[1] _Life of Sir H. Vane_, by W. W. Ireland, 222.
[2] C. H. Firth, Cromwell, p. 324.
[3] John Morley, Oliver Cromwell, p. 393.
[4] Frederic Harrison, _Oliver Cromwell_, p. 214.
[5] John Morley, _Oliver Cromwell_, p. 483.
[6] Frederic Harrison, _Cromwell_, p. 34.
CROMWELL, RICHARD (1626-1712), lord protector of England, eldest
surviving son of Oliver Cromwell and of Elizabeth Bourchier, was born on
the 4th of October 1626. He served in the parliamentary army, and in
1647 was admitted a member of Lincoln's Inn. In 1649 he married Dorothy,
daughter of Richard Mayor, or Major, of Hursley in Hampshire. He
represented Hampshire in the parliament of 1654, and Cambridge
University in that of 1656, and in November 1655 was appointed one of
the council of trade. But he was not brought forward by his father or
prepared in any way for his future greatness, and lived in the country
occupied with field sports, till after the institution of the second
protectorate in 1657 and the recognition of Oliver's right to name his
successor. On the 18th of July he succeeded his father as chancellor of
the university of Oxford, on the 31st of December he was made a member
of the council of state, and about the same time obtained a regiment and
a seat in Cromwell's House of Lords. He was received generally as his
father's successor, and was nominated by him as such on his death-bed.
He was proclaimed on the 3rd of September 1658, and at first his
accession was acclaimed with general favour both at home and abroad.
Dissensions, however, soon broke out between the military faction and
the civilians. Richard's elevation, not being "general of the army as
his father was," was distasteful to the officers, who desired the
appointment of a commander-in-chief from among themselves, a request
refused by Richard. The officers in the council, moreover, showed
jealousy of the civil members, and to settle these difficulties and to
provide money a parliament was summoned on the 27th of January 1659,
which declared Richard protector, and incurred the hostility of the army
by criticizing severely the arbitrary military government of Oliver's
last two years, and by impeaching one of the major-generals. A council
of the army accordingly established itself in opposition to the
parliament, and demanded on the 6th of April a justification and
confirmation of former proceedings, to which the parliament replied by
forbidding meetings of the army council without the permission of the
protector, and insisting that all officers should take an oath not to
disturb the proceedings in parliament. The army now broke into open
rebellion and assembled at St James's. Richard was completely in their
power; he identified himself with their cause, and the same night
dissolved the parliament. The Long Parliament (which re-assembled on
the 7th of May) and the heads of the army came to an agreement to effect
his dismissal; and in the subsequent events Richard appears to have
played a purely passive part, refusing to make any attempt to keep his
power or to forward a restoration of the monarchy. On the 25th of May
his submission was communicated to the House. He retired into private
life, heavily burdened with debts incurred during his tenure of office
and narrowly escaping arrest even before he quitted Whitehall. In the
summer of 1660 he left England for France, where he lived in seclusion
under the name of John Clarke, subsequently removing elsewhere, either
(for the accounts differ) to Spain, to Italy, or to Geneva. He was long
regarded by the government as a dangerous person, and in 1671 a strict
search was made for him but without avail. He returned to England about
1680 and lived at Cheshunt, in the house of Sergeant Pengelly, where he
died on the 12th of July 1712, being buried in Hursley church in
Hampshire. Richard Cromwell was treated with general contempt by his
contemporaries, and invidiously compared with his great father.
According to Mrs Hutchinson he was "gentle and virtuous but a peasant in
his nature and became not greatness." He was nevertheless a man of
respectable abilities, of an irreproachable private character, and a
good speaker.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--See the article in the _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, and
authorities there cited; Noble's _Memoirs of the Protectoral House of
Cromwell_ (1787); _Memoirs of the Protector ... and of his Sons_, by
O. Cromwell (1820); _The Two Protectors_, by Sir R. Tangye (1899);
_Kebleland and a Short Life of Richard Cromwell_, by W. T. Warren
(1900); _Letters and Speeches of O. Cromwell_, by T. Carlyle (1904);
_Eng. Hist. Review_, xiii. 93 (letters) and xviii. 79; _Cal. of State
Papers, Domestic, Lansdowne MSS._ in British Museum. (P. C. Y.)
CROMWELL, THOMAS, EARL OF ESSEX (1485?-1540), born probably not later
than 1485 and possibly a year or two earlier, was the only son of Walter
Cromwell, _alias_ Smyth, a brewer, smith and fuller of Putney. His
grandfather, John Cromwell, seems to have belonged to the
Nottinghamshire family, of whom the most distinguished member was Ralph,
Lord Cromwell (1394?-1456), lord treasurer; and he migrated from
Norwell, Co. Notts, to Wimbledon some time before 1461. John's son,
Walter, seems to have acquired the _alias_ Smyth from being apprenticed
to his uncle, William Smyth, "armourer," of Wimbledon. He was of a
turbulent, vicious disposition, perpetually being fined in the
manor-court for drunkenness, for evading the assize of beer, and for
turning more than his proper number of beasts on to Putney Common. Once
he was punished for a sanguinary assault, and his connexion with
Wimbledon ceased in 1514 when he "falsely and fraudulently erased the
evidences and terrures of the lord." Till that time he had flourished
like the bay-tree.
Under these circumstances the absence of Thomas Cromwell's name from the
Wimbledon manor rolls is almost a presumption of respectability. Perhaps
it would be safer to attribute it to Cromwell's absence from the manor.
He is said to have quarrelled with his father--no great crime
considering the father's character--and fled to Italy, where he served
as a soldier in the French army at the battle of the Garigliano (Dec.
1503). He escaped from the battle-field to Florence, where he was
befriended by the banker Frescobaldi, a debt which he appears to have
repaid with superabundant interest later on. He is next heard of at
Antwerp as a trader, and about 1510 he was induced to accompany a
Bostonian to Rome in quest of some papal indulgences for a Boston gild;
Cromwell secured the boon by the timely present of some choice
sweetmeats to Julius II. In 1512 there is some slight evidence that he
was at Middelburg, and also in London, engaged in business as a merchant
and solicitor. His marriage must have taken place about the same time,
judging from the age of his son Gregory. His wife was Elizabeth Wykes,
daughter of a well-to-do shearman of Putney, whose business Cromwell
carried on in combination with his own.
For about eight years after 1512 we hear nothing of Cromwell. A letter
to him from Cicely, marchioness of Dorset, in which he is seen in
confidential business relations with her ladyship, is probably earlier
than 1520, and it is possible that Cromwell owed his introduction to
Wolsey to the Dorset family. On the other hand, it is stated that his
cousin, Robert Cromwell, vicar of Battersea under the cardinal, gave
Thomas the stewardship of the archiepiscopal estate of York House. At
any rate he was advising Wolsey on legal points in 1520, and from that
date he occurs frequently not only as mentor to the cardinal, but to
noblemen and others when in difficulties, especially of a financial
character; he made large sums as a money-lender.
In 1523 Cromwell emerges into public life as a member of parliament. The
official returns for this election are lost and it is not known for what
constituency he sat, but we have a humorous letter from Cromwell
describing its proceedings, and a remarkable speech which he wrote and
perhaps delivered, opposing the reckless war with France and indicating
a sounder policy which was pursued after Wolsey's fall. If, he said, war
was to be waged, it would be better to secure Boulogne than advance on
Paris; if the king went in person and were killed without leaving a male
heir, he hinted there would be civil war; it would be wiser to attempt a
union with Scotland, and in any case the proposed subsidy would be a
fatal drain on the resources of the realm. Neither Henry nor Wolsey was
so foolish as to resent this criticism, and Cromwell lost nothing by it.
He was made a collector of the subsidy he had opposed--a doubtful favour
perhaps--and in 1524 was admitted at Gray's Inn; but he now became the
most confidential servant of the cardinal. In 1525 he was Wolsey's agent
in the dissolution of the smaller monasteries which were designed to
provide the endowments for Wolsey's foundations at Oxford and Ipswich, a
task which gave Cromwell a taste and a facility for similar enterprises
on a greater scale later on. For these foundations Cromwell drew up the
necessary deeds, and he was receiver-general of cardinal's college,
constantly supervising the workmen there and at Ipswich. His ruthless
vigour and his accessibility to bribes earned him such unpopularity that
there were rumours of his projected assassination or imprisonment. All
this constituted a further bond of sympathy between him and his master,
and Cromwell grew in Wolsey's favour until his fall. His wife had died
in 1527 or 1528, and in July 1529 he made his will, in which one of the
chief beneficiaries was his nephew, Richard Williams, alias Cromwell,
the great-grandfather of the protector.
Wolsey's disgrace reduced Cromwell to such despair that Cavendish once
found him in tears and at his prayers "which had been a strange sight in
him afore." Many of the cardinal's servants had been taken over by the
king, but Cromwell had made himself particularly obnoxious. However, he
rode to court from Esher to "make or mar," as he himself expressed it,
and offered his services to Norfolk. Possibly he had already paved the
way by the pensions and grants which he induced Wolsey to make through
him, out of the lands and revenues of his bishoprics and abbeys, to
nobles and courtiers who were hard pressed to keep up the lavish style
of Henry's court. Cromwell could be most useful to the government in
parliament, and the government, represented by Norfolk, undertook to use
its influence in procuring him a seat, on the natural understanding that
Cromwell should do his best to further government business in the House
of Commons. This was on the 2nd of November 1529; the elections had been
made, and parliament was to meet on the morrow. A seat was, however,
found or made for Cromwell at Taunton. He signalized himself by a
powerful speech in opposition to the bill of attainder against Wolsey
which had already passed the Lords. The bill was thrown out, possibly
with Henry's connivance, though no theory has yet explained its curious
history so completely as the statement of Cavendish and other
contemporaries, that its rejection was due to the arguments of Cromwell.
Doubtless he championed his fallen chief not so much for virtue's sake
as for the impression it would make on others. He did not feel called
upon to accompany Wolsey on his exile from the court.
Cromwell had now, according to Cardinal Pole, whose story has been too
readily accepted, been converted into an "emissary of Satan" by the
study of Machiavelli's _Prince_. In the one interview which Pole had
with Cromwell, the latter, so Pole wrote ten years later in 1539,
recommended him to read a new Italian book on politics, which Pole says
he afterwards discovered was Machiavelli's _Prince_. But this discovery
was not made for some years: the _Prince_ was not published until 1532,
three years after the conversation; there is evidence that Cromwell was
not acquainted with it until 1537 or 1539, and there is nothing in the
_Prince_ bearing on the precise point under discussion by Pole and
Cromwell. On the other hand, the point is discussed in Castiglione's _Il
Cortegiano_ which had just been published in 1528, and of which Cromwell
promised to lend Bonner a copy in 1530. The _Cortegiano_ is the
antithesis of the _Prince_; and there is little doubt that Pole's
account is the offspring of an imagination heated by his own perusal of
the Prince in 1538, and by Cromwell's ruin of the Pole family at the
same time; until then he had failed to see in Cromwell the Machiavellian
"emissary of Satan."
Equally fanciful is Pole's ascription of the whole responsibility for
the Reformation to Cromwell's suggestion. It was impossible for Pole to
realize the substantial causes of that perfectly natural development,
and it was his cue to represent Henry as having acted at the diabolic
suggestion of Satan's emissary. In reality the whole programme, the
destruction of the liberties and confiscation of the wealth of the
church by parliamentary agency, had been indicated before Cromwell had
spoken to Henry. The use of Praemunire had been applied to Wolsey;
laymen had supplanted ecclesiastics in the chief offices of state; the
plan of getting a divorce without papal intervention had been the
original idea, which Wolsey had induced the king to abandon, and it had
been revived by Cranmer's suggestion about the universities. The root
idea of the supreme authority of the king had been asserted in Tyndale's
_Obedience of a Christian Man_ published in 1528, which Anne Boleyn
herself had brought to Henry's notice: "this," he said, "is a book for
me and all kings to read," and Campeggio had felt compelled to warn him
against these notions, of which Pole imagines that he had never heard
until they were put into his head by Cromwell late in 1530. In the same
way Cromwell's influence over the government from 1529-1533 has been
grossly exaggerated. It was not till 1531 that he was admitted to the
privy council nor till 1534 that he was made secretary, though he had
been made master of the Jewel-House, clerk of the Hanaper and master of
the Wards in 1532, and chancellor of the exchequer (then a minor office)
in 1533. It is not till 1533 that his name is as much as mentioned in
the correspondence of any foreign ambassador resident in London. This
obscurity has been attributed to deliberate suppression: but no secrecy
was made about Cranmer's suggestion, and it was not Henry's habit to
assume a responsibility which he could devolve upon others. It is said
that Cromwell's life would not have been safe, had he been known as the
author of this policy; but that is not a consideration which would have
appealed to Henry, and he was just as able to protect his minister in
1530 as he was in 1536. Cromwell, in fact, was not the author of that
policy, but he was the most efficient instrument in its execution.
He was Henry's parliamentary agent, but even in this capacity his power
has been overrated, and he is supposed to have invented those
parliamentary complaints against the clergy, which were transmuted into
the legislation of 1532. But the complaints were old enough; many of
them had been heard in parliament nearly twenty years before, and there
is ample evidence to show that the petition against the clergy
represents the "infinite clamours" of the Commons against the Church,
which the House itself resolved should be "put in writing and delivered
to the king." The actual drafting of the statute, as of all the
Reformation Acts between 1532 and 1539, was largely Cromwell's work; and
the success with which parliament was managed during this period was
also due to him. It was not an easy task, for the House of Commons more
than once rejected government measures, and members were heard to
threaten Henry VIII. with the fate of Richard III.; they even complained
of Cromwell's reporting their proceedings to the king. That was his
business rather than conveying imaginary royal orders to the House.
"They be contented," he wrote in one of these reports, "that deed and
writing shall be treason," but words were only to be misprision: they
refused to include an heir's rebellion or disobedience in the bill "as
rebellion is already treason, and disobedience is no cause of forfeiture
of inheritance." There was, of course, room for manipulation, which
Cromwell extended to parliamentary elections; but parliamentary opinion
was a force of which he had to take account, and not a negligible
quantity.
From the date of his appointment as secretary in 1534, Cromwell's
biography belongs to the history of England, but it is necessary to
define his personal attitude to the revolution in which he was the
king's most conspicuous agent. He was included by Foxe in his _Book of
Martyrs_ to the Protestant faith: more recent historians regard him as a
sacrilegious ruffian. Now, there were two cardinal principles in the
Protestantism of the 16th century--the supremacy of the temporal
sovereign over the church in matters of government, and the supremacy of
the Scriptures over the Church in matters of faith. There is no room for
doubt as to the sincerity of Cromwell's belief in the first of these two
articles: he paid at his own expense for an English translation of
Marsiglio of Padua's _Defensor Pacis_, the classic medieval advocate of
that doctrine; he had a scheme for governing England by means of
administrative councils nominated by the king to the detriment of
parliament; and he urged upon Henry the adoption of the maxim of the
Roman civil law--_quod principi placuit legis habet vigorem_. He wanted,
in his own words, "one body politic" and no rival to the king's
authority; and he set the divine right of kings against the divine right
of the papacy. There is more doubt about the sincerity of Cromwell's
attachment to the second article; it is true that he set up a Bible in
every parish church, and regarded them as invaluable; and the
correspondents who unbosom themselves to him are all of a Protestant way
of thinking. But Protestantism was the greatest support of absolute
monarchy. Hence its value in Cromwell's eyes. Of religious conviction
there is in him little trace, and still less of the religious
temperament. He was a polished representative of the callous, secular
middle class of that most irreligious age. Sentiment found no place, and
feeling little, in his composition; he used the axe with as little
passion as the surgeon does the knife, and he operated on some of the
best and noblest in the land. He saw that it was wiser to proscribe a
few great opponents than to fall on humbler prey; but he set law above
justice, and law to him was simply the will of the state.
In 1534 Cromwell was appointed master of the Rolls, and in 1535
chancellor of Cambridge University and visitor-general of the
monasteries. The policy of the Dissolution has been theoretically
denounced, but practically approved in every civilized state, Catholic
as well as Protestant. Every one has found it necessary, sooner or
later, to curtail or to destroy its monastic foundations; only those
which delayed the task longest have generally lagged farthest behind in
national progress. The need for reform was admitted by a committee of
cardinals appointed by Paul III. in 1535, and it had been begun by
Wolsey. Cromwell was not affected by the iniquities of the monks except
as arguments for the confiscation of their property. He had boasted that
he would make Henry VIII. the richest prince in Christendom; and the
monasteries, with their direct dependence on the pope and their
cosmopolitan organization, were obstacles to that absolute authority of
the national state which was Cromwell's ideal. He had learnt how to
visit monasteries under Wolsey, and the visitation of 1535 was carried
out with ruthless efficiency. During the storm which followed, Henry
took the management of affairs into his own hands, but Cromwell was
rewarded in July 1536 by being knighted, created lord privy seal, Baron
Cromwell, and vicar-general and viceregent of the king in "Spirituals."
In this last offensive capacity he sent a lay deputy to preside in
Convocation, taking precedence of the bishops and archbishops, and
issued his famous Injunctions of 1536 and 1538; a Bible was to be
provided in every church; the _Paternoster_, Creed and Ten Commandments
were to be recited by the incumbent in English; he was to preach at
least once a quarter, and to start a register of births, marriages and
deaths. During these years the outlook abroad grew threatening because
of the alliance, under papal guarantee, between Charles V. and Francis
I.; and Cromwell sought to counterbalance it by a political and
theological union between England and the Lutheran princes of Germany.
The theological part of the scheme broke down in 1538 when Henry
categorically refused to concede the three reforms demanded by the
Lutheran envoys. This was ominous, and the parliament of 1539, into
which Cromwell tried to introduce a number of personal adherents, proved
thoroughly reactionary. The temporal peers were unanimous in favour of
the Six Articles, the bishops were divided, and the Commons for the most
part agreed with the Lords. Cromwell, however, succeeded in suspending
the execution of the act, and was allowed to proceed with his one
independent essay in foreign policy. The friendship between Francis and
Charles was apparently getting closer; Pole was exhorting them to a
crusade against a king who was worse than the Turk; and anxious eyes
searched the Channel in 1539 for signs of the coming Armada. Under these
circumstances Henry acquiesced in Cromwell's negotiations for a marriage
with Anne of Cleves. Anne, of course, was not a Lutheran, and the state
religion in Cleves was at least as Catholic as Henry's own. But her
sister was married to the elector of Saxony, and her brother had claims
on Guelders, which Charles V. refused to recognize. Guelders was to the
emperor's dominions in the Netherlands what Scotland was to England, and
had often been used by France in the same way, and an alliance between
England, Guelders, Cleves and the Schmalkaldic League would, Cromwell
thought, make Charles's position in the Netherlands almost untenable.
Anne herself was the weak point in the argument; Henry conceived an
invincible repugnance to her from the first; he was restrained from an
immediate breach with his new allies only by fear of Francis and
Charles. In the spring of 1540 he was reassured on that score; no attack
on him from that quarter was impending; there was a rift between the two
Catholic sovereigns, and there was no real need for Anne and her German
friends.
From that moment Cromwell's fate was sealed; the Lords loathed him as an
upstart even more than they had loathed Wolsey; he had no church to
support him; Norfolk and Gardiner detested him from pique as well as on
principle, and he had no friend in the council save Cranmer. As lay
viceregent he had given umbrage to nearly every churchman, and he had
put all his eggs in the one basket of royal favour, which had now failed
him. Cromwell did not succumb without an effort, and a desperate
struggle ensued in the council. In April the French ambassador wrote
that he was tottering to his fall; a few days later he was created earl
of Essex and lord great chamberlain, and two of his satellites were made
secretaries to the king; he then despatched one bishop to the Tower, and
threatened to send five others to join him. At last Henry struck as
suddenly and remorselessly as a beast of prey; on the 10th of June
Norfolk accused him of treason; the whole council joined in the attack,
and Cromwell was sent to the Tower. A vast number of crimes was laid to
his charge, but not submitted for trial. An act of attainder was passed
against him without a dissentient voice, and after contributing his mite
towards the divorce of Anne, he was beheaded on Tower Hill on the 28th
of July, repudiating all heresy and declaring that he died in the
Catholic faith.
In estimating Cromwell's character it must be remembered that his father
was a blackguard, and that he himself spent the formative years of his
life in a vile school of morals. A ruffian he doubtless was, as he says,
in his youth, and he was the last man to need the tuition of
Machiavelli. Nevertheless he civilized himself to a certain extent; he
was not a drunkard nor a forger like his father; from personal
immorality he seems to have been singularly free; he was a kind master,
and a stanch friend; and he possessed all the outward graces of the
Renaissance period. He was not vindictive, and his atrocious acts were
done in no private quarrel, but in what he conceived to be the interests
of his master and the state. Where those interests were concerned he
had no heart and no conscience and no religious faith; no man was more
completely blighted by the 16th century worship of the state.
The authorities for the early life of Cromwell are the Wimbledon manor
rolls, used by Mr John Phillips of Putney in _The Antiquary_ (1880),
vol. ii., and the _Antiquarian Mag._ (1882), vol. ii.; Pole's
_Apologia_, i. 126; Bandello's _Novella_, xxxiv.; Chapuys' letter to
Granvelle, 21 Nov. 1535; and Foxe's _Acts and Mon._ From 1522 see
_Letters and Papers of Henry VIII._, vols. iii.-xvi.; Cavendish's
_Life of Wolsey_; Hall's _Chron._; Wriothesley's _Chron._ These and
practically all other available sources have been utilized in R. B.
Merriman's _Life and Letters of Thomas Cromwell_ (2 vols., 1902). For
Cromwell and Machiavelli see Paul van Dyke's _Renascence Portraits_
(1906), App. (A. F. P.)
CRONJE, PIET ARNOLDUS (c. 1840- ), Boer general, was born about 1840 in
the Transvaal and in 1881 took part in the first Boer War in the rank of
commandant. He commanded in the siege of the British garrison at
Potchefstroom, though he was unable to force their surrender until after
the conclusion of the general armistice. The Boer leader was at this
time accused of withholding knowledge of this armistice from the
garrison (see POTCHEFSTROOM). He held various official positions in the
years 1881-1899, and commanded the Boer force which compelled the
surrender of the Jameson raiders at Doornkop (Jan. 2, 1896). In the war
of 1899 Cronje was general commanding in the western theatre of war, and
began the siege of Kimberley. He opposed the advance of the British
division under Lord Methuen, and fought, though without success, three
general actions at Belmont, Graspan and Modder River. At Magersfontein,
early in December 1899, he completely repulsed a general attack made
upon his position, and thereby checked for two months the northward
advance of the British column. In the campaign of February 1900, Cronje
opposed Lord Roberts's army on the Magersfontein battleground, but he
was unable to prevent the relief of Kimberley; retreating westward, he
was surrounded near Paardeberg, and, after a most obstinate resistance,
was forced to surrender with the remnant of his army (Feb. 27, 1900). As
a prisoner of war Cronje was sent to St Helena, where he remained until
released after the conclusion of peace (see TRANSVAAL: _History_).
CROOKES, SIR WILLIAM (1832- ), English chemist and physicist, was born
in London on the 17th of June 1832, and studied chemistry at the Royal
College of Chemistry under A. W. von Hofmann, whose assistant he became
in 1851. Three years later he was appointed an assistant in the
meteorological department of the Radcliffe observatory, Oxford, and in
1855 he obtained a chemical post at Chester. In 1861, while conducting a
spectroscopic examination of the residue left in the manufacture of
sulphuric acid, he observed a bright green line which had not been
noticed previously, and by following up the indication thus given he
succeeded in isolating a new element, thallium, a specimen of which was
shown in public for the first time at the exhibition of 1862. During the
next eight years he carried out a minute investigation of this metal and
its properties. While determining its atomic weight, he thought it
desirable, for the sake of accuracy, to weigh it in a vacuum, and even
in these circumstances he found that the balance behaved in an anomalous
manner, the metal appearing to be heavier when cold than when hot. This
phenomenon he explained as a "repulsion from radiation," and he
expressed his discovery in the statement that in a vessel exhausted of
air a body tends to move away from another body hotter than itself.
Utilizing this principle he constructed the radiometer (q.v.), which he
was at first disposed to regard as a machine that directly transformed
light into motion, but which was afterwards perceived to depend on
thermal action. Thence he was led to his famous researches on the
phenomena produced by the discharge of electricity through highly
exhausted tubes (sometimes known as "Crookes' tubes" in consequence),
and to the development of his theory of "radiant matter" or matter in a
"fourth state," which led up to the modern electronic theory. In 1883 he
began an inquiry into the nature and constitution of the rare earths. By
repeated fractionations he was able to divide yttrium into distinct
portions which gave different spectra when exposed in a high vacuum to
the spark from an induction coil. This result he considered to be due,
not to any removal of impurities, but to an actual splitting-up of the
yttrium molecule into its constituents, and he ventured to draw the
provisional conclusion that the so-called simple bodies are in reality
compound molecules, at the same time suggesting that all the elements
have been produced by a process of evolution from one primordial stuff
or "protyle." A later result of this method of investigation was the
discovery of a new member of the rare earths, monium or victorium, the
spectrum of which is characterized by an isolated group of lines, only
to be detected photographically, high up in the ultra-violet; the
existence of this body was announced in his presidential address to the
British Association at Bristol in 1898. In the same address he called
attention to the conditions of the world's food supply, urging that with
the low yield at present realized per acre the supply of wheat would
within a comparatively short time cease to be equal to the demand caused
by increasing population, and that since nitrogenous manures are
essential for an increase in the yield, the hope of averting starvation,
as regards those races for whom wheat is a staple food, depended on the
ability of the chemist to find an artificial method for fixing the
nitrogen of the air. An authority on precious stones, and especially the
diamond, he succeeded in artificially making some minute specimens of
the latter gem; and on the discovery of radium he was one of the first
to take up the study of its properties, in particular inventing the
spinthariscope, an instrument in which the effects of a trace of radium
salt are manifested by the phosphorescence produced on a zinc sulphide
screen. In addition to many other researches besides those here
mentioned, he wrote or edited various books on chemistry and chemical
technology, including _Select Methods of Chemical Analysis_, which went
through a number of editions; and he also gave a certain amount of time
to the investigation of psychic phenomena, endeavouring to effect some
measure of correlation between them and ordinary physical laws. He was
knighted in 1897, and received the Royal (1875), Davy (1888), and Copley
(1904) medals of the Royal Society, besides filling the offices of
president of the Chemical Society and of the Institution of Electrical
Engineers. He married Ellen, daughter of W. Humphrey, of Darlington, and
their golden wedding was celebrated in 1906.
CROOKSTON, a city and the county-seat of Polk county, Minnesota, U.S.A.,
on the Red Lake river in the Red River valley, about 300 m. N.W. of
Minneapolis, and about 25 m. E. of Grand Forks, North Dakota. Pop.
(1890) 3457; (1900) 5359; (1905, state census) 6794, 2049 being
foreign-born, including 656 from Norway (2 Norwegian weeklies are
published), 613 from Canada, 292 from Sweden; (1910 U.S. census) 7559.
Crookston is served by the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific
railways. It has a Carnegie library, and the St Vincent and Bethesda
hospitals, and is the seat of a Federal Land Office and of a state
agricultural high school (with an experimental farm). Dams on the Red
Lake river provide a fine water-power, and among the city's manufactures
are lumber, leather, flour, farm implements, wagons and bricks. The city
is situated in a fertile farming region, and is a market for grain,
potatoes and other agricultural products, and lumber. Crookston was
settled about 1872, was incorporated in 1879, received its first city
charter in 1883, and adopted a new one in 1906. It was named in honour
of William Crooks, an early settler.
CROP (a word common in various forms, such as Germ. _Kropf_, to many
Teutonic languages for a swelling, excrescence, round head or top of
anything; it appears also in Romanic languages derived from Teutonic, in
Fr. as _croupe_, whence the English "crupper"; and in Ital. _groppo_,
whence English "group"), the _ingluvies_, or pouched expansion of a
bird's oesophagus, in which the food remains to undergo a preparatory
process of digestion before being passed into the true stomach. From the
meaning of "top" or "head," as applied to a plant, herb or flower, comes
the common use of the word for the produce of cereals or other
cultivated plants, the wheat-crop, the cotton-crop and the like, and
generally, "the crops"; more particular expressions are the
"white-crop," for such grain crops as barley or wheat, which whiten as
they grow ripe and "green-crop" for such as roots or potatoes which do
not, and also for those which are cut in a green state, like clover (see
AGRICULTURE). Other uses, more or less technical, of the word are, in
leather-dressing, for the whole untrimmed hide; in mining and geology,
for the "outcrop" or appearance at the surface of a vein or stratum and,
particularly in tin mining, of the best part of the ore produced after
dressing. A "hunting-crop" is a short thick stock for a whip, with a
small leather loop at one end, to which a thong may be attached. From
the verb "to crop," i.e. to take off the top of anything, comes "crop"
meaning a closely cut head of hair, found in the name "croppy" given to
the Roundheads at the time of the Great Rebellion, to the Catholics in
Ireland in 1688 by the Orangemen, probably with reference to the
priests' tonsures, and to the Irish rebels of 1798, who cut their hair
short in imitation of the French revolutionaries.
CROPSEY, JASPER FRANCIS (1823-1900), American landscape painter, was
born at Rossville, Staten Island, New York, on the 18th of February
1823. After practising architecture for several years, he turned his
attention to painting, studying in Italy from 1847 to 1850. In 1851 he
was elected a member of the National Academy of Design. From 1857 to
1863 he had a studio in London, and after his return to America enjoyed
a considerable vogue, particularly as a painter of vivid autumnal
effects, along the lines of the Hudson River school. He was one of the
original members of the American Water Color Society. He continued
actively in this profession until within a few days of his death, at
Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, on the 22nd of June 1900. He made the
architectural designs for the stations of the elevated railways in New
York City.
CROQUET (from Fr. _croc_, a crook, or crooked stick), a lawn game played
with balls, mallets, hoops and two pegs. The game has been evolved,
according to some writers, from the _paille-maille_ which was played in
Languedoc at least as early as the 13th century. Under the name of _le
jeu de la crosse_, or _la crosserie_, a similar game was at the same
period immensely popular in Normandy, and especially at Avranches, but
the object appears to have been to send the ball as far as possible by
driving it with the mallet (see _Sports et jeux d'adresse_, 1904, p.
203). Pall Mall, a fashionable game in England in the time of the
Stuarts, was played with a ball and a mallet, and with two hoops or a
hoop and a peg, the game being won by the player who ran the hoop or
hoops and touched the peg under certain conditions in the fewest
strokes. Croquet certainly has some resemblance to _paille-maille_,
played with more hoops and more balls. It is said that the game was
brought to Ireland from the south of France, and was first played on
Lord Lonsdale's lawn in 1852, under the auspices of the eldest daughter
of Sir Edmund Macnaghten. It came to England in 1856, or perhaps a few
years earlier, and soon became popular.
In 1868 the first all-comers' meeting was held at Moreton-in-the-Marsh.
In the same year the All England Croquet Club was formed, the annual
contest for the championship taking place on the grounds of this club at
Wimbledon.[1] But after being for ten years or so the most popular game
for the country house and garden party, croquet was in its turn
practically ousted by lawn tennis, until, with improved implements and a
more scientific form of play, it was revived about 1894-1895. In
1896-1897 was formed the United All England Croquet Association, on the
initiative of Mr Walter H. Peel. Under the name of the Croquet
Association, with more than 2000 members and nearly a hundred affiliated
clubs (1909), this body is the recognized ruling authority on croquet in
the British Islands. Its headquarters are at the Roehampton Club, where
the championship and champion cup competitions are held each year.
_The Game and its Implements._--The requisites for croquet are a level
grass lawn, six hoops, two posts or pegs, balls, mallets, and hoop-clips
to mark the progress of the players. The usual game is played between
two sides, each having two balls, the side consisting of two players in
partnership, each playing one ball, or of one player playing both balls.
The essential characteristic of croquet is the scientific combination
between two balls in partnership against the other two. The balls are
distinguished by being coloured blue, red, black and yellow, and are
played in that order, blue and black always opposing the other two.
[Illustration: FIG. 1.--Diagram of croquet ground, showing setting of
hoops and pegs, and order of play in accordance with the official Laws
(1909) of the Croquet Association.]
The ground for match play measures 35 yds. by 28 yds., and should be
carefully marked out with white lines. In each corner a white spot is
marked 1 yd. from each boundary. The hoops are made of round iron, not
less than 1/2 in. and not more than 3/4 in. in diameter, and standing 12
in. out of the ground. For match play they are 3(3/4) or 4 in. across,
inside measurement. They are set up as in the accompanying diagram, the
numbers and arrows indicating the order and direction in which they must
be passed. Each hoop is run twice, and each peg struck once. The pegs
may be struck from any direction.
The pegs are 1(1/2) in. in diameter and when fixed stand 18 in. above
the ground. The balls were formerly made of boxwood (earlier still of
beechwood); composition balls are now in general use for tournaments.
They must be 3-5/8 in. in diameter and 15 oz. to 16(1/2) oz. in weight.
It will be seen that for match play the hoops are only 1/8 or at the
most 3/8 in. wider than the diameter of the ball. The mallets may be of
any size and weight, but the head must be made of wood (metal may be
used only for weighting or strengthening purposes), and the ends must be
parallel and similar. Only one mallet may be used in the course of a
game, except in the case of _bona fide_ damage.
The object of the player is to score the points of the game by striking
his ball through each of the hoops and against each of the pegs in a
fixed order; and the side wins which first succeeds in scoring all the
points with both the balls of the side. A metal clip corresponding in
colour with the player's ball is attached to the hoop or peg which that
ball has next to make in the proper order, as a record of its progress
in the game. No point is scored by passing through a hoop or hitting a
peg except in the proper order. Thus, if a player has in any turn or
turns driven his ball successively through hoops 1, 2, and 3, his clip
is attached to hoop 4, and the next point to be made by him will be
that hoop; and so on till all the points (hoops and pegs) have been
scored. Each player starts in turn from any point in a "baulk" or area 3
ft. wide along the left-hand half of the "southern" boundary, marked A
on the diagram, of the lawn--till 1906, from a point 1 ft. in front of
the middle of hoop 1. If he fails either to make a point or to
"roquet"[2] (i.e. drive his ball against) another ball in play, his turn
is at an end and the next player in order takes his turn in like manner.
If he succeeds in scoring a point, he is entitled (as in billiards) to
another stroke; he may then either attempt to score another point, or he
may roquet a ball. Having roqueted a ball--provided he has not already
roqueted the same ball in the same turn without having scored a point in
the interval--he is entitled to two further strokes: first he must "take
croquet," i.e. he places his own ball (which from the moment of the
roquet is "dead" or "in hand") in contact with the roqueted ball on any
side of it, and then strikes his own ball with his mallet, being bound
to move or shake both balls perceptibly. If at the beginning of a turn
the striker's ball is in contact with another ball, a "roquet" is held
to have been made and "croquet" must be taken at once. After taking
croquet the striker is entitled to another stroke, with which he may
score another point, or roquet another ball not previously roqueted in
the same turn since a point was scored, or he may play for safety. Thus,
by skilful alternation of making points and roqueting balls, a "break"
may be made in which point after point, and even all the points in the
game (for the ball in play), may be scored in a single turn, in addition
to 3 or 4 points for the partner ball. The chief skill in the game
perhaps consists in playing the stroke called "taking croquet" (but see
below on the "rush"). Expert players can drive both balls together from
one end of the ground to the other, or send one to a distance while
retaining the other, or place each with accuracy in different directions
as desired, the player obtaining position for scoring a point or
roqueting another ball according to the strategical requirements of his
position. Care has, however, to be taken in playing the croquet-stroke
that both balls are absolutely moved or perceptibly shaken, and that
neither of them be driven over the boundary line, for in either event
the player's next stroke is forfeited and his turn brought summarily to
an end.
There are three distinct methods of holding the mallet among good
players. A comparatively small number still adhere to the once universal
"side stroke," in which the player faces more or less at right angles to
the line of aim, and strikes the ball very much like a golfer, with his
hands close together on the mallet shaft. The majority use "front play,"
in which the player faces in the direction in which he proposes to send
the ball. The essential characteristic of this stroke is that eye, hand
and ball should be in the same vertical plane, and the stroke is rather
a swing--the "pendulum stroke"--than a hit. There are two ways of
playing it. The majority of right-handed front players swing the mallet
outside the right foot, holding it with the left hand as a pivot at the
top of the shaft, while the right hand (about 12 in. lower down) applies
the necessary force, though it must always be borne in mind that the
heavy mallet-head, weighing from 3 to 3(1/2) lb. or even more, does the
work by itself, and the nearer the stroke is to a simple swing, like
that of a pendulum, the more likely it is to be accurate. Either the
right or the left foot may be in advance, and should be roughly parallel
to the line of aim, the player's weight being mainly on the rear foot.
Most of the best Irish and some English players swing the mallet between
their feet, using a grip like that of the side player or golfer, with
the hands close together, and often interlocking. It is claimed that the
loss of power caused by the hampered swing--usually compensated by an
extra heavy mallet--is more than counterbalanced by the greater accuracy
in aim. The beginner is well advised to try all these methods, and adopt
that which comes most natural to him. Skirted players, of course, are
unable to use the Irish stroke; and, as one of the most meritorious
features of croquet is that it is the only out-of-door game in which men
and women can compete on terms of real equality, this has been put
forward as a reason for barring it, if it is actually an advantage.
When a croquet ground is thoroughly smooth and level, the game gives
scope for considerable skill; a great variety of strokes may be played
with the mallet, each having its own well-defined effect on the
behaviour of the balls, while a knowledge of angles is essential.
Skilful tactics are at least as necessary as skilful execution to enable
the player so to dispose the balls on the ground while making a break
that they may most effectively assist him in scoring his points. The
tactics of croquet are in this respect similar to those of billiards,
that the player tries to make what progress he can during his own break,
and to leave the balls "safe" at the end of it; he must also keep in
mind the needs of the other ball of his side by leaving his own ball, or
the last player's ball, or both, within easy roqueting distance or in
useful positions, and that of the next player isolated. Good judgment is
really more valuable than mechanical skill. Croquet is a game of
combination, partners endeavouring to keep together for mutual help, and
to keep their opponents apart. It is important always to leave the next
player in such a position that he will be unable to score a point or
roquet a ball; a break, however profitable, which does not end by doing
this is often fatal. Formerly this might be done by leaving the next
player's ball in such a position that either a hoop or a peg lay between
it and all the other balls ("wiring"), or so near to a hoop or peg that
there was no room for a proper stroke to be taken in the required
direction. Under rule 36 of the _Laws of Croquet_ for 1906, a ball left
in such a position, provided it were within a yard of the obstacle
("close-wired"), might at the striker's option be moved one yard in any
direction. This rule left to the striker whose ball was "wired" more
than a yard from the hoop or peg ("distance-wired") the possibility of
hitting his ball in such a way as to jump the obstacle. The jump-shot
is, however, very bad for the lawn, and in 1907 a further provision was
made by which the player whose ball is left "wired" from all the other
balls by the stroke of an opponent may lift it and play from the "baulk"
area. This practically means that "wiring" is impossible. The most that
can be done is to "close-wire" the next player from two balls and leave
him with a difficult shot at the third. If, however, the next player's
ball has not been moved by the adversary, the adversary is entitled to
wire the balls as best he can.
The following is a specimen of elementary croquet tactics. If a player
is going up to hoop 5 (diagram 1) in the course of a break, he should
have contrived, if possible, to have a ball waiting for him at that hoop
and another at hoop 6. With the aid of the first he runs hoop 5 and
sends it on to the turning peg, stopping his ball in taking croquet
close to the ball at 6. The corner hoops are the difficult ones, and
after running hoop 6 the assisting ball is croqueted to 1 back, the peg
being struck with the aid of the ball already there, which is again
struck and driven to 2 back. If the player has been able to leave the
fourth ball in the centre of the ground (known as a centre ball), he
hits this after taking croquet, takes croquet, going off it to the ball
at 1 back, and continues the break, leaving the centre ball where it
will be useful for 3 back and 4 back. A first-class player should,
however, be able to make a break with 3 balls almost as easily as with
4. A useful device, especially in a losing game, is to get rid of the
opponent's advanced ball if a "rover" (i.e. one which has run all the
hoops and is for the winning peg) by croqueting it in such a way that it
hits the peg and is thus out of the game. This can be done only by a
ball which is itself also a rover. The opponent has then only one turn
out of every three, and may be rendered practically helpless by leaving
him always in a "safe" position. Inasmuch as a skilful player can cause
an opponent's ball to pass through the last two or even three hoops in
the course of his turn and then peg it out, it is considered prudent to
leave unrun the last three hoops until the partner's ball is well
advanced. There is a perennial agitation in the croquet world for a law
prohibiting the player from pegging out his opponent's ball. Many good
players also think it desirable that the four-ball break should be
restricted or wholly forbidden, e.g. by barring the dead ball.
To "rush" a ball is to roquet it hard so that it proceeds for a
considerable distance in a desired direction. This stroke requires
absolute accuracy and often considerable force, which must be applied in
such a way as to drive the player's ball evenly; otherwise it is very
liable, especially if the ground be not perfectly smooth, to jump the
object ball. The rush stroke is absolutely essential to good play, as it
enables croquet to be taken (e.g.) close to the required hoop, whereas
to croquet into position from a great distance and also provide a ball
for use after running the hoop is extremely difficult, often impossible.
To "rush" successfully, the striker's ball must lie near the object
ball, preferably, though not necessarily, in the line of the rush. By
means of the rush it is possible to accomplish the complete round with
the assistance of one ball only. To "cut" a ball is to hit it on the
edge and cause it to move at some desired angle. "Rolling croquet" is
made either by hitting near the top of the player's ball which gives it
"follow," or by making the mallet so hit the ball as to keep up a
sustained pressure. The first impact must, however, result in a
distinctly audible single tap; if a prolonged rattle or a second tap is
heard the stroke is foul. The passing stroke is merely an extension of
this. Here the player's ball proceeds a greater distance than the
croqueted ball, but in somewhat the same direction. The "stop stroke" is
made by a short, sharp tap, the mallet being withdrawn immediately after
contact; the player's ball only rolls a short distance, the other going
much farther. The "jump stroke" is made by striking downwards on to the
ball, which can thus be made to jump over another ball, or even a hoop.
"Peeling" (a term derived from Walter H. Peel, a famous advocate of the
policy) is the term applied to the device of putting a partner's or an
opponent's ball through the hoops with a view to ultimately pegging it
out.
The laws of croquet, and even the arrangement of the hoops, have not
attained complete uniformity wherever the game is played. Croquet
grounds are not always of full size, and some degree of elasticity in
the rules is perhaps necessary to meet local conditions. The laws by
which matches for the championship and all tournaments are governed are
issued annually by the Croquet Association; and though from time to time
trifling amendments may be made, they have probably reached permanence
in essentials.
See _The Encyclopaedia of Sport; The Complete Croquet Player_ (London,
1896); the latest _Laws of Croquet_, published annually by the Croquet
Association, and its official organ _The Croquet Gazette_. For the
principles of the game and its history in England, see C. D. Locock,
_Modern Croquet Tactics_ (London, 1907); A. Lillie, _Croquet up to
Date_ (London, 1900).
_Croquet in the United States: Roque._--Croquet was brought to America
from England soon after its introduction into that country, and enjoyed
a wide popularity as a game for boys and girls before the Civil War (see
Miss Alcott's _Little Women_, cap. 12). American croquet is quite
distinct from the modern English game. It is played on a lawn 60 ft. by
30, and preserves the old-fashioned English arrangement of ten hoops,
including a central "cage" of two hoops. The balls, coloured red, white,
blue and black, are 3(1/4) in. in diameter, and the hoops are from
3(1/2) to 4 in. wide, according to the skill of the players. This game,
however, is not taken seriously in the United States; the _Official
Croquet Guide_ of Mr Charles Jacobus emphasizes "the ease with which the
game can be established," since almost every country home has a grass
plot, and "no elaboration is needed." The scientific game of croquet in
the United States is known as "roque." Under this title a still greater
departure from the English game has been elaborated on quite independent
lines from those of the English Croquet Association since 1882, in which
year the National Roque Association was formed. Roque also suffered from
the popularity of lawn tennis, but since 1897 it has developed almost as
fast as croquet in England. A great national championship tournament is
held in Norwich, Conn., every August, and the game--which is fully as
scientific as modern English croquet--has numerous devotees, especially
in New England.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Diagram of roque ground, showing setting of
arches and stakes and order of play, in accordance with the official
laws (1906) of the National Roque Association.]
Roque is played, not on grass, but on a prepared surface something like
a cinder tennis-court. The standard ground, as adopted by the National
Association in 1903, is hexagonal in shape, with ten arches (hoops) and
two stakes (pegs) as shown in diagram 2. The length is 60 ft., width 30,
and the "corner pieces" are 6 ft. long. An essential feature of the
ground is that it is surrounded by a raised wooden border, often lined
with india-rubber to facilitate the rebound of the ball, and it is
permissible to play a "carom" (or rebounding shot) off this border; a
skilful player can often thus hit a ball which is wired to a direct
shot. A boundary line is marked 28 in. inside the border, on which a
ball coming to rest outside it must be replaced. The hoops are run in
the order marked on the diagram, so that the game consists of 36 points.
Red and white are always partners against blue and black, and the
essential features and tactics of the game are, _mutatis mutandis_, the
same as in modern English croquet--i.e. the skilful player goes always
for a break and utilizes one or both of the opponent's balls in making
it. The balls are 3(1/4) in. in diameter, of hard rubber or composition,
and the arches are 3-3/8 or 3(1/2) in. wide for first- and second-class
players respectively; they are made of steel 1/2 in. in diameter and
stand about 8 in. out of the ground. The stakes are 1 in. in diameter
and only 1(1/2) in. above the ground. The mallets are much shorter than
those commonly employed in England, the majority of players using only
one hand, though the two-handed "pendulum stroke," played between the
legs, finds an increasingly large number of adherents, on account of the
greater accuracy which it gives. The "jump shot" is a necessary part of
the player's equipment, as dead wiring is allowed; it is supplemented by
the carom off the border or off a stake or arch, and roque players
justly claim that their game is more like billiards than any other
out-of-door game.
The game of roque is opened by scoring (stringing) for lead from an
imaginary line through the middle wicket (cage), the player whose ball
rests nearest the southern boundary line having the choice of lead and
balls. The balls are then placed on the four corner spots marked A in
diagram, partner balls being diagonally opposite one another, and the
starting ball having the choice of either of the upper corners. The
leader, say red, usually begins by shooting at white; if he misses, a
carom off the border will leave him somewhere near his partner, blue.
White then shoots at red or blue, with probably a similar result. Blue
is then "in," with a certain roquet and the choice of laying for red or
going for an immediate break himself. The general strategy of the game
corresponds to that of croquet, the most important differences being
that "pegging out" is not allowed, and that on the small ground with its
ten arches and two stakes the three-ball break is usually adopted, the
next player or "danger ball" being wired at the earliest opportunity.
See Spalding's _Official Roque Guide_, edited by Mr Charles Jacobus
(New York, 1906).