[1] Clarendon, _State Papers_, iii. 472.
DE LAND, a town and the county-seat of Volusia county, Florida, U.S.A.,
111 m. by rail S. of Jacksonville, 20 m. from the Atlantic coast and 4
m. from the St John's river. Pop. (1900) 1449; (1910) 2812. De Land is
served by the Atlantic Coast Line and by steamboats on the St John's
river. It has a fine winter climate, with an average temperature of 60
deg. F., has sulphur springs, and is a health and winter resort. There
is a starch factory here; and the surrounding country is devoted to
fruit-growing. De Land is the seat of the John B. Stetson University
(co-educational), an undenominational institution under Baptist control,
founded in 1884, as an academy, by Henry A. De Land, a manufacturer of
Fairport, New York, and in 1887 incorporated under the name of De Land
University, which was changed in 1889 to the present name, in honour of
John Batterson Stetson (1830-1906), a Philadelphia manufacturer of hats,
who during his life gave nearly $500,000 to the institution. The
university includes a college of liberal arts, a department of law, a
school of technology, an academy, a normal school, a model school, a
business college and a school of music. De Land was founded in 1876 by
H. A. De Land, above mentioned, who built a public school here in 1877
and a high school in 1883.
DELANE, JOHN THADEUS (1817-1879), editor of _The Times_ (London), was
born on the 11th of October 1817 in London. He was the second son of Mr
W. F. A. Delane, a barrister, of an old Irish family, who about 1832 was
appointed by Mr Walter financial manager of _The Times_. While still a
boy he attracted Mr Walter's attention, and it was always intended that
he should find work on the paper. He received a good general education
at private schools and King's College, London, and also at Magdalen
Hall, Oxford; after taking his degree in 1840 he at once began work on
the paper, though later he read for the bar, being called in 1847. In
1841 he succeeded Thomas Barnes as editor, a post which he occupied for
thirty-six years. He from the first obtained the best introductions into
society and the chief political circles, and had a position there such
as no journalist had previously enjoyed, using his opportunities with a
sure intuition for the way in which events would move. His staff
included some of the most brilliant men of the day, who worked together
with a common ideal. The result to the paper, which in those days had
hardly any real competitor in English journalism, was an excellence of
information which gave it great power. (See NEWSPAPERS.) Delane was a
man of many interests and great judgment; capable of long application
and concentrated attention, with power to seize always on the main point
at issue, and rapidly master the essential facts in the most complicated
affair. His general policy was to keep the paper a national organ of
opinion above party, but with a tendency to sympathize with the Liberal
movements of the day. He admired Palmerston and respected Lord Aberdeen,
and was of considerable use to both; and it was Lord Aberdeen himself
who, in 1845, told him of the impending repeal of the Corn Laws, an
incident round which many incorrect stories have gathered. The history,
however, of the events during the thirteen administrations, between 1841
and 1877, in which _The Times_, and therefore Delane, played an
important part cannot here be recapitulated. In 1877 his health gave
way, and he retired from the editorship; and on the 22nd of November
1879 he died at Ascot.
A biography by his nephew, Arthur Irwin Dasent, was published in 1908.
DELANY, MARY GRANVILLE (1700-1788), an Englishwoman of literary tastes,
was born at Coulston, Wilts, on the 14th of May 1700. She was a niece of
the 1st Lord Lansdowne. In 1717 or 1718 she was unhappily married to
Alexander Pendarves, a rich old Cornish landowner, who died in 1724.
During a visit to Ireland she met Dean Swift and his intimate friend,
the Irish divine, Patrick Delany, whose second wife she became in 1743.
After his death in 1768 she passed all her summers with her bosom friend
the dowager duchess of Portland--Prior's "Peggy"--and when the latter
died George III. and Queen Charlotte, whose affection for their "dearest
Mrs Delany" seems to have been most genuine, gave her a small house at
Windsor and a pension of L300 a year. Fanny Burney (Madame D'Arblay) was
introduced to her in 1783, and frequently visited her at her London home
and at Windsor, and owed to her friendship her court appointment. At
this time Mrs Delany was a charming and sweet old lady, with a
reputation for cutting out and making the ingenious "paper mosaiks" now
in the British Museum; she had known every one worth knowing in her day,
had corresponded with Swift and Young, and left an interesting picture
of the polite but commonplace English society of the 18th century in her
six volumes of _Autobiography and Letters_. Burke calls her "a real fine
lady"--"the model of an accomplished woman of former times." She died on
the 15th of April 1788.
DE LA REY, JACOBUS HERCULES (1847- ), Boer soldier, was born in the
Lichtenburg district, and in his youth and early manhood saw much
service in savage warfare. In 1893 he entered the Volksraad of the South
African Republic, and was an active supporter of the policy of General
Joubert. At the outbreak of the war with Great Britain in 1899 De La Rey
was made a general, and he was engaged in the western campaign against
Lord Methuen and Lord Roberts. He won his first great success at
Nitral's Nek on the 11th of July 1900, where he compelled the surrender
of a strong English detachment. In the second or guerrilla stage of the
war De La Rey became one of the most conspicuously successful of the
Boer leaders. He was assistant to General Louis Botha and a member of
the government, with charge of operations in the western Transvaal. The
principal actions in which he was successful (see also TRANSVAAL:
_History_) were Nooitgedacht, Vlakfontein and the defeat and capture of
Lord Methuen at Klerksdorp (March 7, 1902). The British general was
severely wounded in the action, and De La Rey released him at once,
being unable to afford him proper medical assistance. This humanity and
courtesy marked De La Rey's conduct throughout the war, and even more
than his military skill and daring earned for him the esteem of his
enemies. After the conclusion of peace De La Rey, who had borne a
prominent part in the negotiations, visited Europe with the other
generals, with the intention of raising funds to enable the Boers to
resettle their country. In December 1903 he went on a mission to India,
and induced the whole of the Boer prisoners of war detained at
Ahmednagar to accept the new order of things and to take the oath of
allegiance. In February 1907 General De La Rey was returned unopposed as
member for Ventersdorp in the legislative assembly of the first
Transvaal parliament under self-government.
DE LA RIVE, AUGUSTE ARTHUR (1801-1873), Swiss physicist, was born at
Geneva on the 9th of October 1801. He was the son of Charles Gaspard de
la Rive (1770-1834), who studied medicine at Edinburgh, and after
practising for a few years in London, became professor of pharmaceutical
chemistry at the academy of Geneva in 1802 and rector in 1823. After a
brilliant career as a student, he was appointed at the age of twenty-two
to the chair of natural philosophy in the academy of Geneva. For some
years after his appointment he devoted himself specially, with Francois
Marcet (1803-1883), to the investigation of the specific heat of gases,
and to observations for determining the temperature of the earth's
crust. Electrical studies, however, engaged most of his attention,
especially in connexion with the theory of the voltaic cell and the
electric discharge in rarefied gases. His researches on the
last-mentioned subject led him to form a new theory of the aurora
borealis. In 1840 he described a process for the electro-gilding of
silver and brass, for which in the following year he received a prize of
3000 francs from the French Academy of Sciences. Between 1854 and 1858
he published a _Traite de l'electricite theorique et appliquee_, which
was translated into several languages. De la Rive's birth and fortune
gave him considerable social and political influence. He was
distinguished for his hospitality to literary and scientific men, and
for his interest in the welfare and independence of his native country.
In 1860, when the annexation of Savoy and Nice had led the Genevese to
fear French aggression, de la Rive was sent by his fellow-citizens on a
special embassy to England, and succeeded in securing a declaration from
the English government, which was communicated privately to that of
France, that any attack upon Geneva would be regarded as a _casus
belli_. On the occasion of this visit the university of Oxford conferred
upon de la Rive the honorary degree of D.C.L. When on his way to pass
the winter at Cannes he died suddenly at Marseilles on the 27th of
November 1873.
His son, LUCIEN DE LA RIVE, born at Geneva on the 3rd of April 1834,
published papers on various mathematical and physical subjects, and with
Edouard Sarasin carried out investigations on the propagation of
electric waves.
DELAROCHE, HIPPOLYTE, commonly known as PAUL (1797-1856), French
painter, was born in Paris on the 17th of July 1797. His father was an
expert who had made a fortune, to some extent, by negotiating and
cataloguing, buying and selling. He was proud of his son's talent, and
able to forward his artistic education. The master selected was Gros,
then painting life-size histories, and surrounded by many pupils. In no
haste to make an appearance in the Salon, his first exhibited picture
was a large one, "Josabeth saving Joas" (1822). This picture led to his
acquaintance with Gericault and Delacroix, with whom he remained on the
most friendly terms, the three forming the central group of a numerous
body of historical painters, such as perhaps never before lived in one
locality and at one time.
From 1822 the record of his life is to be found in the successive works
coming from his hand. He visited Italy in 1838 and 1843, when his
father-in-law, Horace Vernet, was director of the French Academy. His
studio in Paris was in the rue Mazarine, where he never spent a day
without some good result, his hand being sure and his knowledge great.
His subjects, definitely expressed and popular in their manner of
treatment, illustrating certain views of history dear to partisans, yet
romantic in their general interest, were painted with a firm, solid,
smooth surface, which gave an appearance of the highest finish. This
solidity, found also on the canvas of Vernet, Scheffer, Leopold Robert
and Ingres, was the manner of the day. It repudiates the technical charm
of texture and variety of handling which the English school inherited as
a tradition from the time of Reynolds; but it is more easily understood
by the world at large, since a picture so executed depends for its
interest rather on the history, scene in nature or object depicted, than
on the executive skill, which may or may not be critically appreciated.
We may add that his point of view of the historical characters which he
treated is not always just. "Cromwell lifting the Coffin-lid and looking
at the Body of Charles" is an incident only to be excused by an
improbable tradition; but "The King in the Guard-Room," with villainous
roundhead soldiers blowing tobacco smoke in his patient face, is a libel
on the Puritans; and "Queen Elizabeth dying on the Ground," like a
she-dragon no one dares to touch, is sensational; while the "Execution
of Lady Jane Grey" is represented as taking place in a dungeon. Nothing
can be more incorrect than this last as a reading of English history,
yet we forget the inaccuracy in admiration of the treatment which
represents Lady Jane, with bandaged sight, feeling for the block, her
maids covering their faces, and none with their eyes visible among the
many figures. On the other hand, "Strafford led to Execution," when Laud
stretches his lawn-covered arms out of the small high window of his cell
to give him a blessing as he passes along the corridor, is perfect; and
the splendid scene of Richelieu in his gorgeous barge, preceding the
boat containing Cinq-Mars and De Thou carried to execution by their
guards, is perhaps the most dramatic semi-historical work ever done.
"The Princes in the Tower" must also be mentioned as a very complete
creation; and the "Young female Martyr floating dead on the Tiber" is so
pathetic that criticism feels hard-hearted and ashamed before it. As a
realization of a page of authentic history, again, no picture can
surpass the "Assassination of the duc de Guise at Blois." The expression
of the murdered man stretched out by the side of the bed, the
conspirators all massed together towards the door and far from the body,
show exact study as well as insight into human nature. This work was
exhibited in his meridian time, 1835; and in the same year he exhibited
the "Head of an Angel," a study from Horace Vernet's young daughter
Louise, his love for whom was the absorbing passion of his life, and
from the shock of whose death, in 1845, it is said he never quite
recovered. By far his finest productions after her death are of the most
serious character, a sequence of small elaborate pictures of incidents
in the Passion. Two of these, the Virgin and the other Maries, with the
apostles Peter and John, within a nearly dark apartment, hearing the
crowd as it passes haling Christ to Calvary, and St John conducting the
Virgin home again after all is over, are beyond all praise as exhibiting
the divine story from a simply human point of view. They are pure and
elevated, and also dramatic and painful. Delaroche was not troubled by
ideals, and had no affectation of them. His sound but hard execution
allowed no mystery to intervene between him and his _motif_, which was
always intelligible to the million, so that he escaped all the waste of
energy that painters who try to be poets on canvas suffer. Thus it is
that essentially the same treatment was applied by him to the characters
of distant historical times, the founders of the Christian religion, and
the real people of his own day, such as "Napoleon at Fontainebleau," or
"Napoleon at St Helena," or "Marie Antoinette leaving the Convention"
after her sentence.
In 1837 Delaroche received the commission for the great picture, 27
metres long, in the hemicycle of the lecture theatre of the Ecole des
Beaux Arts. This represents the great artists of the modern ages
assembled in groups on either hand of a central elevation of white
marble steps, on the topmost of which are three thrones filled by the
architects and sculptors of the Parthenon. To supply the female element
in this vast composition he introduced the genii or muses, who symbolize
or reign over the arts, leaning against the balustrade of the steps,
beautiful and queenly figures with a certain antique perfection of form,
but not informed by any wonderful or profound expression. The portrait
figures are nearly all unexceptionable and admirable. This great and
successful work is on the wall itself, an inner wall however, and is
executed in oil. It was finished in 1841, and considerably injured by a
fire which occurred in 1855, which injury he immediately set himself to
remedy (finished by Robert-Fleury); but he died before he had well
begun, on the 4th of November 1856.
Personally Delaroche exercised even a greater influence than by his
works. Though short and not powerfully made, he impressed every one as
rather tall than otherwise; his physiognomy was accentuated and firm,
and his fine forehead gave him the air of a minister of state.