 pastor of the
church of St Thomas, professor Ordinarius of historical theology and
superintendent of the Lutheran church of Leipzig. He died on the 26th of
December 1888. A disciple of Neander, he belonged to the extreme right
of the school of mediating theologians. He is important as the historian
of early Christianity and of the pre-Reformation period. Although F. C.
Baur was his teacher, he did not attach himself to the Tübingen school;
in reply to the contention that there are traces of a sharp conflict
between two parties, Paulinists and Petrinists, he says that "we find
variety coupled with agreement, and unity with difference, between Paul
and the earlier apostles; we recognize the one spirit in the many
gifts." His _Das apostolische und das nachapostolische Zeitalter_
(1851), which developed out of a prize essay (1849), passed through
three editions in Germany (3rd ed., 1885), and was translated into
English (2 vols., 1886). The work which in his own opinion was his
greatest, _Johann von Wiclif und die Vorgeschichte der Reformation_ (2
vols., 1873), appeared in English with the title _John Wiclif and his
English Precursors_ (1878, new ed., 1884). An earlier work, _Geschichte
des engl. Deïsmus_ (1841), is still regarded as a valuable contribution
to the study of religious thought in England.
Lechler's other works include _Geschichte der Presbyterial- und
Synodal-verfassung_ (1854), _Urkundenfunde zur Geschichte des christl.
Altertums_ (1886), and biographies of Thomas Bradwardine (1862) and
Robert Grosseteste (1867). He wrote part of the commentary on the Acts
of the Apostles in J. P. Lange's _Bibelwerk_. From 1882 he edited with
F. W. Dibelius the _Beiträge zur sächsischen Kirchengeschichte_.
_Johannes Hus_ (1890) was published after his death.
LECKY, WILLIAM EDWARD HARTPOLE (1838-1903), Irish historian and
publicist, was born at Newtown Park, near Dublin, on the 26th of March
1838, being the eldest son of John Hartpole Lecky, whose family had for
many generations been landowners in Ireland. He was educated at
Kingstown, Armagh, and Cheltenham College, and at Trinity College,
Dublin, where he graduated B.A. in 1859 and M.A. in 1863, and where,
with a view to becoming a clergyman in the Irish Protestant Church, he
went through a course of divinity. In 1860 he published anonymously a
small book entitled _The Religious Tendencies of the Age_, but on
leaving college he abandoned his first intention and turned to
historical work. In 1861 he published _Leaders of Public Opinion in
Ireland_, a brief sketch of the lives and work of Swift, Flood, Grattan
and O'Connell, which gave decided promise of his later admirable work in
the same field. This book, originally published anonymously, was
republished in 1871; and the essay on Swift, rewritten and amplified,
appeared again in 1897 as an introduction to a new edition of Swift's
works. Two learned surveys of certain aspects of history followed: _A
History of the Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe_ (2 vols.,
1865), and _A History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne_
(2 vols., 1869). Some criticism was aroused by these books, especially
by the last named, with its opening dissertation on "the natural history
of morals," but both have been generally accepted as acute and
suggestive commentaries upon a wide range of facts. Lecky then devoted
himself to the chief work of his life, _A History of England during the
Eighteenth Century_, vols. i. and ii. of which appeared in 1878, and
vols. vii. and viii. (completing the work) in 1890. His object was "to
disengage from the great mass of facts those which relate to the
permanent forces of the nation, or which indicate some of the more
enduring features of national life," and in the carrying out of this
task Lecky displays many of the qualities of a great historian. The work
is distinguished by the lucidity of its style, but the fulness and
extent of the authorities referred to, and, above all, by the judicial
impartiality maintained by the author throughout. These qualities are
perhaps most conspicuous and most valuable in the chapters which deal
with the history of Ireland, and in the cabinet edition of 1892, in 12
vols. (frequently reprinted) this part of the work is separated from the
rest, and occupies five volumes under the title of _A History of Ireland
in the Eighteenth Century_. A volume of _Poems_, published in 1891, was
characterized by a certain frigidity and by occasional lapses into
commonplace, objections which may also be fairly urged against much of
Lecky's prose-writing. In 1896 he published two volumes entitled
_Democracy and Liberty_, in which he considered, with special reference
to Great Britain, France and America, some of the tendencies of modern
democracies. The somewhat gloomy conclusions at which he arrived
provoked much criticism both in Great Britain and America, which was
renewed when he published in a new edition (1899) an elaborate and very
depreciatory estimate of Gladstone, then recently dead. This work,
though essentially different from the author's purely historical
writings, has many of their merits, though it was inevitable that other
minds should take a different view of the evidence. In _The Map of Life_
(1900) he discussed in a popular style some of the ethical problems
which arise in everyday life. In 1903 he published a revised and greatly
enlarged edition of _Leaders of Public Opinion in Ireland_, in two
volumes, from which the essay on Swift was omitted and that on O'Connell
was expanded into a complete biography of the great advocate of repeal
of the Union. Though always a keen sympathizer with the Irish people in
their misfortunes and aspirations, and though he had criticized severely
the methods by which the Act of Union was passed, Lecky, who grew up as
a moderate Liberal, was from the first strenuously opposed to
Gladstone's policy of Home Rule, and in 1895 he was returned to
parliament as Unionist member for Dublin University. In 1897 he was made
a privy councillor, and among the coronation honours in 1902 he was
nominated an original member of the new Order of Merit. His university
honours included the degree of LL.D. from Dublin, St Andrews and
Glasgow, the degree of D.C.L. from Oxford and the degree of Litt.D. from
Cambridge. In 1894 he was elected corresponding member of the Institute
of France. He contributed occasionally to periodical literature, and two
of his addresses, _The Political Value of History_ (1892) and _The
Empire, its Value and its Growth_ (1893), were published. He died in
London on the 22nd of October 1903. He married in 1871 Elizabeth,
baroness de Dedem, daughter of baron de Dedem, a general in the Dutch
service, but had no children. Mrs Lecky contributed to various reviews a
number of articles, chiefly on historical and political subjects. A
volume of Lecky's _Historical and Political Essays_ was published
posthumously (London, 1908).
LE CLERC [CLERICUS], JEAN (1657-1736), French Protestant theologian, was
born on the 19th of March 1657 at Geneva, where his father, Stephen Le
Clerc, was professor of Greek. The family originally belonged to the
neighbourhood of Beauvais in France, and several of its members acquired
some name in literature. Jean Le Clerc applied himself to the study of
philosophy under J. R. Chouet (1642-1731) the Cartesian, and attended
the theological lectures of P. Mestrezat, Franz Turretin and Louis
Tronchin (1629-1705). In 1678-1679 he spent some time at Grenoble as
tutor in a private family; on his return to Geneva he passed his
examinations and received ordination. Soon afterwards he went to Saumur,
where in 1679 were published _Liberii de Sancto Amore Epistolae
Theologicae_ (Irenopoli: Typis Philalethianis), usually attributed to
him; they deal with the doctrine of the Trinity, the hypostatic union of
the two natures in Jesus Christ, original sin, and the like, in a manner
sufficiently far removed from that of the conventional orthodoxy of the
period. In 1682 he went to London, where he remained six months,
preaching on alternate Sundays in the Walloon church and in the Savoy
chapel. Passing to Amsterdam he was introduced to John Locke and to
Philip v. Limborch, professor at the Remonstrant college; the
acquaintance with Limborch soon ripened into a close friendship, which
strengthened his preference for the Remonstrant theology, already
favourably known to him by the writings of his grand-uncle, Stephan
Curcellaeus (d. 1645) and by those of Simon Episcopius. A last attempt
to live at Geneva, made at the request of relatives there, satisfied him
that the theological atmosphere was uncongenial, and in 1684 he finally
settled at Amsterdam, first as a moderately successful preacher, until
ecclesiastical jealousy shut him out from that career, and afterwards as
professor of philosophy, belles-lettres and Hebrew in the Remonstrant
seminary. This appointment, which he owed to Limborch, he held from
1684, and in 1712 on the death of his friend he was called to occupy the
chair of church history also. His suspected Socinianism was the cause,
it is said, of his exclusion from the chair of dogmatic theology. Apart
from his literary labours, Le Clerc's life at Amsterdam was uneventful.
In 1691 he married a daughter of Gregorio Leti. From 1728 onward he was
subject to repeated strokes of paralysis, and he died on the 8th of
January 1736.
A full catalogue of the publications of Le Clerc will be found, with
biographical material, in E. and E. Haag's _France Protestante_ (where
seventy-three works are enumerated), or in J. G. de Chauffepié's
Dictionnaire. Only the most important of these can be mentioned here.
In 1685 he published _Sentimens de quelques théologiens de Hollande
sur l'histoire critique du Vieux Testament composée par le P. Richard
Simon_, in which, while pointing out what he believed to be the faults
of that author, he undertook to make some positive contributions
towards a right understanding of the Bible. Among these last may be
noted his argument against the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch,
his views as to the manner in which the five books were composed, his
opinions (singularly free for the time in which he lived) on the
subject of inspiration in general, and particularly as to the
inspiration of Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles. Richard Simon's
_Réponse_ (1686) elicited from Le Clerc a _Défense des sentimens_ in
the same year, which was followed by a new _Réponse_ (1687). In 1692
appeared his _Logica sive Ars Ratiocinandi_, and also _Ontologia et
Pneumatologia_; these, with the _Physica_ (1695), are incorporated
with the _Opera Philosophica_, which have passed through several
editions. In 1693 his series of Biblical commentaries began with that
on Genesis; the series was not completed until 1731. The portion
relating to the New Testament books included the paraphrase and notes
of Henry Hammond (1605-1660). Le Clerc's commentary had a great
influence in breaking up traditional prejudices and showing the
necessity for a more scientific inquiry into the origin and meaning of
the biblical books. It was on all sides hotly attacked. His _Ars
Critica_ appeared in 1696, and, in continuation, _Epistolae Criticae
et Ecclesiasticae_ in 1700. Le Clerc's new edition of the _Apostolic
Fathers_ of Johann Cotelerius (1627-1686), published in 1698, marked
an advance in the critical study of these documents. But the greatest
literary influence of Le Clerc was probably that which he exercised
over his contemporaries by means of the serials, or, if one may so
call them, reviews, of which he was editor. These were the
_Bibliothèque universelle et historique_ (Amsterdam, 25 vols. 12 mo.,
1686-1693), begun with J. C. de la Croze; the _Bibliothèque choisie_
(Amsterdam, 28 vols., 1703-1713); and the _Bibliothèque ancienne et
moderne_, (29 vols., 1714-1726).
See Le Clerc's _Parrhasiana ou pensées sur des matières de critique,
d'histoire, de morale, et de politique: avec la défense de divers
ouvrages de M. L. C. par Théodore Parrhase_ (Amsterdam, 1699); and
_Vita et opera ad annum MDCCXI., amici ejus opusculum, philosophicis
Clerici operibus subjiciendum_, also attributed to himself. The
supplement to Hammond's notes was translated into English in 1699,
_Parrhasiana, or Thoughts on Several Subjects_, in 1700, the _Harmony
of the Gospels_ in 1701, and _Twelve Dissertations out of M. Le
Clerc's Genesis_ in 1696.
LECOCQ, ALEXANDRE CHARLES (1832- ), French musical composer, was born
in Paris, on the 3rd of June 1832. He was admitted into the
Conservatoire in 1849, being already an accomplished pianist. He studied
under Bazin, Halévy and Benoist, winning the first prize for harmony in
1850, and the second prize for fugue in 1852. He first gained notice by
dividing with Bizet the first prize for an operetta in a competition
instituted by Offenbach. His operetta, _Le Docteur miracle_, was
performed at the Bouffes Parisiens in 1857. After that he wrote
constantly for theatres, but produced nothing worthy of mention until
_Fleur de thé_ (1868), which ran for more than a hundred nights. _Les
Cent vierges_ (1872) was favourably received also, but all his previous
successes were cast into the shade by _La Fille de Madame Angot_ (Paris,
1873; London, 1873), which was performed for 400 nights consecutively,
and has since gained and retained enormous popularity. After 1873 Lecocq
produced a large number of comic operas, though he never equalled his
early triumph in _La Fille de Madame Angot_. Among the best of his
pieces are _Giroflé-Girofla_ (Paris and London, 1874); _Les Prés
Saint-Gervais_ (Paris and London, 1874); _La Petite Mariée_ (Paris,
1875; London, 1876, revived as _The Scarlet Feather_, 1897); _Le Petit
Duc_ (Paris, 1878; London, as _The Little Duke_, 1878); _La Petite
Mademoiselle_ (Paris, 1879; London, 1880); _Le Jour et la Nuit_ (Paris,
1881; London, as _Manola_, 1882); _Le Coeur et la main_ (Paris, 1882;
London, as _Incognita_, 1893); _La Princesse des Canaries_ (Paris, 1883;
London, as _Pepita_, 1888). In 1899 a ballet by Lecocq, entitled _Le
Cygne_, was staged at the Opéra Comique, Paris; and in 1903 _Yetta_ was
produced at Brussels.
LECOINTE-PUYRAVEAU, MICHEL MATHIEU (1764-1827), French politician, was
born at Saint-Maixent (Deux-Sèvres) on the 13th of December 1764. Deputy
for his department to the Legislative Assembly in 1792, and to the
Convention in the same year, he voted for "the death of the tyrant." His
association with the Girondins nearly involved him in their fall, in
spite of his vigorous republicanism. He took part in the revolution of
Thermidor, but protested against the establishment of the Directory, and
continually pressed for severer measures against the _émigrés_, and even
their relations who had remained in France. He was secretary and then
president of the Council of Five Hundred, and under the Consulate a
member of the Tribunate. He took no part in public affairs under the
Empire, but was lieutenant-general of police for south-east France
during the Hundred Days. After Waterloo he took ship from Toulon, but
the ship was driven back by a storm and he narrowly escaped massacre at
Marseilles. After six weeks' imprisonment in the Château d'If he
returned to Paris, escaping, after the proscription of the regicides, to
Brussels, where he died on the 15th of January 1827.
LE CONTE, JOSEPH (1823-1901), American geologist, of Huguenot descent,
was born in Liberty county, Georgia, on the 26th of February 1823. He
was educated at Franklin College, Georgia, where he graduated (1841); he
afterwards studied medicine and received his degree at the New York
College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1845. After practising for three
or four years at Macon, Georgia, he entered Harvard, and studied natural
history under L. Agassiz. An excursion made with Professors J. Hall and
Agassiz to the Helderberg mountains of New York developed a keen
interest in geology. After graduating at Harvard, Le Conte in 1851
accompanied Agassiz on an expedition to study the Florida reefs. On his
return he became professor of natural science in Oglethorpe University,
Georgia; and from 1852 to 1856 professor of natural history and geology
in Franklin College. From 1857 to 1869 he was professor of chemistry and
geology in South Carolina College, and he was then appointed professor
of geology and natural history in the university of California, a post
which he held until his death. He published a series of papers on
monocular and binocular vision, and also on psychology. His chief
contributions, however, related to geology, and in all he wrote he was
lucid and philosophical. He described the fissure-eruptions in western
America, discoursed on earth-crust movements and their causes and on the
great features of the earth's surface. As separate works he published
_Elements of Geology_ (1878, 5th ed. 1889); _Religion and Science_
(1874); and _Evolution: its History, its Evidences, and its Relation
to Religious Thought_ (1888). He was president of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science in 1892, and of the
Geological Society of America in 1896. He died in the Yosemite Valley,
California, on the 6th of June 1901.
See Obituary by J. J. Stevenson, _Annals of New York Acad. of
Sciences_, vol. xiv. (1902), p. 150.
LECONTE DE LISLE, CHARLES MARIE RENÉ (1818-1894), French poet, was born
in the island of Réunion on the 22nd of October 1818. His father, an
army surgeon, who brought him up with great severity, sent him to travel
in the East Indies with a view to preparing him for a commercial life.
After this voyage he went to Rennes to complete his education, studying
especially Greek, Italian and history. He returned once or twice to
Réunion, but in 1846 settled definitely in Paris. His first volume, _La
Vénus de Milo_, attracted to him a number of friends many of whom were
passionately devoted to classical literature. In 1873 he was made
assistant librarian at the Luxembourg; in 1886 he was elected to the
Academy in succession to Victor Hugo. His _Poèmes antiques_ appeared in
1852; _Poèmes et poésies_ in 1854; _Le Chemin de la croix_ in 1859; the
_Poèmes barbares_, in their first form, in 1862; _Les Erinnyes_, a
tragedy after the Greek model, in 1872; for which occasional music was
provided by Jules Massenet; the _Poèmes tragiques_ in 1884;
_L'Apollonide_, another classical tragedy, in 1888; and two posthumous
volumes, _Derniers poèmes_ in 1899, and _Premières poésies et lettres
intimes_ in 1902. In addition to his original work in verse, he
published a series of admirable prose translations of Theocritus, Homer,
Hesiod, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Horace. He died at Voisins,
near Louveciennes (Seine-et-Oise), on the 18th of July 1894.
In Leconte de Lisle the Parnassian movement seems to crystallize. His
verse is clear, sonorous, dignified, deliberate in movement, classically
correct in rhythm, full of exotic local colour, of savage names, of
realistic rhetoric. It has its own kind of romance, in its "legend of
the ages," so different from Hugo's, so much fuller of scholarship and
the historic sense, yet with far less of human pity. Coldness cultivated
as a kind of artistic distinction seems to turn all his poetry to
marble, in spite of the fire at its heart. Most of Leconte de Lisle's
poems are little chill epics, in which legend is fossilized. They have
the lofty monotony of a single conception of life and of the universe.
He sees the world as what Byron called it, "a glorious blunder," and
desires only to stand a little apart from the throng, meditating
scornfully. Hope, with him, becomes no more than this desperate
certainty:--
"Tu te tairas, ô voix sinistre des vivants!"
His only prayer is to Death, "divine Death," that it may gather its
children to its breast:--
"Affranchis-nous du temps, du nombre et de l'espace,
Et rends-nous le repos que la vie a troublé!"
The interval which is his he accepts with something of the defiance of
his own Cain, refusing to fill it with the triviality of happiness,
waiting even upon beauty with a certain inflexible austerity. He listens
and watches, throughout the world, for echoes and glimpses of great
tragic passions, languid with fire in the East, a tumultuous
conflagration in the middle ages, a sombre darkness in the heroic ages
of the North. The burning emptiness of the desert attracts him, the
inexplicable melancholy of the dogs that bark at the moon; he would
interpret the jaguar's dreams, the sleep of the condor. He sees nature
with the same wrathful impatience as man, praising it for its
destructive energies, its haste to crush out human life before the stars
fall into chaos, and the world with them, as one of the least of stars.
He sings the "Dies Irae" exultingly; only seeming to desire an end of
God as well as of man, universal nothingness. He conceives that he does
well to be angry, and this anger is indeed the personal note of his
pessimism; but it leaves him somewhat apart from the philosophical
poets, too fierce for wisdom and not rapturous enough for poetry. (A.
Sy.)
See J. Dornis, _Leconte de Lisle intime_ (1895); F. Calmette, _Un Demi
siècle littéraire, Leconte de Lisle et ses amis_ (1902); Paul Bourget,
_Nouveaux essais de psychologie contemporaine_ (1885); F. Brunetière,
_L'Évolution de la poésie lyrique en France au XIX^e siècle_ (1894);
Maurice Spronck, _Les Artistes littéraires_ (1889); J. Lemaître, _Les
Contemporains_ (2nd series, 1886); F. Brunetière, _Nouveaux essais sur
la litt. contemp._ (1895).
LE COQ, ROBERT (d. 1373), French bishop, was born at Montdidier,
although he belonged to a bourgeois family of Orléans, where he first
attended school before coming to Paris. In Paris he became advocate to
the parlement (1347); then King John appointed him master of requests,
and in 1351, a year during which he received many other honours, he
became bishop of Laon. At the opening of 1354 he was sent with the
cardinal of Boulogne, Pierre I., duke of Bourbon, and Jean VI., count of
Vendome, to Mantes to treat with Charles the Bad, king of Navarre, who
had caused the constable, Charles of Spain, to be assassinated, and from
this time dates his connexion with this king. At the meeting of the
estates which opened in Paris in October 1356 Le Coq played a leading
rôle and was one of the most outspoken of the orators, especially when
petitions were presented to the dauphin Charles, denouncing the bad
government of the realm and demanding the banishment of the royal
councillors. Soon, however, the credit of the estates having gone down,
he withdrew to his diocese, but at the request of the bourgeois of Paris
he speedily returned. The king of Navarre had succeeded in escaping from
prison and had entered Paris, where his party was in the ascendant; and
Robert le Coq became the most powerful person in his council. No one
dared to contradict him, and he brought into it whom he pleased. He did
not scruple to reveal to the king of Navarre secret deliberations, but
his fortune soon turned. He ran great danger at the estates of Compiègne
in May 1358, where his dismissal was demanded, and he had to flee to St
Denis, where Charles the Bad and Étienne Marcel came to find him. After
the death of Marcel, he tried, unsuccessfully, to deliver Laon, his
episcopal town, to the king of Navarre, and he was excluded from the
amnesty promised in the treaty of Calais (1360) by King John to the
partisans of Charles the Bad. His temporalities had been seized, and he
was obliged to flee from France. In 1363, thanks to the support of the
king of Navarre, he was given the bishopric of Calahorra in the kingdom
of Aragon, which he administered until his death in 1373.
See L. C. Douët d'Arcq, "Acte d'accusation contre Robert le Coq,
évêque de Laon" in _Bibliothèque de l'Ecole des Chartes_, 1st series,
t. ii., pp. 350-387; and R. Delachenal, "La Bibliothèque d'un avocat
du XIV^e siècle, inventaire estimatif des livres de Robert le Coq," in
_Nouvelle revue historique de droit français et étranger_ (1887), pp.
524-537.
LECOUVREUR, ADRIENNE (1692-1730), French actress, was born on the 5th of
April 1692, at Damery, Marne, the daughter of a hatter, Robert Couvreur.
She had an unhappy childhood in Paris. She showed a natural talent for
declamation and was instructed by La Grand, _sociétaire_ of the Comédie
Française, and with his help she obtained a provincial engagement. It
was not until 1717, after a long apprenticeship, that she made her Paris
début as Electre, in Crébillon's tragedy of that name, and Angélique in
Molière's _George Dandin_. Her success was so great that she was
immediately received into the Comédie Française, and for thirteen years
she was the queen of tragedy there, attaining a popularity never before
accorded an actress. She is said to have played no fewer than 1184 times
in a hundred rôles, of which she created twenty-two. She owed her
success largely to her courage in abandoning the stilted style of
elocution of her predecessors for a naturalness of delivery and a
touching simplicity of pathos that delighted and moved her public. In
Baron, who returned to the stage at the age of sixty-seven, she had an
able and powerful coadjutor in changing the stage traditions of
generations. The jealousy she aroused was partly due to her social
successes, which were many, in spite of the notorious freedom of her
manner of life. She was on visiting and dining terms with half the
court, and her _salon_ was frequented by Voltaire and all the other
notables and men of letters. She was the mistress of Maurice de Saxe
from 1721, and sold her plate and jewels to supply him with funds for
his ill-starred adventures as duke of Courland. By him she had a
daughter, her third, who was grandmother of the father of George Sand.
Adrienne Lecouvreur died on the 20th of March 1730. She was denied the
last rites of the Church, and her remains were refused burial in
consecrated ground. Voltaire, in a fine poem on her death, expressed his
indignation at the barbarous treatment accorded to the woman whose
"friend, admirer, lover" he was.
Her life formed the subject of the well-known tragedy (1849), by
Eugène Scribe and Ernest Legouvé.
LE CREUSOT, a town of east-central France in the department of
Saône-et-Loire, 55 m. S.W. of Dijon on the Paris-Lyon railway. Pop.
(1906), town, 22,535; commune, 33,437. Situated at the foot of lofty
hills in a district rich in coal and iron, it has the most extensive
iron works in France. The coal bed of Le Creusot was discovered in the
13th century; but it was not till 1774 that the first workshops were
founded there. The royal crystal works were transferred from Sèvres to
Le Creusot in 1787, but this industry came to an end in 1831. Meanwhile
two or three enterprises for the manufacture of metal had ended in
failure, and it was only in 1836 that the foundation of iron works by
Adolphe and Eugène Schneider definitely inaugurated the industrial
prosperity of the place. The works supplied large quantities of war
material to the French armies during the Crimean and Franco-German wars.
Since that time they have continuously enlarged the scope of their
operations, which now embrace the manufacture of steel, armour-plate,
guns, ordnance-stores, locomotives, electrical machinery and engineering
material of every description. A network of railways about 37 m. in
length connects the various branches of the works with each other and
with the neighbouring Canal du Centre. Special attention is paid to the
welfare of the workers who, not including the miners, number about
12,000, and good schools have been established. In 1897 the
ordnance-manufacture of the Société des Forges et Chantiers de la
Méditerranée at Havre was acquired by the Company, which also has
important branches at Chalon-sur-Saône, where ship-building and
bridge-construction is carried on, and at Cette (Hérault).
LECTERN (through O. Fr. _leitrun_, from Late Lat. _lectrum_, or
_lectrinum_, _legere_, to read; the French equivalent is _lutrin_; Ital.
_leggio_; Ger. _Lesepult_), in the furniture of certain Christian
churches, a reading-desk, used more especially for the reading of the
lessons and in the Anglican Church practically confined to that purpose.
In the early Christian Church this was done from the ambo (q.v.), but in
the 15th century, when the books were often of great size, it became
necessary to provide a lectern to hold them. These were either in wood
or metal, and many fine examples still exist; one at Detling in wood, in
which there are shelves on all four sides to hold books, is perhaps the
most elaborate. Brass lecterns, as in the colleges of Oxford and
Cambridge, are common; in the usual type the book is supported on the
outspread wings of an eagle or pelican, which is raised on a moulded
stem, carried on three projecting ledges or feet with lions on them. In
the example in Norwich cathedral, the pelican supporting the book stands
on a rock enclosed with a rich cresting of Gothic tabernacle work; the
central stem or pillar, on which this rests, is supported by miniature
projecting buttresses, standing on a moulded base with lions on it.
LECTION, LECTIONARY. The custom of reading the books of Moses in the
synagogues on the Sabbath day was a very ancient one in the Jewish
Church. The addition of lections (i.e. readings) from the prophetic
books had been made afterwards and was in existence in our Lord's time,
as may be gathered from such passages as St Luke iv. 16-20, xvi. 29.
This element in synagogue worship was taken over with others into the
Christian divine service, additions being made to it from the writings
of the apostles and evangelists. We find traces of such additions within
the New Testament itself in such directions as are contained in Col. iv.
16; 1 Thess. v. 27.
From the 2nd century onwards references multiply, though the earlier
references do not prove the existence of a fixed lectionary or order of
lessons, but rather point the other way. Justin Martyr, describing
divine worship in the middle of the 2nd century says: "On the day called
Sunday all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one
place, and the memoirs of the Apostles, or the writings of the Prophets
are read as long as time permits" (_Apol._ i. cap. 67). Tertullian about
half a century later makes frequent reference to the reading of Holy
Scripture in public worship (_Apol._ 39; _De praescript._ 36; _De
amina_, 9).
In the canons of Hippolytus in the first half of the 3rd century we find
this direction: "Let presbyters, subdeacons and readers, and all the
people assemble daily in the church at time of cock-crow, and betake
themselves to prayers, to psalms and to the reading of the Scriptures,
according to the command of the Apostles, until I come attend to
reading" (canon xxi.).
But there are traces of fixed lessons coming into existence in the
course of this century; Origen refers to the book of Job being read in
Holy Week (_Commentaries on Job_, lib. i.). Allusions of a similar kind
in the 4th century are frequent. John Cassian (c. 380) tells us that
throughout Egypt the Psalms were divided into groups of twelve, and that
after each group there followed two lessons, one from the Old, one from
the New Testament (_De caenob. inst._ ii. 4), implying but not
absolutely stating that there was a fixed order of such lessons just as
there was of the Psalms. St Basil the Great mentions fixed lessons on
certain occasions taken from Isaiah, Proverbs, St Matthew and Acts (Hom.
xiii. _De bapt._). From Chrysostom (Hom. lxiii _in Act._ &c.), and
Augustine (Tract. vi. _in Joann._ &c.) we learn that Genesis was read in
Lent, Job and Jonah in Passion Week, the Acts of the Apostles in
Eastertide, lessons on the Passion on Good Friday and on the
Resurrection on Easter Day. In the _Apostolical Constitutions_ (ii. 57)
the following service is described and enjoined. First come two lessons
from the Old Testament by a reader, the whole of the Old Testament being
made use of except the books of the Apocrypha. The Psalms of David are
then to be sung. Next the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles of Paul
are to be read, and finally the four Gospels by a deacon or a priest.
Whether the selections were _ad libitum_ or according to a fixed table
of lessons we are not informed. Nothing in the shape of a lectionary is
extant older than the 8th century, though there is evidence that
Claudianus Mamercus made one for the church at Vienne in 450, and that
Musaeus made one for the church at Marseilles c. 458. The _Liber
comitis_ formerly attributed to St Jerome must be three, or nearly
three, centuries later than that saint, and the Luxeuil lectionary, or
_Lectionarium Gallicanum_, which Mabillon attributed to the 7th, cannot
be earlier than the 8th century; yet the oldest MSS. of the Gospels have
marginal marks, and sometimes actual interpolations, which can only be
accounted for as indicating the beginnings and endings of liturgical
lessons. The third council of Carthage in 397 forbade anything but Holy
Scripture to be read in church; this rule has been adhered to so far as
the liturgical epistle and gospel, and occasional additional lessons in
the Roman missal are concerned, but in the divine office, on feasts when
nine lessons are read at matins, only the first three lessons are taken
from Holy Scripture, the next three being taken from the sermons of
ecclesiastical writers, and the last three from expositions of the day's
gospel; but sometimes the lives or _Passions_ of the saints, or of some
particular saints, were substituted for any or all of these breviary
lessons. (F. E. W.)
LECTISTERNIUM (from Lat. _lectum sternere_, "to spread a couch"; [Greek:
strômnai] in Dion. Halic. xii. 9), in ancient Rome, a propitiatory
ceremony, consisting of a meal offered to gods and goddesses,
represented by their busts or statues, or by portable figures of wood,
with heads of bronze, wax or marble, and covered with drapery. Another
suggestion is that the symbols of the gods consisted of bundles of
sacred herbs, tied together in the form of a head, covered by a waxen
mask so as to resemble a kind of bust (cf. the straw puppets called
Argei). These symbols were laid upon a couch (_lectus_), the left arm
resting on a cushion (_pulvinus_, whence the couch itself was often
called _pulvinar_) in the attitude of reclining. In front of the couch,
which was placed in the open street, a meal was set out on a table. It
is definitely stated by Livy (v. 13) that the ceremony took place "for
the first time" in Rome in the year 399 B.C., after the Sibylline books
had been consulted by their keepers and interpreters (_duumviri sacris
faciendis_), on the occasion of a pestilence. Three couches were
prepared for three pairs of gods--Apollo and Latona, Hercules and Diana,
Mercury and Neptune. The feast, which on that occasion lasted for eight
(or seven) days, was also celebrated by private individuals; the
citizens kept open house, quarrels were forgotten, debtors and prisoners
were released, and everything done to banish sorrow. Similar honours
were paid to other divinities in subsequent times--Fortuna, Saturnus,
Juno Regina of the Aventine, the three Capitoline deities (Jupiter,
Juno, Minerva), and in 217, after the defeat of lake Trasimenus, a
lectisternium was held for three days to six pairs of gods,
corresponding to the twelve great gods of Olympus--Jupiter, Juno,
Neptune, Minerva, Mars, Venus, Apollo, Diana, Vulcan, Vesta, Mercury,
Ceres. In 205, alarmed by unfavourable prodigies, the Romans were
ordered to fetch the Great Mother of the gods from Pessinus in Phrygia;
in the following year the image was brought to Rome, and a lectisternium
held. In later times, the lectisternium became of constant (even daily)
occurrence, and was celebrated in the different temples. Such
celebrations must be distinguished from those which were ordered, like
the earlier lectisternia, by the Sibylline books in special emergencies.
Although undoubtedly offerings of food were made to the gods in very
early Roman times on such occasions as the ceremony of _confarreatio_,
and the _epulum Jovis_ (often confounded with the lectisternium), it is
generally agreed that the lectisternia were of Greek origin. In favour
of this may be mentioned: the similarity of the Greek [Greek:
Theoxenia], in which, however, the gods played the part of hosts; the
gods associated with it were either previously unknown to Roman
religion, though often concealed under Roman names, or were provided
with a new cult (thus Hercules was not worshipped as at the Ara Maxima,
where, according to Servius on _Aeneid_, viii. 176 and Cornelius Balbus,
_ap._ Macrobius, _Sat._ iii. 6, a lectisternium was forbidden); the
Sibylline books, which decided whether a lectisternium was to be held or
not, were of Greek origin; the custom of reclining at meals was Greek.
Some, however, assign an Etruscan origin to the ceremony, the Sibylline
books themselves being looked upon as old Italian "black books." A
probable explanation of the confusion between the lectisternia and
genuine old Italian ceremonies is that, as the lectisternia became an
almost everyday occurrence in Rome, people forgot their foreign origin
and the circumstances in which they were first introduced, and then the
word _pulvinar_ with its associations was transferred to times in which
it had no existence. In imperial times, according to Tacitus (_Annals_,
xv. 44), chairs were substituted for couches in the case of goddesses,
and the lectisternium in their case became a sellisternium (the reading,
however, is not certain). This was in accordance with Roman custom,
since in the earliest times all the members of a family sat at meals,
and in later times at least the women and children. This is a point of
distinction between the original practice at the lectisternium and the
epulum Jovis, the goddesses at the latter being provided with chairs,
whereas in the lectisternium they reclined. In Christian times the word
was used for a feast in memory of the dead (Sidonius Apollinaris,
_Epistulae_, iv. 15).
See article by A. Bouché-Leclercq in Daremberg and Saglio,
_Dictionnaire des antiquités_; Marquardt, _Römische Staatsverwaltung_,
iii. 45, 187 (1885); G. Wissowa, _Religion und Kultus der Römer_, p.
355 seq.; monograph by Wackermann (Hanau, 1888); C. Pascal, _Studii di
antichità e mitologia_ (1896).
LECTOR, or READER, a minor office-bearer in the Christian Church. From
an early period men have been set apart, under the title of
_anagnostae_, _lectores_, or readers, for the purpose of reading Holy
Scripture in church. We do not know what the custom of the Church was in
the first two centuries, the earliest reference to readers, as an order,
occurring in the writings of Tertullian (_De praescript. haeret._ cap.
41); there are frequent allusions to them in the writings of St Cyprian
and afterwards. Cornelius, bishop of Rome in A.D. 251-252, in a
well-known letter mentions readers among the various church orders then
existing at Rome. In the _Apostolic Church Order_ (canon 19), mention
is made of the qualifications and duties of a reader, but no reference
is made to their method of ordination. In the _Apostolic Didascalia_
there is recognition of three minor orders of men, subdeacons, readers
and singers, in addition to two orders of women, deaconesses and widows.
A century later, in the _Apostolic Constitutions_, we find not only a
recognition of readers, but also a form of admission provided for them,
consisting of the imposition of hands and prayer (lib. viii. cap. 22).
In Africa the imposition of hands was not in use, but a Bible was handed
to the newly appointed reader with words of commission to read it,
followed by a prayer and a benediction (Fourth Council of Carthage, can.
8). This is the ritual of the Roman Church of to-day. With regard to
age, the novels of Justinian (No. 123) forbade any one to be admitted to
the office of reader under the age of eighteen. (F. E. W.)
LECTOURE, a town of south-western France, capital of an arrondissement
in the department of Gers, 21 m. N. of Auch on the Southern railway
between that city and Agen. Pop. (1906), town, 2426; commune, 4310. It
stands on the right bank of the Gers, overlooking the river from the
summit of a steep plateau. The church of St Gervais and St Protais was
once a cathedral. The massive tower which flanks it on the north belongs
to the 15th century; the rest of the church dates from the 13th, 15th,
16th and 17th centuries. The hôtel de ville, the sous-préfecture and the
museum occupy the palace of the former bishops, which was once the
property of Marshal Jean Lannes, a native of the town. A recess in the
wall of an old house contains the Fontaine de Houndélie, a spring
sheltered by a double archway of the 13th century. At the bottom of the
hill a church of the 16th century marks the site of the monastery of St
Gény. Lectoure has a tribunal of first instance and a communal college.
Its industries include distilling, the manufacture of wooden shoes and
biscuits, and market gardening; it has trade in grain, cattle, wine and
brandy.
Lectoure, capital of the Iberian tribe of the _Lactorates_ and for a
short time of Novempopulania, became the seat of a bishopric in the
4th century. In the 11th century the counts of Lomagne made it their
capital, and on the union of Lomagne with Armagnac, in 1325, it became
the capital of the counts of Armagnac. In 1473 Cardinal Jean de
Jouffroy besieged the town on behalf of Louis XI. and after its fall
put the whole population to the sword. In 1562 it again suffered
severely at the hands of the Catholics under Blaise de Montluc.
LEDA, in Greek mythology, daughter of Thestius, king of Aetolia, and
Eurythemis (her parentage is variously given). She was the wife of
Tyndareus and mother of Castor and Pollux, Clytaemnestra and Helen (see
CASTOR AND POLLUX). In another account Nemesis was the mother of Helen
(q.v.) whom Leda adopted as her daughter. This led to the identification
of Leda and Nemesis. In the usual later form of the story, Leda herself,
having been visited by Zeus in the form of a swan, produced two eggs,
from one of which came Helen, from the other Castor and Pollux.
See Apollodorus iii. 10; Hyginus, _Fab._ 77; Homer, _Iliad_, iii. 426,
_Od._ xi. 298; Euripides, _Helena_, 17; Isocrates, _Helena_, 59; Ovid,
_Heroides_, xvii. 55; Horace, _Ars poetica_, 147; Stasinus in
Athenaeus viii. 334 c.; for the representations of Leda and the swan
in art, J. A. Overbeck, _Kunstmythologie_, i., and Atlas to the same;
also article in Roscher's _Lexikon der Mythologie_.
LE DAIM (or LE DAIN), OLIVIER (d. 1484), favourite of Louis XI. of
France, was born of humble parentage at Thielt near Courtrai in
Flanders. Seeking his fortune at Paris, he became court barber and valet
to Louis XI., and so ingratiated himself with the king that in 1474 he
was ennobled under the title Le Daim and in 1477 made comte de Meulant.
In the latter year he was sent to Burgundy to influence the young
heiress of Charles the Bold, but he was ridiculed and compelled to leave
Ghent. He thereupon seized and held Tournai for the French. Le Daim had
considerable talent for intrigue, and, according to his enemies, could
always be depended upon to execute the baser designs of the king. He
amassed a large fortune, largely by oppression and violence, and was
named gentleman-in-waiting, captain of Loches, and governor of
Saint-Quentin. He remained in favour until the death of Louis XI., when
the rebellious lords were able to avenge the slights and insults they
had suffered at the hands of the royal barber. He was arrested on
charges, the nature of which is uncertain, tried before the parlement of
Paris, and on the 21st of May 1484 hanged at Montfaucon without the
knowledge of Charles VIII., who might have heeded his father's request
and spared the favourite. Le Daim's property was given to the duke of
Orleans.
See the memoirs of the time, especially those of Ph. de Commines (ed.
Mandrot, 1901-1903, Eng. trans. in Bohn Library); Robt. Gaguin,
_Compendium de origine et gestis Francorum_ (Paris, 1586)--it was
Gaguin who made the celebrated epigram concerning Le Daim: "Eras
judex, lector, et exitium"; De Reiffenberg, _Olivier le Dain_
(Brussels, 1829); Delanone, _Le Barbier de Louis XI._ (Paris, 1832):
G. Picot, "Procès d'Olivier le Dain," in the _Comptes rendus de
l'Académie des sciences morales et politiques_, viii. (1877), 485-537.
The memoirs of the time are uniformly hostile to Le Daim.
LEDBURY, a market town in the Ross parliamentary division of
Herefordshire, England, 14½ m. E. of Hereford by the Great Western
railway, pleasantly situated on the south-western slope of the Malvern
Hills. Pop. of urban district (1901) 3259. Cider and agricultural
produce are the chief articles of trade, and there are limestone
quarries in the neighbouring hills. The town contains many picturesque
examples of timbered houses, characteristic of the district, the
principal being the Market House (1633) elevated on massive pillars of
oak. The fine church of St Michael exhibits all the Gothic styles, the
most noteworthy features being the Norman chancel and west door, and the
remarkable series of ornate Decorated windows on the north side. Among
several charities is the hospital of St Catherine, founded by Foliot,
bishop of Hereford, in 1232. Hope End, 2 m. N.E. of Ledbury, was the
residence of Elizabeth Barrett Browning during her early life. A
clock-tower in the town commemorates her.
Wall Hills Camp, supposed to be of British origin, is the earliest
evidence of a settlement near Ledbury (Liedeburge, Lidebury). The
manor was given to the see of Hereford in the 11th century; but in
1561-1562 became crown property. As early as 1170-1171 an episcopal
castle existed in Ledbury. The town was not incorporated, but was
early called a borough; and in 1295 and 1304-1305 returned two members
to parliament. A fair on the day of the decollation of John the
Baptist was granted to the bishop in 1249. Of fairs which survived in
1792 those of the days of St Philip and St James and St Barnabas were
granted in 1584-1585; those held on the Monday before Easter and St
Thomas's day were reputed ancient, but not those of the 12th of May,
the 22nd of June, the 2nd of October and the 21st of December.
Existing fairs are on the second Tuesday in every month and in
October. A weekly market, granted to the bishop by Stephen, John and
Henry III., was obsolete in 1584-1585, when the present market of
Tuesday was authorized. The wool trade was considerable in the 14th
century; later Ledbury was inhabited by glovers and clothiers. The
town was deeply involved in the operations of the Civil Wars, being
occupied both by the royalist leader Prince Rupert and by the
Parliamentarian Colonel Birch.
LEDGER (from the English dialect forms _liggen_ or _leggen_, to lie or
lay; in sense adapted from the Dutch substantive _legger_), properly a
book remaining regularly in one place, and so used of the copies of the
Scriptures and service books kept in a church. The _New English
Dictionary_ quotes from Charles Wriothesley's _Chronicle_, 1538 (ed.
_Camden Soc._, 1875, by W. D. Hamilton), "the curates should provide a
booke of the bible in Englishe, of the largest volume, to be a lidger in
the same church for the parishioners to read on." It is an application
of this original meaning that is found in the commercial usage of the
term for the principal book of account in a business house (see
BOOK-KEEPING). Apart from these applications to various forms of books,
the word is used of the horizontal timbers in a scaffold (q.v.) lying
parallel to the face of a building, which support the "put logs"; of a
flat stone to cover a grave; and of a stationary form of tackle and bait
in angling. In the form "lieger" the term was formerly frequently
applied to a "resident," as distinguished from an "extraordinary"
ambassador.
LEDOCHOWSKI, MIECISLAUS JOHANN, COUNT (1822-1902), Polish cardinal, was
born on the 29th of October 1822 in Gorki (Russian Poland), and received
his early education at the gymnasium and seminary of Warsaw. After
finishing his studies at the Jesuit Accademia dei Nobili Ecclesiastici
in Rome, which strongly influenced his religious development and his
attitude towards church affairs, he was ordained in 1845. From 1856 to
1858 he represented the Roman See in Columbia, but on the outbreak of
the Columbian revolution had to return to Rome. In 1861 Pope Pius IX.
made him his nuncio at Brussels, and in 1865 he was made archbishop of
Gnesen-Posen. His preconization followed on the 8th of January 1866.
This date marks the beginning of the second period in Ledochowski's
life; for during the Prussian and German _Kulturkampf_ he was one of the
most declared enemies of the state. It was only during the earliest
years of his appointment as archbishop that he entertained a different
view, invoking, for instance, an intervention of Prussia in favour of
the Roman Church, when it was oppressed by the house of Savoy. On the
12th of December 1870 he presented an effective memorandum on the
subject at the headquarters at Versailles. In 1872 the archbishop
protested against the demand of the government that religious teaching
should be given only in the German language, and in 1873 he addressed a
circular letter on this subject to the clergy of his diocese. The
government thereupon demanded a statement from the teachers of religion
as to whether they intended to obey it or the archbishop, and on their
declaring for the archbishop, dismissed them. The count himself was
called upon at the end of 1873 to lay aside his office. On his refusing
to do so, he was arrested between 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning on the
3rd of February 1874 by Standi the director of police, and taken to the
military prison of Ostrowo. The pope made him a cardinal on the 13th of
March, but it was not till the 3rd of February 1876 that he was released
from prison. Having been expelled from the eastern provinces of Prussia,
he betook himself to Cracow, where his presence was made the pretext for
anti-Prussian demonstrations. Upon this he was also expelled from
Austria, and went to Rome, whence, in spite of his removal from office,
which was decreed on the 15th of April 1874, he continued to direct the
affairs of his diocese, for which he was on several occasions from 1877
to 1879 condemned _in absentia_ by the Prussian government for
"usurpation of episcopal rights." It was not till 1885 that Ledochowski
resolved to resign his archbishopric, in which he was succeeded by
Dinder at the end of the year. Ledochowski's return in 1884 was
forbidden by the Prussian government (although the _Kulturkampf_ had now
abated), on account of his having stirred up anew the Polish nationalist
agitation. He passed the closing years of his life in Rome. In 1892 he
became prefect of the Congregation of the Propaganda, and he died in
Rome on the 22nd of July 1902.
See Ograbiszewski, _Deutschlands Episkopat in Lebensbildern_ (1876 and
following years); Holtzmann-Zöppfel, _Lexikon für Theologie und
Kirchenwesen_ (2nd ed., 1888); Vapereau, _Dictionnaire universel des
contemporains_ (6th ed., 1893); Brück, _Geschichte der katholischen
Kirche in Deutschland im neunzehnten Jahrhundert_ vol. 4 (1901 and
1908); Lauchert, _Biographisches Jahrbuch_, vol. 7 (1905). (J. Hn.)
LEDRU-ROLLIN, ALEXANDRE AUGUSTE (1807-1874), French politician, was the
grandson of Nicolas Philippe Ledru, the celebrated quack doctor known as
"Comus" under Louis XIV., and was born in a house that was once
Scarron's, at Fontenay-aux-Roses (Seine), on the 2nd of February 1807.
He had just begun to practise at the Parisian bar before the revolution
of July, and was retained for the Republican defence in most of the
great political trials of the next ten years. In 1838 he bought for
330,000 francs Desiré Dalloz's place in the Court of Cassation. He was
elected deputy for Le Mans in 1841 with hardly a dissentient voice; but
for the violence of his electoral speeches he was tried at Angers and
sentenced to four months' imprisonment and a fine, against which he
appealed successfully on a technical point. He made a rich and romantic
marriage in 1843, and in 1846 disposed of his charge at the Court of
Cassation to give his time entirely to politics. He was now the
recognized leader of the working-men of France. He had more authority in
the country than in the Chamber, where the violence of his oratory
diminished its effect. He asserted that the fortifications of Paris were
directed against liberty, not against foreign invasion, and he
stigmatized the law of regency (1842) as an audacious usurpation.
Neither from official Liberalism nor from the press did he receive
support; even the Republican _National_ was opposed to him because of
his championship of labour. He therefore founded _La Réforme_ in which
to advance his propaganda. Between Ledru-Rollin and Odilon Barrot with
the other chiefs of the "dynastic Left" there were acute differences,
hardly dissimulated even during the temporary alliance which produced
the campaign of the banquets. It was the speeches of Ledru-Rollin and
Louis Blanc at working-men's banquets in Lille, Dijon and Châlons that
really heralded the revolution. Ledru-Rollin prevented the appointment
of the duchess of Orleans as regent in 1848. He and Lamartine held the
tribune in the Chamber of Deputies until the Parisian populace stopped
serious discussion by invading the Chamber. He was minister of the
interior in the provisional government, and was also a member of the
executive committee[1] appointed by the Constituent Assembly, from which
Louis Blanc and the extremists were excluded. At the crisis of the 15th
of May he definitely sided with Lamartine and the party of order against
the proletariat. Henceforward his position was a difficult one. He never
regained his influence with the working classes, who considered they had
been betrayed; but to his short ministry belongs the credit of the
establishment of a working system of universal suffrage. At the
presidential election in December he was put forward as the Socialist
candidate, but secured only 370,000 votes. His opposition to the policy
of President Louis Napoleon, especially his Roman policy, led to his
moving the impeachment of the president and his ministers. The motion
was defeated, and next day (June 13, 1849) he headed what he called a
peaceful demonstration, and his enemies armed insurrection. He himself
escaped to London where he joined the executive of the revolutionary
committee of Europe, with Kossuth and Mazzini among his colleagues. He
was accused of complicity in an obscure attempt (1857) against the life
of Napoleon III., and condemned in his absence to deportation. Émile
Ollivier removed the exceptions from the general amnesty in 1870, and
Ledru-Rollin returned to France after twenty years of exile. Though
elected in 1871 in three departments he refused to sit in the National
Assembly, and took no serious part in politics until 1874 when he was
returned to the Assembly as member for Vaucluse. He died on the 31st of
December of that year.
Under Louis Philippe he made large contributions to French
jurisprudence, editing the _Journal du palais, 1791-1837_ (27 vols.,
1837), and _1837-1847_ (17 vols.), with a commentary _Répertoire
général de la jurisprudence française_ (8 vols., 1843-1848), the
introduction to which was written by himself. His later writings were
political in character. See _Ledru-Rollin, ses discours et ses écrits
politiques_ (2 vols., Paris, 1879), edited by his widow.