[1] This is probably a Greek legend (cf. the Attic vase of about 500
B.C. in _Journ. of Hell. Stud._, 1898, p. 268).
CROFT, SIR HERBERT, Bart. (1751-1816), English author, was born at
Dunster Park, Berkshire, on the 1st of November 1751, son of Herbert
Croft (see below) of Stifford, Essex. He matriculated at University
College, Oxford, in March 1771, and was subsequently entered at
Lincoln's Inn. He was called to the bar, but in 1782 returned to Oxford
with a view to preparing for holy orders. In 1786 he received the
vicarage of Prittlewell, Essex, but he remained at Oxford for some years
accumulating materials for a proposed English dictionary. He was twice
married, and on the day after his second wedding day he was imprisoned
at Exeter for debt. He then retired to Hamburg, and two years later his
library was sold. He had succeeded in 1797 to the title, but not to the
estates, of a distant cousin, Sir John Croft, the fourth baronet. He
returned to England in 1800, but went abroad once more in 1802. He lived
near Amiens at a house owned by Lady Mary Hamilton, said to have been a
daughter of the earl of Leven and Melville. Later he removed to Paris,
where he died on the 26th of April 1816. In some of his numerous
literary enterprises he had the help of Charles Nodier. Croft wrote the
Life of Edward Young inserted in Johnson's _Lives of the Poets_. In 1780
he published _Love and Madness, a Story too true, in a series of letters
between Parties whose names could perhaps be mentioned were they less
known or less lamented_. This book, which passed through seven editions,
narrates the passion of a clergyman named James Hackman for Martha Ray,
mistress of the earl of Sandwich, who was shot by her lover as she was
leaving Covent Garden in 1779 (see the Case and Memoirs of the late Rev.
Mr James Hackman, 1779). _Love and Madness_ has permanent interest
because Croft inserted, among other miscellaneous matter, information
about Thomas Chatterton gained from letters which he obtained from the
poet's sister, Mrs Newton, under false pretences, and used without
payment. Robert Southey, when about to publish an edition of
Chatterton's works for the benefit of his family, published (November
1799) details of Croft's proceedings in the _Monthly Review_. To this
attack Croft wrote a reply addressed to John Nichols in the _Gentleman's
Magazine_, and afterwards printed separately as _Chatterton and Love and
Madness ..._ (1800). This tract evades the main accusation, and contains
much abuse of Southey. Croft, however, supplied the material for the
exhaustive account of Chatterton in A. Kippis's _Biographia Britannica_
(vol. iv., 1789). In 1788 he addressed a letter to William Pitt on the
subject of a new dictionary. He criticized Samuel Johnson's efforts, and
in 1790 he claimed to have collected 11,000 words used by excellent
authorities but omitted by Johnson. Two years later he issued proposals
for a revised edition of Johnson's _Dictionary_, but subscribers were
lacking and his 200 vols. of MS. remained unused. Croft was a good
scholar and linguist, and the author of some curious books in French.
_The Love Letters of Mr H. and Miss R. 1775-1779_ were edited from
Croft's book by Mr Gilbert Burgess (1895). See also John Nichols's
_Illustrations ..._ (1828), v. 202-218.
CROFT, SIR JAMES (d. 1590), lord deputy of Ireland, belonged to an old
family of Herefordshire, which county he represented in parliament in
1541. He was made governor of Haddington in 1549, and became lord deputy
of Ireland in 1551. There he effected little beyond gaining for himself
the reputation of a conciliatory disposition. Croft was all his life a
double-dealer. He was imprisoned in the Tower for treason in the reign
of Mary, but was released and treated with consideration by Elizabeth
after her accession. He was made governor of Berwick, where he was
visited by John Knox in 1559, and where he busied himself actively on
behalf of the Scottish Protestants, though in 1560 he was suspected,
probably with good reason, of treasonable correspondence with Mary of
Guise, the Catholic regent of Scotland; and for ten years he was out of
public employment. But in 1570 Elizabeth, who showed the greatest
forbearance and favour to Sir James Croft, made him a privy councillor
and controller of her household. He was one of the commissioners for the
trial of Mary queen of Scots, and in 1588 was sent on a diplomatic
mission to arrange peace with the duke of Parma. Croft established
private relations with Parma, for which on his return he was sent to the
Tower. He was released before the end of 1589, and died on the 4th of
September 1590.
Croft's eldest son, Edward, was put on his trial in 1589 on the curious
charge of having contrived the death of the earl of Leicester by
witchcraft, in revenge for the earl's supposed hostility to Sir James
Croft. Edward Croft was father of Sir Herbert Croft (d. 1622), who
became a Roman Catholic and wrote several controversial pieces in
defence of that faith. His son Herbert Croft (1603-1691), bishop of
Hereford, after being for some time, like his father, a member of the
Roman church, returned to the church of England about 1630, and about
ten years later was chaplain to Charles I., and obtained within a few
years a prebend's stall at Worcester, a canonry of Windsor, and the
deanery of Hereford, all of which preferments he lost during the Civil
War and Commonwealth. By Charles II. he was made bishop of Hereford in
1661. Bishop Croft was the author of many books and pamphlets, several
of them against the Roman Catholics; and one of his works, entitled _The
Naked Truth, or the True State of the Primitive Church_ (London, 1675),
was very celebrated in its day, and gave rise to prolonged controversy.
The bishop died in 1691. His son Herbert was created a baronet in 1671,
and was the ancestor of Sir Herbert Croft (q.v.), the 18th century
writer.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--See Richard Bagwell, _Ireland under the Tudors_, vol.
i. (3 vols., London, 1885); David Lloyd, _State Worthies from the
Reformation to the Revolution_ (2 vols., London, 1766); John Strype,
_Annals of the Reformation_ (Oxford, 1824), which contains an account
of the trial of Edward Croft; S. L. Lee's art. "Croft, Sir James," in
_Dict. of National Biography_, vol. xiii.; and for Bishop Croft see
Anthony a Wood, _Athenae Oxonienses_ (ed. Bliss, 1813-1820); John Le
Neve, _Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae_ (ed. by T. D. Hardy, Oxford, 1854).
CROFT (or CROFTS), WILLIAM (1678-1727), English composer, was born in
1678, at Nether Ettington in Warwickshire. He received his musical
education in the Chapel Royal under Dr Blow. He early obtained the place
of organist of St Anne's, Soho, and in 1700 was admitted a gentleman
extraordinary of the Chapel Royal. In 1707 he was appointed
joint-organist with Blow; and upon the death of the latter in 1708 he
became solo organist, and also master of the children and composer of
the Chapel Royal, besides being made organist of Westminster Abbey. In
1712 he wrote a brief introduction on the history of English church
music to a collection of the words of anthems which he had edited under
the title of _Divine Harmony_. In 1713 he obtained his degree of doctor
of music in the university of Oxford. In 1724 he published an edition of
his choral music in 2 vols. folio, under the name of _Musica Sacra, or
Select Anthems in score, for two, three, four, five, six, seven and
eight voices, to which is added the Burial Service, as it is
occasionally performed in Westminster Abbey_. This handsome work
included a portrait of the composer and was the first of the kind
executed on pewter plates and in score. John Page, in his _Harmonia
Sacra_, published in 1800 in 3 vols. folio, gives seven of Croft's
anthems. Of instrumental music, Croft published six sets of airs for two
violins and a bass, six sonatas for two flutes, six solos for a flute
and bass. He died at Bath on the 14th of August 1727, and was buried in
the north aisle of Westminster Abbey, where a monument was erected to
his memory by his friend and admirer Humphrey Wyrley Birch. Burney in
his _History of Music_ devotes several pages of his third volume (pp.
603-612) to Dr Croft's life, and criticisms of some of his anthems.
During the earlier period of his life Croft wrote much for the theatre,
including overtures and incidental music for _Courtship a la mode_
(1700), _The Funeral_ (1702) and _The Lying Lover_ (1703).
CROFTER, a term used, more particularly in the Highlands and islands of
Scotland, to designate a tenant who rents and cultivates a small holding
of land or "croft." This Old English word, meaning originally an
enclosed field, seems to correspond to the Dutch _kroft_, a field on
high ground or downs. The ultimate origin is unknown. By the Crofters'
Holdings (Scotland) Act 1886, a crofter is defined as the tenant of a
holding who resides on his holding, the annual rent of which does not
exceed L30 in money, and which is situated in a crofting parish. The
wholesale clearances of tenants from their crofts during the 19th
century, in violation of, as the tenants claimed, an implied security of
tenure, has led in the past to much agitation on the part of the
crofters to secure consideration of their grievances. They have been the
subject of royal commissions and of considerable legislation, but the
effect of the Crofters Act of 1886, with subsequent amending acts, has
been to improve their condition markedly, and much of the agitation has
now died out. A history of the legislation dealing with the crofters is
given in the article SCOTLAND.
CROKER, JOHN WILSON (1780-1857), British statesman and author, was born
at Galway on the 20th of December 1780, being the only son of John
Croker, the surveyor-general of customs and excise in Ireland. He was
educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he graduated in 1800.
Immediately afterwards he was entered at Lincoln's Inn, and in 1802 he
was called to the Irish bar. His interest in the French Revolution led
him to collect a large number of valuable documents on the subject,
which are now in the British Museum. In 1804 he published anonymously
_Familiar Epistles to J. F. Jones, Esquire, on the State of the Irish
Stage_, a series of caustic criticisms in verse on the management of the
Dublin theatres. The book ran through five editions in one year. Equally
successful was the _Intercepted Letter from Canton_ (1805), also
anonymous, a satire on Dublin society. In 1807 he published a pamphlet
on _The State of Ireland, Past and Present_, in which he advocated
Catholic emancipation.
In the following year he entered parliament as member for Downpatrick,
obtaining the seat on petition, though he had been unsuccessful at the
poll. The acumen displayed in his Irish pamphlet led Spencer Perceval to
recommend him in 1808 to Sir Arthur Wellesley, who had just been
appointed to the command of the British forces in the Peninsula, as his
deputy in the office of chief secretary for Ireland. This connexion led
to a friendship which remained unbroken till Wellington's death. The
notorious case of the duke of York in connexion with his abuse of
military patronage furnished him with an opportunity for distinguishing
himself. The speech which he delivered on the 14th of March 1809, in
answer to the charges of Colonel Wardle, was regarded as the most able
and ingenious defence of the duke that was made in the debate; and
Croker was appointed to the office of secretary to the Admiralty, which
he held without interruption under various administrations for more than
twenty years. He proved an excellent public servant, and made many
improvements which have been of permanent value in the organization of
his office. Among the first acts of his official career was the exposure
of a fellow-official who had misappropriated the public funds to the
extent of L200,000.
In 1827 he became the representative of the university of Dublin, having
previously sat successively for the boroughs of Athlone, Yarmouth (Isle
of Wight), Bodmin and Aldeburgh. He was a determined opponent of the
Reform Bill, and vowed that he would never sit in a reformed parliament;
his parliamentary career accordingly terminated in 1832. Two years
earlier he had retired from his post at the admiralty on a pension of
L1500 a year. Many of his political speeches were published in pamphlet
form, and they show him to have been a vigorous and effective, though
somewhat unscrupulous and often virulently personal, party debater.
Croker had been an ardent supporter of Peel, but finally broke with him
when he began to advocate the repeal of the Corn Laws. He is said to
have been the first to use (Jan. 1830) the term "conservatives." He was
for many years one of the leading contributors on literary and
historical subjects to the _Quarterly Review_, with which he had been
associated from its foundation. The rancorous spirit in which many of
his articles were written did much to embitter party feeling. It also
reacted unfavourably on Croker's reputation as a worker in the
department of pure literature by bringing political animosities into
literary criticism. He had no sympathy with the younger school of poets
who were in revolt against the artificial methods of the 18th century,
and he was responsible for the famous _Quarterly_ article on Keats. It
is, nevertheless, unjust to judge Croker by the criticisms which
Macaulay brought against his _magnum opus_, his edition of Boswell's
_Life of Johnson_ (1831). With all its defects the work had merits which
Macaulay was of course not concerned to point out, and Croker's
researches have been of the greatest value to subsequent editors. There
is little doubt that Macaulay had personal reasons for his attack on
Croker, who had more than once exposed in the House the fallacies that
lay hidden under the orator's brilliant rhetoric. Croker made no
immediate reply to Macaulay's attack, but when the first two volumes of
the _History_ appeared he took the opportunity of pointing out the
inaccuracies that abounded in the work. Croker was occupied for several
years on an annotated edition of Pope's works. It was left unfinished at
the time of his death, but it was afterwards completed by the Rev.
Whitwell Elwin and Mr W. J. Courthope. He died at St Albans Bank,
Hampton, on the 10th of August 1857.
Croker was generally supposed to be the original from which Disraeli
drew the character of "Rigby" in _Coningsby_, because he had for many
years had the sole management of the estates of the marquess of
Hertford, the "Lord Monmouth" of the story; but the comparison is a
great injustice to the sterling worth of Croker's character.
The chief works of Croker not already mentioned were his _Stories for
Children from the History of England_ (1817), which provided the model
for Scott's _Tales of a Grandfather_; _Letters on the Naval War with
America_; _A Reply to the Letters of Malachi Malagrowther_ (1826);
_Military Events of the French Revolution of 1830_ (1831); a
translation of Bassompierre's _Embassy to England_ (1819); and several
lyrical pieces of some merit, such as the _Songs of Trafalgar_ (1806)
and _The Battles of Talavera_ (1809). He also edited the _Suffolk
Papers_ (1823), _Hervey's Memoirs of the Court of George II._ (1817),
the _Letters of Mary Lepel, Lady Hervey_ (1821-1822), and _Walpole's
Letters to Lord Hertford_ (1824). His memoirs, diaries and
correspondence were edited by Louis J. Jennings in 1884 under the
title of _The Croker Papers_ (3 vols.).
CROKER, RICHARD (1843- ), American politician, was born at Blackrock,
Ireland, on the 24th of November 1843. He was taken to the United States
by his parents when two years old, and was educated in the public
schools of New York City, where he eventually became a member of
Tammany Hall and active in its politics. He was an alderman from 1868 to
1870, a coroner from 1873 to 1876, a fire commissioner in 1883 and 1887,
and city chamberlain from 1889 to 1890. After the fall of John Kelly he
became the leader of Tammany Hall (q.v.), and for some time almost
completely controlled the organization. His greatest political success
was his bringing about the election of Robert A. van Wyck as first mayor
of greater New York in 1897, and during van Wyck's administration Croker
is popularly supposed to have dominated completely the government of the
city. After Croker's failure to "carry" the city in the presidential
election of 1900 and the defeat of his mayoralty candidate, Edward M.
Shepard, in 1901, he resigned from his position of leadership in
Tammany, and retired to a country life in England and Ireland. In 1907
he won the Derby with his race-horse Orby.
CROKER, THOMAS CROFTON (1798-1854), Irish antiquary and humorist, was
born in Cork on the 15th of January 1798. He was apprenticed to a
merchant, but in 1819, through the interest of John Wilson Croker, who
was, however, no relation of his, he became a clerk in the Admiralty.
Moore was indebted to him in the production of his _Irish Melodies_ for
"many curious fragments of ancient poetry." In 1825 he produced his most
popular book, the _Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of
Ireland_, which he followed up by the publication of his _Legends of the
Lakes_ (1829), his _Adventures of Barney Mahoney_ (1852), and an edition
of the _Popular Songs of Ireland_ (1839). In 1827 he was made a member
of the Irish Academy; in 1839 and 1840 he helped to found the Camden and
Percy Societies, and in 1843 the British Archaeological Association. He
wrote _Narratives Illustrative of the Contests in Ireland in 1641 and
1688_ (1841), for the Camden Society, _Historical Songs of Ireland_, &c.
(1841), for the Percy Society, and several other works. He was also a
member of the Hakluyt and the Antiquarian Society. He died in London on
the 8th of August 1854.
CROLL, JAMES (1821-1890), Scottish man of science, was born of a peasant
family at Little Whitefield, in the parish of Cargill, in Perthshire, on
the 2nd of January 1821. He was regarded as an unpromising boy, but a
trifling circumstance aroused a passion for reading, and he made great
progress in self-education. He was apprenticed to a wheelwright at
Collace in Perthshire, but being debarred by ill-health from manual
labour, he became successively a shop-keeper and an insurance agent. In
1859 he was made keeper of the Andersonian Museum in Glasgow, a humble
appointment, which, however, gave him congenial occupation. In 1857,
being deeply impressed by the metaphysics of Jonathan Edwards, he had
published an anonymous volume entitled _The Philosophy of Theism_; but
his connexion with the Museum induced him to take up physical science,
and from 1861 onwards he studied with such perseverance that he was
enabled to contribute papers to the _Philosophical Magazine_ and other
journals. For that magazine in 1864 he wrote his celebrated essay "On
the Physical Cause of the Changes of Climate during Geological Epochs."
This led to his receiving an appointment on the Scottish Geological
Survey in 1867, and for thirteen years he took charge of the Edinburgh
Office. In 1875 he summed up his researches upon the ancient condition
of the earth in his _Climate and Time, in their Geological Relations_,
in which he contends that terrestrial revolutions are due in a measure
to cosmical causes. This theory excited warm controversy. Croll's
replies to his opponents are collected in his _Climate and Cosmology_
(1885). He had been compelled by ill-health to withdraw from the public
service in 1880; yet, working under the greatest difficulties, and
harassed by the inadequacy of his retiring pension, he managed to
produce _Stellar Evolution_, discussing, among other things, the age of
the sun, in 1889; and _The Philosophical Basis of Evolution_, partly a
critique of Herbert Spencer's philosophy, in 1890. He died on the 15th
of December 1890. The soundness of Croll's astronomical theory regarding
the glacial period has since been criticized by E. P. Culverwell in the
_Geological Magazine_ for 1895, and by others; and it is now generally
abandoned. Nevertheless it must be admitted that his character as a
scientific worker under great discouragements was nothing less than
heroic. The hon. degree of LL.D. was conferred on him in 1876 by the
university of St Andrews; and he was elected F.R.S. in the same year.
An _Autobiographical Sketch of James Croll, with Memoir of his Life
and Work_, was prepared by J. C. Irons, and published in 1896.
CROLY, GEORGE (1780-1860), British divine and author, son of a Dublin
physician, was born on the 17th of August 1780. He was educated at
Trinity College, Dublin, and after ordination was appointed to a small
curacy in the north of Ireland. About 1810 he came to London, and
occupied himself with literary work. A man of restless energy, he claims
attention by his extraordinary versatility. He wrote dramatic criticisms
for a short-lived periodical called the _New Times_; he was one of the
earliest contributors to _Blackwood's Magazine_; and to the _Literary
Gazette_ he contributed poems, reviews and essays on all kinds of
subjects. In 1819 he married Margaret Helen Begbie. Efforts to secure an
English living for Croly were frustrated, according to the _Gentleman's
Magazine_ (Jan. 1861), because Lord Eldon confounded him with a Roman
Catholic of the same name. Excluding his contributions to the daily and
weekly press his chief works were:--_Paris in 1815_ (1817), a poem in
imitation of _Childe Harold; Catiline_ (1822), a tragedy lacking in
dramatic force; _Salathiel: A Story of the Past, the Present and the
Future_ (1829), a successful romance of the "Wandering Jew" type; _The
Life and Times of his late Majesty George the Fourth_ (1830); _Marston;
or, The Soldier and Statesman_ (1846), a novel of modern life; _The
Modern Orlando_ (1846), a satire which owes something to _Don Juan_; and
some biographies, sermons and theological works.
Croly was an effective preacher, and continued to hope for preferment
from the Tory leaders, to whom he had rendered considerable services by
his pen; but he eventually received, in 1835, the living of St
Stephen's, Walbrook, London, from a Whig patron, Lord Brougham, with
whose family he was connected. In 1847 he was made afternoon lecturer at
the Foundling hospital, but this appointment proved unfortunate. He died
suddenly on the 24th of November 1860, in London.
His _Poetical Works_ (2 vols.) were collected in 1830. For a list of
his works see Allibone's _Critical Dictionary of English Literature_
(1859).
CROMAGNON RACE, the name given by Paul Broca to a type of mankind
supposed to be represented by remains found by Lartet, Christy and
others, in France in the Cromagnon cave at Les Eyzies, Tayac district,
Dordogne. At the foot of a steep rock near the village this small cave,
nearly filled with debris, was found by workmen in 1868. Towards the top
of the loose strata three human skeletons were unearthed. They were
those of an old man, a young man and a woman, the latter's skull bearing
the mark of a severe wound. The skulls presented such special
characteristics that Broca took them as types of a race. Palaeolithic
man is exclusively long-headed, and the dolichocephalic appearance of
the crania (they had a mean cephalic index of 73.34) supported the view
that the "find" at Les Eyzies was palaeolithic. It is, however,
inaccurate to state that brachycephaly appears at once with the
neolithic age, dolichocephaly even of a pronounced type persisting far
into neolithic times. The Cromagnon race may thus be, as many
anthropologists believe it, early neolithic, a type of man who spread
over and inhabited a large portion of Europe at the close of the
Pleistocene period. Some have sought to find in it the substratum of the
present populations of western Europe. Quatrefages identifies Cromagnon
man with the tall, long-headed, fair Kabyles (Berbers) who still survive
in various parts of Mauritania. He suggests the introduction of the
Cromagnon from Siberia, "arriving in Europe simultaneously with the
great mammals (which were driven by the cold from Siberia), and no doubt
following their route."
See A. H. Keane's _Ethnology_ (1896); Mortillet, _Le Prehistorique_
(1900); Sergi, _The Mediterranean Race_ (1901); Lord Avebury,
_Prehistoric Times_, p. 317 of 1900 edition.
CROMARTY, GEORGE MACKENZIE, 1ST EARL OF (1630-1714), Scottish statesman,
was the eldest son of Sir John Mackenzie, Bart., of Tarbat (d. 1654),
and belonged to the same family as the earls of Seaforth. In 1654 he
joined the rising in Scotland on behalf of Charles II. and after an
exile of six years he returned to his own country and took some part in
public affairs after the Restoration. In 1661 he became a lord of
session as Lord Tarbat, but having been concerned in a vain attempt to
overthrow Charles II.'s secretary, the earl of Lauderdale, he was
dismissed from office in 1664. A period of retirement followed until
1678 when Mackenzie was appointed lord justice general of Scotland; in
1681 he became lord clerk register and a lord of session for the second
time, and from 1682 to 1688 he was the chief minister of Charles II. and
James II. in Scotland, being created viscount of Tarbat in 1685. In
1688, however, he deserted James and soon afterwards made his peace with
William III., his experience being very serviceable to the new
government in settling the affairs of Scotland. From 1692 to 1695 Tarbat
was again lord clerk register, and having served for a short time as a
secretary of state under Queen Anne he was created earl of Cromarty in
1703. He was again lord justice general from 1704 to 1710. He warmly
supported the union between England and Scotland, writing some pamphlets
in favour of this step, and he died on the 17th of August 1714. Cromarty
was a man of much learning, and among his numerous writings may be
mentioned his _Account of the conspiracies by the earls of Gowry and R.
Logan_ (Edinburgh, 1713).
The earl's grandson George, 3rd earl of Cromarty (c. 1703-1766),
succeeded his father John, the 2nd earl, in February 1731. In 1745 he
joined Charles Edward, the young pretender, and he served with the
Jacobites until April 1746 when he was taken prisoner in
Sutherlandshire. He was tried and sentenced to death, but he obtained a
conditional pardon although his peerage was forfeited. He died on the
28th of September 1766.
This earl's eldest son was John Mackenzie, Lord Macleod (1727-1789), who
shared his father's fortunes in 1745 and his fate in 1746. Having
pleaded guilty at his trial Macleod was pardoned on condition that he
gave up all his rights in the estates of the earldom, and he left
England and entered the Swedish army. In this service he rose to high
rank and was made Count Cromarty. The count returned to England in 1777
and was successful in raising, mainly among the Mackenzies, two splendid
battalions of Highlanders, the first of which, now the Highland Light
Infantry, served under him in India. In 1784 he regained the family
estates and he died on the 2nd of April 1789. Macleod wrote an account
of the Jacobite rising of 1745, and also one of a campaign in Bohemia in
which he took part in 1757; both are printed in Sir W. Fraser's _Earls
of Cromartie_ (Edinburgh, 1876).
Macleod left no children, and his heir was his cousin, Kenneth Mackenzie
(d. 1796), a grandson of the 2nd earl, who also died childless. The
estates then passed to Macleod's sister, Isabel (1725-1801), wife of
George Murray, 6th Lord Elibank. In 1861 Isabel's descendant, Anne
(1829-1888), wife of George, 3rd duke of Sutherland, was created
countess of Cromartie with remainder to her second son Francis
(1852-1893), who became earl of Cromartie in 1888. In 1895, two years
after the death of Francis, his daughter Sibell Lilian (b. 1878) was
granted by letters patent the title of countess of Cromartie.
CROMARTY, a police burgh and seaport of the county of Ross and Cromarty,
Scotland. Pop. (1901) 1242. It is situated on the southern shore of the
mouth of Cromarty Firth, 5 m. E. by S. of Invergordon on the opposite
coast, with which there is daily communication by steamer, and 9 m. N.E.
of Fortrose, the most convenient railway station. Before the union of
the shires of Ross and Cromarty, it was the county town of
Cromartyshire, and is one of the Wick district group of parliamentary
burghs. Its name is variously derived from the Gaelic _crom_, crooked,
and _bath_, bay, or _ard_, height, meaning either the "crooked bay," or
the "bend between the heights" (the high rocks, or Sutors, which guard
the entrance to the Firth), and gave the title to the earldom of
Cromarty. The principal buildings are the town hall and the Hugh Miller
Institute. The harbour, enclosed by two piers, accommodates the herring
fleet, but the fisheries, the staple industry, have declined. The town,
however, is in growing repute as a midsummer resort. The thatched house
with crow-stepped gables in Church Street, in which Hugh Miller the
geologist was born, still stands, and a statue has been erected to his
memory. To the east of the burgh is Cromarty House, occupying the site
of the old castle of the earls of Ross. It was the birthplace of Sir
Thomas Urquhart, the translator of Rabelais.
Cromarty, formerly a county in the north of Scotland, was incorporated
with Ross-shire in 1889 under the designation of the county of Ross and
Cromarty. The nucleus of the county consisted of the lands of Cromarty
in the north of the peninsula of the Black Isle. To this were added from
time to time the various estates scattered throughout Ross-shire--the
most considerable of which were the districts around Ullapool and Little
Loch Broom on the Atlantic coast, the area in which Ben Wyvis is
situated, and a tract to the north of Loch Fannich--which had been
acquired by the ancestors of Sir George Mackenzie (1630-1714),
afterwards Viscount Tarbat (1685) and 1st earl of Cromarty (1703).
Desirous of combining these sporadic properties into one shire, Viscount
Tarbat was enabled to procure their annexation to his sheriffdom of
Cromarty in 1685 and 1698, the area of the enlarged county amounting to
nearly 370 sq. m. (See ROSS AND CROMARTY.)
CROMARTY FIRTH, an arm of the North Sea, belonging to the county of Ross
and Cromarty, Scotland. From the Moray Firth it extends inland in a
westerly and then south-westerly direction for a distance of 19 m.
Excepting at the Bay of Nigg, on the northern shore, and Cromarty Bay,
on the southern, where it is about 5 m. wide (due N. and S.), and at
Alness Bay, where it is 2 m. wide, it has an average width of 1 m. and a
depth varying from 5 to 10 fathoms, forming one of the safest and most
commodious anchorages in the north of Scotland. Besides other streams it
receives the Conon, Peffery, Skiack and Alness, and the principal places
on its shores are Dingwall near the head, Cromarty near the mouth,
Kiltearn, Invergordon and Kilmuir on the north. The entrance is guarded
by two precipitous rocks--the one on the north 400 ft., that on the
south 463 ft. high--called the Sutors from a fancied resemblance to a
couple of shoemakers (_Scotice_, souter), bending over their lasts.
There are ferries at Cromarty, Invergordon and Dingwall.
CROME, JOHN (1769-1821), English landscape painter, founder and chief
representative of the "Norwich School," often called Old Crome, to
distinguish him from his son, was born at Norwich, on the 21st of
December 1769. His father was a weaver, and could give him only the
scantiest education. His early years were spent in work of the humblest
kind; and at a fit age he became apprentice to a house-painter. To this
step he appears to have been led by an inborn love of art and the desire
to acquaint himself by any means with its materials and processes.
During his apprenticeship he sometimes painted signboards, and devoted
what leisure time he had to sketching from nature. Through the influence
of a rich art-loving friend he was enabled to exchange his occupation of
house-painter for that of drawing-master; and in this he was engaged
throughout his life. He took great delight in a collection of Dutch
pictures to which he had access, and these he carefully studied. About
1790 he was introduced to Sir William Beechey, whose house in London he
frequently visited, and from whom he gathered additional knowledge and
help in his art. In 1805 the Norwich Society of Artists took definite
shape, its origin being traceable a year or two further back. Crome was
its president and the largest contributor to its annual exhibitions.
Among his pupils were James Stark, Vincent, Thirtle and John Bernay
(Barney) Crome (1794-1842), his son. J. S. Cotman, too, a greater artist
than any of these, was associated with him. Crome continued to reside at
Norwich, and with the exception of his short visits to London had little
or no communication with the great artists of his own time. He first
exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1806; but in this and the following
twelve years he exhibited there only fourteen of his works. With very
few exceptions Crome's subjects are taken from the familiar scenery of
his native county. Fidelity to nature was his dominant aim. "The bit of
heath, the boat, and the slow water of the flattish land, trees most of
all--the single tree in elaborate study, the group of trees, and how the
growth of one affects that of another, and the characteristics of
each,"--these, says Frederick Wedmore (_Studies in English Art_), are
the things to which he is most constant. He still remains, says the same
critic, of many trees the greatest draughtsman, and is especially the
master of the oak. His most important works are--"Mousehold Heath, near
Norwich," now in the National Gallery; "Clump of Trees, Hautbois
Common"; "Oak at Poringland"; the "Willow"; "Coast Scene near Yarmouth";
"Bruges, on the Ostend River"; "Slate Quarries"; the "Italian
Boulevards"; and the "Fishmarket at Boulogne." He executed a good many
etchings, and the great charm of these is in the beautiful and faithful
representation of trees. Crome enjoyed a very limited reputation during
his life, and his pictures were sold at low prices; but since his death
they have been more and more appreciated, and have given him a high
place among English painters of landscape. He died at Norwich on the
22nd of April 1821. His son, J. B. Crome, was his assistant in teaching,
and his best pictures were in the same style, his moonlight effects
being much admired.
A collection of "Old" Crome's etchings, entitled _Norfolk Picturesque
Scenery_, was published in 1834, and was re-issued with a memoir by
Dawson Turner in 1838, but in this issue the prints were retouched by
other hands.
CROMER, EVELYN BARING, 1ST EARL (1841- ), British statesman and
diplomatist, was born on the 26th of February 1841, the ninth son of
Henry Baring, M.P., by Cecilia Anne, eldest daughter of Admiral Windham
of Felbrigge Hall, Norfolk. Having joined the Royal Artillery in 1858,
he was appointed in 1861 A.D.C. to Sir Henry Storks, high commissioner
of the Ionian Islands, and acted as secretary to the same chief during
the inquiry into the Jamaica outbreak in 1865. Gazetted captain in 1870,
he went in 1872 as private secretary to his cousin Lord Northbrook,
Viceroy of India, where he remained until 1876, when he became major,
received the C.S.I., and was appointed British commissioner of the
Egyptian public debt office. Up to this period Major Baring had given no
unusual signs of promise, and the appointment of a comparatively untried
major of artillery as the British representative on a Financial Board
composed of representatives of all the great powers was considered a
bold one. Within a very short time it was recognized that the
Englishman, though keeping himself carefully in the background, was
unmistakably the predominant factor on the board. He was mainly
responsible for the searching report, issued in 1878, of the commission
of inquiry that had been instituted into the financial methods of the
Khedive Ismail; and when that able and unscrupulous Oriental had to
submit to an enforced abdication in 1879, it was Major Baring who became
the British controller-general and practical director of the Dual
Control. Had he remained in Egypt, the whole course of Egyptian history
might have been altered, but his services were deemed more necessary in
India, and under Lord Ripon he became financial member of council in
June 1880. He remained there till 1883, leaving an unmistakable mark on
the Indian financial system, and then, having been rewarded by the
K.C.S.I., he was appointed British agent and consul-general in Egypt and
a minister plenipotentiary in the diplomatic service.
Sir Evelyn Baring was at that time only a man of forty-two, who had
gained a reputation for considerable financial ability, combined with an
abruptness of manner and a certain autocracy of demeanour which, it was
feared, would impede his success in a position which required
considerable tact and diplomacy. It was a friendly colleague who wrote--
"The virtues of Patience are known,
But I think that, when put to the touch,
The people of Egypt will own, with a groan,
There's an Evil in Baring too much."
When he arrived in Cairo in 1883 he found the administration of the
country almost non-existent. Ismail had ruled with all the vices, but
also with all the advantages, of autocracy. Disorder in the finances,
brutality towards the people, had been combined with public tranquillity
and the outer semblance of civilization. Order, at least, reigned from
the Sudan to the Mediterranean, and such trivial military disturbances
as had occurred had been of Ismail's own devising and for his own
purposes. Tewfik, who had succeeded him, had neither the inclination nor
character to be a despot. Within three years his government had been all
but overthrown, and he was only khedive by the grace of British
bayonets. Government by bayonets was not in accord with the views of the
House of Commons, yet Ismail's government by the kourbash could not be
restored. The British government, under Mr Gladstone, desired to
establish in Egypt a sort of constitutional government; and as there
existed no single element of a constitution, they had sent out Lord
Dufferin (the first marquess of Dufferin) to frame one. That gifted
nobleman, in the delightful lucidity of his picturesque report, left
nothing to be desired except the material necessary to convert the
flowing periods into political entities.[1] In the absence of that, the
constitution was still-born, and Sir Evelyn Baring arrived to find, not
indeed a clean slate, but a worn-out papyrus, disfigured by the efforts
of centuries to describe in hieroglyph a method of rule for a docile
people.
From that date the history of Sir Evelyn Baring, who became Baron Cromer
in 1892, G.C.B. in 1895, viscount in 1897, and earl in 1901, is the
history of Egypt, and requires the barest mention of its salient points
here. From the outset he realized that the task he had to perform could
only be effected piecemeal and in detail, and his very first measure was
one which, though severely criticized at the time, has been justified by
events, and which in any case showed that he shirked no responsibility,
and was capable of adopting heroic methods. He counselled the
abandonment, at least temporarily, by Egypt of its authority in the
Sudan provinces, already challenged by the mahdi. His views were shared
by the British ministry of the day and the policy of abandonment
enforced upon the Egyptian government. At the same time it was decided
that efforts should be made to relieve the Egyptian garrisons in the
Sudan and this resolve led to the mission of General C. G. Gordon (q.v.)
to Khartum. Lord Cromer subsequently told the story of Gordon's mission
at length, making clear the measure of responsibility resting upon him
as British agent. The proposal to employ Gordon came from the British
government and twice Sir Evelyn rejected the suggestion. Finally,
mistrusting his own judgment, for he did not consider Gordon the proper
person for the mission, Baring yielded to pressure from Lord Granville.
Thereafter he gave Gordon all the support possible, and in the critical
matter of the proposed despatch of Zobeir to Khartum, Baring--after a
few days' hesitation--cordially endorsed Gordon's request. The request
was refused by the British government--and the catastrophe which
followed at Khartum rendered inevitable.
The Sudan crisis being over, for the time, Sir Evelyn Baring set to work
to reorganize Egypt itself. This work he attacked in detail. The very
first essential was to regulate the financial situation; and in Egypt,
where the entire revenue is based on the production of the soil,
irrigation was of the first importance. With the assistance of Sir Colin
Scott Moncrieff, in the public works department, and Sir Edgar Vincent,
as financial adviser, these two great departments were practically put
in order before he gave more than superficial attention to the rest. The
ministry of justice was the next department seriously taken in hand,
with the assistance of Sir John Scott, while the army had been reformed
under Sir Evelyn Wood, who was succeeded by Sir Francis (afterwards
Lord) Grenfell. Education, the ministry of the interior, and gradually
every other department, came to be reorganized, or, more correctly
speaking, formed, under Lord Cromer's carefully persistent direction,
until it may be said to-day that the Egyptian administration can safely
challenge comparison with that of any other state. In the meantime the
rule of the mahdi and his successor, the khalifa, in the temporarily
abandoned provinces of the Sudan, had been weakened by internal
dissensions; the Italians from Massawa, the Belgians from the Congo
State, and the French from their West African possessions, had gradually
approached nearer to the valley of the Nile; and the moment had arrived
at which Egypt must decide either to recover her position in the Sudan
or allow the Upper Nile to fall into hands hostile to Great Britain and
her position in Egypt. Lord Cromer was as quick to recognize the moment
for action and to act as he had fifteen years earlier been prompt to
recognize the necessity of abstention. In March-September 1896 the first
advance was made to Dongola under the Sirdar, Sir Herbert (afterwards
Lord) Kitchener; between July 1897 and April 1898 the advance was pushed
forward to the Atbara; and on the 2nd of September 1898, the battle of
Omdurman finally crushed the power of the khalifa and restored the Sudan
to the rule of Egypt and Great Britain. In the negotiations which
resulted in the Anglo-French Declaration of the 8th of April 1904,
whereby France bound herself not to obstruct in any manner the action of
Great Britain in Egypt and the Egyptian government acquired financial
freedom, Lord Cromer took an active part. He also successfully guarded
the interests of Egypt and Great Britain in 1906 when Turkey attempted
by encroachments in the Sinai Peninsula to obtain a strategic position
on the Suez Canal. To have effected all this in the face of the greatest
difficulties--political, national and international--and at the same
time to have raised the credit of the country from a condition of
bankruptcy to an equality with that of the first European powers,
entitles Lord Cromer to a very high place among the greatest
administrators and statesmen that the British empire has produced. In
April 1907, in consequence of the state of his health, he resigned
office, having held the post of British agent in Egypt for twenty-four
years. In July of the same year parliament granted L50,000 out of the
public funds to Lord Cromer in recognition of his "eminent services" in
Egypt. In 1908 he published, in two volumes, _Modern Egypt_, in which he
gave an impartial narrative of events in Egypt and the Sudan since 1876,
and dealt with the results to Egypt of the British occupation of the
country. Lord Cromer also took part in the political controversies at
home, joining himself to the free-trade wing of the Unionist party.
Lord Cromer married in 1876 Ethel Stanley, daughter of Sir Rowland
Stanley Errington, eleventh baronet, but was left a widower with two
sons in 1898; and in 1901 he married Lady Katherine Thynne, daughter of
the 4th marquess of Bath.