mentioned." The conference, which was attended by representatives of 26 states, sat from the 18th of May to the 29th of July 1899. When the subject of excessive armaments came up for discussion, the objections of the German military delegate led to its abandonment. Other very important matters, however, were dealt with, and three momentous conventions were adopted, viz.I. A convention for the pacific settlement of international disputes. II. A convention relating to the laws and customs of war by land. III. A convention for the adaptation to maritime warfare of the principles of the Geneva Convention of the 22nd of August 1864. Three declarations on the following matters were also adopted:a. Prohibition of the launching of projectiles and explosives from balloons or by other similar new methods.2 b. Prohibition of the use of projectiles the only object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases. c. Prohibition of the use of bullets which expand or flatten easily in the human body, such as bullets with a hard envelope, of which the envelope does not entirely cover the core, or is pierced with incisions. The conference furthermore passed the following resolutions:The Conference is of opinion that the restriction of military budgets, which are at present a heavy burden on the world, is extremely desirable for the increase of the material and moral welfare of mankind." "The Conference, taking into consideration the preliminary steps taken by the Swiss Federal Government for the revision of the Geneva Convention, expresses the wish that steps may be shortly taken for the assembling of a special Conference, having for its object the revision of that Convention." The following vœux were adopted, but not unanimously:"1. The Conference expresses the wish that the question of the rights and duties of neutrals may be inserted in the programme of a conference in the near future. 2. The Conference expresses the wish that the questions with regard to rifles and naval guns, as considered by it, may be studied by the Governments with the object of coming to an agreement respecting the employment of new types and calibres. 3. The Conference expresses the wish that the Governments, taking into consideration the proposals made at the Conference, may examine the possibility of an agreement as to the limitation of armed forces by land and sea, and of war budgets. "4. The Conference expresses the wish that the proposals which contemplate the declaration of the inviolability of private property in naval warfare may be referred to a subsequent conference for consideration. 5. The Conference expresses the wish that the proposal to settle the question of the bombardment of ports, towns and villages by naval forces may be referred to a subsequent conference for consideration." Great Britain signed and became a party to the three Conventions, but not to all the declarations, &c. The Conference of 1907, which was attended by representatives of forty-four states, sat from the 15th of June to the 18th of October. Again, in spite of the resolution and vœu on armaments handed down from the Conference of 1899 this subject was waived, but still more important conventions than in 1899 were adopted on other matters. These were as follows:I. Convention for the pacific settlement of international disputes.3 II. Convention respecting the limitation of the employment of force for the recovery of contract debts. III. Convention relative to the commencement of hostilities. IV. Conventions concerning the laws and customs of war on land.3 V. Convention respecting the rights and duties of neutral powers and persons in war on land. VI. Convention relative to the status of enemy merchant-ships at the outbreak of hostilities. 1 At the Conference the Russian government, further developing the proposal, submitted the following details: 1. Establishment of an international understanding for a term of five years, stipulating non-increase of the present figures of the peace effective of the troops kept up for home use. 2. Fixation, in case of this understanding being arrived at, and, if possible, of the figures of the peace effective of all the powers excepting colonial troops. 64 3. Maintenance for a like term of five years of the amount of the military budgets at present in force." This Conference was held at Geneva in June-July 1906. The revised Convention, composed of 33 articles, is dated July 6, 1906. This is an amended edition of that of 1899. VII. Convention relative to the conversion of merchant-ships into war-ships. VIII. Convention relative to the laying of automatic submarine contact mines. IX. Convention respecting bombardment by naval forces in time of war. X. Conventions for the adaptation of the principles of the Geneva Convention to maritime war. XI. Convention relative to certain restrictions on the exercise of the right of capture in maritime war.4 XII. Convention relative to the establishment of an international prize court. XIII. Convention respecting the rights and duties of neutral powers in maritime war. XIV. Declaration prohibiting discharge of projectiles, &c., from balloons." A draft Convention relative to the creation of a judicial arbitration court was also drawn up in connexion with the first of the four following vœux: 1. The Conference calls the attention of the signatory powers to the advisability of adopting the annexed draft convention for the creation of a judicial arbitration court, and of bringing it into force as soon as an agreement has been reached respecting the selection of the judges and the constitution of the court. 2. The Conference expresses the opinion that, in case of war, the responsible authorities, civil as well as military, should make it their special duty to ensure and safeguard the maintenance of pacific relations, more especially of the commercial and industrial relations between the inhabitants of the belligerent states and neutral countries. 3. The Conference expresses the opinion that the powers should regulate, by special treaties, the position, as regards military charges, of foreigners residing within their territories. 4. The Conference expresses the opinion that the preparation of regulations relative to the laws and customs of naval war should figure in the programme of the next conference, and that in any case the powers may apply, as far as possible, to war by sea the principles of the Convention relative to the laws and customs of war on land. Finally, the Conference recommended to the powers the assembly of a Third Peace Conference, and it called their attention to the necessity of preparing the programme of this Third Conference a sufficient time in advance to ensure its deliberations being conducted with the necessary authority and expedition. In order to attain this object the Conference considered that it "would be very desirable that, some two years before the probable date of the meeting, a preparatory committee should be charged by the governments with the task of collecting the various. proposals to be submitted to the Conference, of ascertaining what subjects are ripe for embodiment in an international regulation, and of preparing a programme which the governments should decide upon in sufficient time to enable it to be carefully examined by the countries interested," and that this committee should further be entrusted with the task of proposing a system of organization and procedure for the Conference itself. (T. BA.) and geologist, was born on the 30th of September 1800 at Wans PEACH, CHARLES WILLIAM (1800-1886), British naturalist and harness-maker, and afterwards became an innkeeper ford in Northamptonshire; his father at the time was a saddler farming about 80 acres of land. He received an elementary education at Wansford and at Folkingham in Lincolnshire; and assisted for several years in the inn and farm. In 1824 he was appointed riding officer in the Revenue Coast-guard at Weybourn in Norfolk. Sea-weeds and other marine organisms now attracted his attention, and these he zealously collected. His duties during the next few years led him to remove successively to Sheringham, Hasboro (Happisburgh), Cromer and Cley, all in Norfolk. In the course of his rambles he met the Rev. James Layton, curate at Catfield, who lent him books and assisted in About the year laying the foundations of accurate knowledge. 1830 he was transferred to Charmouth in Dorset, thence to Beer, and Paignton in Devon, and to Gorran Haven near Mevagissey in Cornwall. Here he continued to pursue his zoological studies 4 This is an amended edition of that of 1899. This was practically a re-enactment of that of 1899. This has since been done to a large extent by the Conference of London (1908-1909). See BLOCKADE, ČONTRABAND, INTERNATIONAL LAW PEACE. and supplied many specimens to G. Johnston, who was then preparing his History of the British Zoophytes (1838). It was here too that he first found fossils in some of the older rocks previously regarded as unfossiliferous-the discovery of which proved the presence of Bala Beds (Ordovician or Lower Silurian) in the neighbourhood of Gorran Haven. In 1841 he read a paper before the British Association at Plymouth "On the Fossil Organic Remains found on the south-east coast of Cornwall," and in 1843 he brought before the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall an account of his discovery of fish remains in the Devonian slates near Polperro. Peach was transferred for a time to Fowey; and in 1849 to Scotland, first to Peterhead and then to Wick (1853), where he made acquaintance with Robert Dick of Thurso. He collected the old red Sandstone fishes; and during a sojourn at Durness he first found fossils in the Cambrian limestone (1854). Peach retired from the government service in 1861, and died at Edinburgh on the 28th of February 1886. Biographical notice, with portrait, in S. Smiles's Robert Dick, Baker, of Thurso, Geologist and Botanist (1878). PEACH, the name of a fruit tree which is included by Bentham and Hooker (Genera plantarum, i. 610) under the genus Prunus (Prunus persica); its resemblance to the plum is indeed obvious. Others have classed it with the almond as a distinct genus, Amygdalus; while others again have considered it sufficiently distinct to constitute a separate genus, Persica. m e the production and perpetuation of varieties. As to the origin of recognized in the wild state. additional force to this view. In general terms the peach may be said to be a medium-sized tree, with lanceolate, stipulate leaves, borne on long, slender, relatively unbranched shoots, and with the flowers arranged singly, or in groups of two or more, at intervals along the shoots of the previous year's growth. The flowers have a hollow tube at the base bearing at its free edge five sepals, On the other hand, Alphonse de Candolle, from philological and an equal number of petals, usually con- other considerations, considers the peach to be of Chinese origin. cave or spoon-shaped, pink or white, The peach has not, it is true, been found wild in China, but it has and a great number of stamens. The the literature and folk-lore of the people; and it is designated by been cultivated there from time immemorial; it has entered into pistil consists of a single carpel with its a distinct name, to " or "tao," a word found in the writings of ovary, style, stigma and solitary ovule Confucius five centuries before Christ, and even in other writings or twin ovules. The fruit is a drupe dating from the 10th century before the Christian era. Though now (fig. 1) having a thin outer skin (epi-west, and, as we have seen, probably also in Afghanistan, it has no cultivated in India, and almost wild in some parts of the northcarp) enclosing the flesh of the peach Sanskrit name; it is not mentioned in the Hebrew text of the (mesocarp), the inner layers of the carpel Scriptures, nor in the earliest Greek times. Xenophon, makes no becoming woody to form the stone, mention of the peach, though the Ten Thousand must have traversed while the ovule ripens into the kernel the country where, according to some, the peach is native; but Theophrastus, a hundred years later, does speak of it as a Persian or seed. This is exactly the structure of fruit, and De Candolle suggests that it might have been introduced the plum or apricot, and differs from that of the almond, which is into Greece by Alexander. According to his view, the seeds of the identical in the first instance, only in the circumstance that the peach, cultivated for ages in China, might have been carried by the fleshy part of the latter eventually becomes dry and leathery and Chinese into Kashmir, Bokhara, and Persia between the period of the Sanskrit emigration and the Graeco-Persian period. Once cracks open along a line called the suture. established, its cultivation would readily extend westward, or, on the other hand, by Cabul to north-western India, where its cultivation is not ancient. While the peach has been cultivated in China for thousands of years, the almond does not grow wild in that country and its introduction is supposed not to go back farther than the FIG. 1.-Fruit (drupe) of Peach cut lengthwise. e, Skin or epicarp. m,Flesh or mesocarp. s, Stone or endocarp, within which is the seed or kernel. The nectarine is a variation from the peach, mainly characterized by the circumstance that, while the skin of the ripe fruit is downy in the peach, it is shining and destitute of hairs in the nectarine. That there is no essential difference between the two is, however, shown by the facts that the seeds of the peach will produce nectarines, and vice versa, and that it is not very uncommon, though still exceptional, to see peaches and nectarines on the same branch, and fruits which combine in themselves the characteristics of both nectarines and peaches. The blossoms of the peach are formed the autumn previous to their expansion, and this fact, together with the peculiarities of their form and position, requires to be borne in mind by the gardener in his pruning and training operations. The only point of practical interest requiring mention here is the very singular fact attested by all peach-growers, that, while certain peaches are liable to the attacks of mildew, others are not. In the case of the peach this peculiarity is in some way connected with the presence of small glandular outgrowths on the stalk, or at the base of the leaf. Some peaches have globular, others reniform glands, others none at all, and these latter trees are much more subject to mildew than are those provided with glands. The history of the peach, almond and nectarine is interesting and important as regards the question of the origin of species and Christian era. On the whole, greater weight is due to the evidence from botanical sourvery both of the wild almond and of a form like a wild peach sources than to that derived from philology, particularly since the almond are derived from some pre-existing and now extinct form in Afghanistan. It may, however, well be that both peach and whose descendants have spread over the whole geographic area mentioned; but this is a mere speculation, though indirect evidence in its support might be obtained from the nectarine, of which no mention is made in ancient literature, and which, as we have seen, originates from the peach and reproduces itself by seed, thus offering the characteristics of a species in the act of developing itself. The treatment in horticulture of the peach and nectarine is the same in every respect. To perpetuate and multiply the choicer varieties, peaches and nectarines are budded upon plum or almond stocks. For dry situations almond stocks are preferable, but they are not long-lived, while for damp or clayey loams it is better to use certain kinds of plums. Double-working is sometimes beneficial; thus an almond budded on a plum stock may be rebudded with a tender peach, greatly to the advantage of the latter. The peach border should be composed of turfy mellow loam, such as is suitable for the vine and the fig; this should be used in as rough a state as possible, or not broken small and fine. The bottom should slope towards the outer edge, where a drain should be cut, with an outlet, and on this sloping bottom should be laid a thickness of from 9 in. to 12 in. of rough materials, such as broken bricks or mortar rubbish, over which should be placed a layer of rough turf with the grassy side downwards, and then the good loamy soil to form the border, which should have a depth of about 2 ft. 6 in. The peach-tree is most productive when the roots are kept near the surface, and the borders, which should be from 8 ft. to 12 ft. wide, should not be cropped heavily with culinary vegetables, as deep trenching is very injurious. Sickly and unfruitful trees may often be revived by bringing up their roots within 5 or 6 in. of the surface. It is questionable whether it is not better, in cold soils and bleak situations, to abandon outdoor peach culture, and to cover the walls with a casing of glass, so that the trees may be under shelter during the uncongenial spring weather. The fruit of the peach is produced on the ripened shoots of the preceding year. If these be too luxuriant, they yield nothing but leaves; and if too weak, they are incapable of developing flower buds. To furnish young shoots in sufficient abundance, and of requisite strength, is the great object of peach training and pruning. Trees of slender-growing, twiggy habit naturally fall most readily into the fan form of training, and accordingly this has generally been adopted in the culture of peaches and nectarines (fig. 2). The young tree is, in many cases, procured when it has been trained for two or three years in the nursery; but it is generally better to begin with a maiden plant-that is, a plant of the first year after it has been budded. It is FIG. 2.-Montreuil Fan Training. then in ordinary practice headed down to five or six buds, and in the following summer from two to four shoots, according to the vigour of the plant, are trained in, the laterals from which, if any, are thinned out and nailed to the wall. If there are four branches, the two central ones are shortened back at the subsequent winter pruning so as to produce others, the two lower ones being laid in nearly at full length. In the following season additional shoots are sent forth; and the process is repeated till eight or ten principal limbs or mother branches are obtained, forming, as it were, the frame-work of the future tree. The branches may be depressed or elevated, so as to check or encourage them, as occasion may arise; and it is highly advantageous to keep them thin, without their becoming in any part deficient of young shoots. Sometimes a more rapid mode of formation is now adopted, the main shoots being from the first laid in nearly at full length, instead of being shortened. The pruning for fruit consists in shortening back the laterals which had been nailed in at the disbudding, or summer pruning, their length depending on their individual vigour and the luxuriance of the tree. In well-developed shoots the buds are generally double, or rather triple, a wood bud growing between two fruit buds; the shoot must be cut back to one of these, or else to a wood bud alone, so that a young shoot may be produced to draw up the sap beyond the fruit, this being generally desirable to secure its proper swelling. The point of this leading shoot is subsequently pinched off, that it may not draw away too much of the sap. If the fruit sets too abundantly, it must be thinned, first when as large as peas, reducing the clusters, and then when as large as nuts to distribute the crop equally; the extent of the thinning must depend on the vigour of the tree, but one or two fruits ultimately left to each square foot of wall is a full average crop. The final thinning should take place after stoning. be cut out. The best-placed healthy young shoot produced from the wood buds at the base of the bearing branch is to be carefully preserved and in due time nailed to the wall. In the following winter this will take the place of the branch which has just borne, and which is to If there be no young shoot below, and the bearing branch is short, the shoot at the point of the latter may sometimes be preserved as a fruit bearer, though if the bearing branch be long it is better to cut it back for young wood. It is the neglect of this which constitutes the principal fault in carrying out the English fan system, as it is usually practised. Several times during summer the trees ought to be regularly examined, and the young shoots respectively topped or thinned out; those that remain are to be nailed to the wall, or braced in with pieces of slender twigs, and the trees ought occasionally to be washed with the garden engine or thoroughly syringed, especially during very hot summers. After gathering the fruit all the wood not needed for extending the tree or for fruit bearing next season should be cut out so as to give the shoots left full exposure to air and light. The Montreuil form of training is represented by fig. 2. The principal feature is the suppression of the direct channel of the sap, and the substitution of four, or more commonly two, mother branches, so laid to the wall that the central angle contains about 90°. The other branches are all treated as subordinate members. This form open to the objection that, if the under branch should die, the upper one cannot be brought down into its place. is The form à la Dumoutier (fig. 3), so called from its inventor, is merely a refinement on the Montreuil method. The formation d.....? of the tree begins with the inferior limbs and proceeds towards the centre, the branches being lowered from time to time as the tree acquires strength. What is most worthy of notice in this method is the management of the subordinates in the pruning for fruit. When a shoot promises blossom, it is generally at some distance from the point of insertion into the old wood, and the intermediate space is covered with wood buds. All the latter, therefore, which are between the old wood a and the blossoms c in fig. 4, except the lowest b, are carefully removed by rubbing them off with the FIG. 4.-Pruning à la finger. This never fails to produce Dumoutier. a shoot d, the growth of which is favoured by destroying the useless spray e above the blossoms, and pinching off the points of those which are necessary to perfect the fruit. A replacing shoot is thus obtained, to which the whole is invariably shortened at the end of the year. Seymour's form (fig. 5) approaches more nearly to the French method than any other practised in England; but the direct channel of the sap is not suppressed, and this results in the production of branches of unequal vigour, which is very undesirable. For cold and late situations, Thomas Andrew Knight recommended the encouragement of spurs on the young wood, as such spurs, when close to the wall, generate the best organized and most vigorous blossoms, and generally ensure a crop of fruit. They may be produced, by taking care, during the summer pruning or disbudding, to preserve a number of the little shoots emitted by the yearly wood, only pinching off the minute succulent points. On the spurs thus formed blossom buds will be developed early in the following season. This practice is well adapted to cold situations. Peachtrees require protection, especially at the period of blossoming, particularly in the north of England and in Scotland. Canvas or bunting screens are most effectual. By applying these early in the season, great benefit may be derived from retarding the blossom till the frosty nights of spring have passed. Wooden and glass copings are also very useful in warding off frosts. Care must be taken that the roots always have a sufficient supply of moisture and that the soil is moist wherever the roots run. Forcing. The pruning and training of the trees in the peach house do not differ materially from the methods practised out of doors. It may also be stated here that when occasion arises peachtrees well furnished with buds may be transplanted and forced immediately without risking the crop of fruit, a matter of some importance when, as sometimes happens, a tree may accidentally fail. In the forcing of peaches fire heat is commonly applied about December or January; but it may, where there is a demand, begin a month sooner. The trees must be got to start growth very gradually, and at first the house should be merely kept closed at a temperature of about 45°, but the heat should gradually increase to 50° at night by the time the trees are in flower, and to 60° when the fruit is set, after which the house should be kept moist by sprinkling the walls and paths, or by placing water troughs on the return pipes, and the temperature should range from 65° by day to 70° or more with sun heat. After the fruit has set, the foliage should be refreshed and cleansed by the daily use of the syringe or garden engine. When the fruit has stoned-that is, as soon as the kernels have been formed the temperature should be raised to about 65° as a minimum, and to 70°, with 75° by sun heat, as a maximum. Water must now be copiously supplied to the border, and air admitted in abundance, but cold draughts which favour the attack of mildew must be avoided. After the end of April little fire heat is required. When the fruit begins to ripen, syringing must be discontinued till the crop is gathered, after which the syringe must be again occasionally used. If the leaves should happen to shade the fruit, not only during the ripening process but at any time after the stoning period, they should be gently turned aside, for, in order that the fruit may acquire good colour and flavour, it should be freely exposed to light and air when ripening; it will bear the direct rays of the sun, even if they should rise to 100°, but nectarines are much more liable to damage than peaches. The trees often suffer from mildew, which is best prevented by keeping the borders of the peach house clear and sufficiently moist and the house well ventilated, and if it should appear the trees should be sprayed with I oz. potassium sulphide dissolved in 3 gallons of water. Care must be taken in using this fungicide not to wet the painted wood, as it is sure to become discoloured. Peaches and nectarines are frequently cultivated in well-drained pots, and are then usually trained as pyramids, and in some cases as half-standards. The potting must be done very firmly, using turfy loam with which a little mortar rubble has been mixed. The trees are to be top-dressed from time to time with well-decayed manure and turfy loam, and considerable space must be left in the pots for this and the watering. The following are some of the best peaches and nectarines, arranged in the order of the times of their ripening: e. Aug. {b. Sept. b.m.Sept. e. Sept. Walburton Admirable { e. e. Crawford's Early e. Aug. b. Grosse Mignonne . Noblesse Aug. b. Sept. Sept. Salwey Aug. Sept. Princess of Wales Nectarines. Cardinal (under glass) e. July Pitmaston Orange Lord Napier Darwin Early Rivers Balgowan Elruge b. Aug. m. m. Aug. Violette Hâtive. Se. . e. Aug. Victoria (under glass) b. Sept. Pineapple e. Aug. Stanwick Elruge b. Sept. Humbolt Stanwick (under glass) m.e. Sept. e. Se. b. ع ف ف فن فن b. b. m. Sept. Oct. Nov. authorship, stating that they were written by a namesake, "a divine, a scholar and a traveller." The change was, however, easily rebutted. Peacham had many friends in London, among them Thomas Dowland the musician, Inigo Jones, and Edward Wright the mathematician. In 1622 appeared Peacham's magnum opus, the Compleat Gentleman. Enlarged editions appeared in 1626 and 1627. The 1627 edition was reprinted in 1634, and a third, with additional notes on blazonry by Thomas Blount (1617-1679), appeared in 1661. The book is a text-book of manners and polite learning; it includes chapters on cosmography, geometry, poetry, music, antiquities, painting, the lives of the painters, the "art of limming " (Peacham himself was a proficient engraver), and the military art, including the order of a maine battaile or pitched field in eight severall wayes." The book differs from the Courtier of Castiglione, which had been the guide of an earlier generation. Peacham was a Cavalier, even an ardent polemist in the royal cause, but the central point of his book is a more or less Puritan sentiment of duty. In his later years Peacham was reduced to extreme poverty, and is said to have written children's books at a penny each. His last book was published in 1642, and it may be concluded that he died soon afterwards. 66 His other works include: Minerva Britanna (1612), dedicated to Henry, prince of Wales; The Period of Mourning (1613), in honour of the same prince; Thalia's Banquet (1620), a book of epigrams; The Art of Living in London (1642), and The Worth of a Peny (1641), &c. There is a nearly complete collection of Peacham's translation by Peacham of James I.'s Basilicon doron into Latin works in the Bodleian, Oxford. Harleian MS. 6855 contains a verse, written in his own hand and ornamented with pen and ink drawings. His Compleat Gentleman was edited by G. S. Gordon in 1906 for the Clarendon Press; the Art of Living is reprinted in the Harleian Misc. ix.; The Worth of a Peny in E. Arber's English Garner (vol. vi. 1883). PEACOCK, SIR BARNES (1810-1890), English judge, was born in 1810, the son of Lewis Peacock, a solicitor. After practising as a special pleader, he was called to the bar in 1836, and in 1844 obtained great reputation by pointing out the flaw which invalidated the conviction of Daniel O'Connell and his fellow defendants. In 1852 he went to India as legal member of the governor-general's council. He here displayed great activity as a law reformer, but sometimes manifested too little consideration for native susceptibilities. The legislative council was established soon after his arrival, and although no orator, he was so frequent a speaker that legislation enjoining councillors to deliver their speeches sitting was said to have been devised with the sole object of restraining him. As a member of Lord Dalhousie's council he supported the annexation of Oudh, and he stood by Sept. Lord Canning all through the Mutiny. In 1859 he became chief Sept. justice of the Supreme Court. He returned to England in 1870, Sept. and in 1872 was placed upon the judicial committee of the privy Sept. council, where his Indian experience rendered him invaluable. He died on the 3rd of December 1890. Aug. Sept. PEACHAM, HENRY (c. 1576-c. 1643), English writer, was the son of Henry Peacham, curate of North Mimms, Hertfordshire, and author of a book on rhetoric called the Garden of Rhetoric (1577). The elder Peacham became in 1597 rector of Leverton, Lincolnshire. The son was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1594-1595 and M.A. in 1598. He was for some time a schoolmaster at Wymondham, Norfolk, but settled in London in 1612, earning his living as tutor to young men preparing for the universities. His first book was Graphice (1606), a treatise on pen and water-colour drawing, which, as The Gentleman's Exercise, passed through three editions. The years 1613-1614 he spent abroad, part of the time as tutor to the three young sons of Thomas Howard (1585-1646), earl of Arundel, and partly on his own account. He travelled in Italy, France, Westphalia and the Netherlands. The table of Sir John Ogle, English governor of Utrecht, was, he says, a "little academy," where he met soldiers and scholars of all nationalities. When he returned to London he was accused of libel on the king. Incriminating papers had been discovered in the house of Edmond Peacham, rector of Hinton Saint George, who, on being charged with an attack on the king denied the PEACOCK, GEORGE (1791-1858), English mathematician, was born at Thornton Hall, Denton, near Darlington, on the 9th of April 1791. He was educated at Richmond, Yorkshire, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1809. He was second wrangler in 1812 (Sir J. F. W. Herschel being senior), was elected fellow of his college in 1814, became assistant tutor in 1815 and full tutor in 1823. While still an undergraduate he formed a league with John Herschel and Charles Babbage, to conduct the famous struggle of "d-ism versus dot-age," which ended in the introduction into Cambridge of the continental notation in the infinitesimal calculus to the exclusion of the fluxional notation of Sir Isaac Newton. This was an important reform, not so much on account of the mere change of notation (for mathematicians follow J. L. Lagrange in using both these notations), but because it signified the opening to the mathematicians of Cambridge of the vast storehouse of continental discoveries. The analytical society thus formed in 1813 published various memoirs, and translated S. F. Lacroix's Differential Calculus in 1816. Peacock powerfully aided the movement by publishing in 1820 A Collection of Examples of the Application of the Differential and Integral Calculus. In 1841 he published a pamphlet on the university statutes, in which he indicated the necessity for | Buckingham and the Liverpool salt interest, and made the subject reform; and in 1850 and 1855 he was a member of the commission of inquiry relative to the university of Cambridge. In 1837 he was appointed Lowndean professor of astronomy. In 1839 he took the degree of D.D., and the same year was appointed by Lord Melbourne to the deanery of Ely. Peacock threw himself with characteristic ardour into the duties of this new position. He improved the sanitation of Ely, published in 1840 Observations on Plans for Cathedral Reform, and carried out extensive works of restoration in his own cathedral. He was twice prolocutor of the lower house of convocation for the province of Canterbury. He was also a prime mover in the establishment of the Cambridge Astronomical Observatory, and in the founding of the Cambridge Philosophical Society. He was a fellow of the Royal, Royal Astronomical, Geological and other scientific societies. In 1838, and again in 1843, he was one of the commissioners for standards of weights and measures; and he also furnished valuable information to the commissioners on decimal coinage. He died on the 8th of November 1858. Peacock's original contributions to mathematical science were concerned chiefly with the philosophy of its first principles. He did good service in systematizing the operational laws of algebra, and in throwing light upon the nature and use of imaginaries. He published, first in 1830, and then in an enlarged form in 1842, a Treatise on Algebra, in which he applied his philosophical ideas concerning algebraical analysis to the elucidation of its elements. A second great service was the publication in the British Association Reports for 1833 of his "Report on the Recent Progress and Present State of certain branches of Analysis." Modern mathematicians may find on reading this brilliant summary a good many dicta which they will call in question, but, whatever its defects may be, Peacock's report remains a work of permanent value. In 1855 he published a memoir of Thomas Young, and about the same time there appeared Young's collected works in three volumes, for the first two of which Peacock was responsible. PEACOCK, THOMAS LOVE (1785-1866), English novelist and poet, was born at Weymouth on the 18th of October 1785. He was the only son of a London glass merchant, who died soon after the child's birth. Young Peacock was educated at a private school at Englefield Green, and after a brief experience of business determined to devote himself to literature, while living with his mother (daughter of Thomas Love, a naval man) on their private means. His first books were poetical, The Monks of St Mark (1804), Palmyra (1806), The Genius of the Thames (1810), The Philosophy of Melancholy (1812)—works of no great merit. He also made several dramatic attempts, which were never acted. He served for a short time as secretary to Sir Home Popham at Flushing, and paid several visits to Wales. In 1812 he became acquainted with Shelley. In 1815 he evinced his peculiar power by writing his novel Headlong Hall. It was published in 1816, and Melincourt followed in the ensuing year. During 1817 he lived at Great Marlow, enjoying the almost daily society of Shelley, and writing Nightmare Abbey and Rhododaphne, by far the best of his long poems. In 1819 he was appointed assistant examiner at the India House. Peacock's nomination appears to have been due to the influence of his old schoolfellow Peter Auber, secretary to the East India Company, and the papers he prepared as tests of his ability were returned with the comment, "Nothing superfluous and nothing wanting." This was characteristic of the whole of his intellectual work; and equally characteristic of the man was his marriage about this time to Jane Griffith, to whom he proposed by letter, not having seen her for eight years. They had four children, only one of whom, a son, survived his father; one daughter was the first wife of George Meredith. His novel Maid Marian appeared in 1822, The Misfortunes of Elphin in 1829, and Crotchet Castle in 1831; and he would probably have written more but for the death in 1833 of his mother. He also contributed to the Westminster Review and the Examiner. His services to the East India Company, outside the usual official routine, were considerable. He defended it successfully against the attacks of James Silk of steam navigation to India peculiarly his own. He represented the company before the various parliamentary committees on this question; and in 1839 and 1840 superintended the construction of iron steamers, which not only made the voyage round the Cape successfully, but proved very useful in the Chinese War. He also drew up the instructions for the Euphrates expedition of 1835, subsequently pronounced by its commander, General F. R. Chesney, to be models of sagacity. In 1836 he succeeded James Mill as chief examiner, and in 1856 he retired upon a pension. During his later years he contributed several papers to Fraser's Magazine, including reminiscences of Shelley, whose executor he was. He also wrote in the same magazine his last novel, Gryll Grange (1860), inferior to his earlier writings in humour and vigour, but still a surprising effort for a man of his age. He died on the 23rd of January 1866 at Lower Halliford, near Chertsey, where, so far as his London occupations would allow him, he had resided for more than forty years. Peacock's position in English literature is unique. There was nothing like his type of novel before his time; though there might have been if it had occurred to Swift to invent a story as a vehicle for the dialogue of his Polite Conversation. Peacock speaks as well in his own person as through his puppets; and his pithy wit and sense, combined with remarkable grace and accuracy of natural description, atone for the primitive simplicity of plot and character. Of his seven fictions, Nightmare Abbey and Crotchet Castle are perhaps on the whole the best, the former displaying the most vis comica of situation, the latter the fullest maturity of intellectual power and the most skilful grouping of the motley crowd of "perfectibilians, deteriorationists, statuquo-ites, phrenologists, transcendentalists, political economists, theorists in all sciences, projectors in all arts, morbid visionaries, romantic enthusiasts, lovers of music, lovers of the picturesque and lovers of good dinners," who constitute the dramatis personae of the Peacockian novel. Maid Marian and The Misfortunes of Elphin are hardly less entertaining. Both contain descriptive passages of extraordinary beauty. Melincourt is a comparative failure, the excellent idea of an orang-outang mimicking humanity being insufficient as the sole groundwork of a novel. Headlong | Hall, though more than foreshadowing the author's subsequent excellence, is marred by a certain bookish awkwardness characteristic of the recluse student, which reappears in Gryll Grange as the pedantry of an old-fashioned scholar, whose likes and dislikes have become inveterate and whose sceptical liberalism, always rather inspired by hatred of cant than enthusiasm for progress, has petrified into only toc earnest conservatism. The book's quaint resolute paganism, however, is very refreshing in an age eaten up with introspection; it is the kindliest of Peacock's writings, and contains the most beautiful of his poems, “Years Ago," the reminiscence of an early attachment. In general the ballads and songs interspersed through his tales are models of exact and melodious diction, and instinct with true feeling. His more ambitious poems are worth little, except Rhododaphne, attractive as a story and perfect as a composition, but destitute of genuine poetical inspiration. His critical and miscellaneous writings are always interesting, especially the restorations of lost classical plays in the Horae dramaticae, but the only one of great mark is the witty and crushing exposure in the Westminster Review of Thomas Moore's ignorance of the manners and belief he has ventured to portray in his Epicurean. Peacock resented the misrepresentation of his favourite sect, the good and ill of whose tenets were fairly represented in his own person. Somewhat sluggish and self-indulgent, incapable of enthusiasm or selfsacrifice, he yet possessed a deep undemonstrative kindliness of nature; he could not bear to see anyone near him unhappy or uncomfortable; and his sympathy, no less than his genial humour, gained him the attachment of children, dependants, and friends. In official life he was upright and conscientious; his judgment was shrewd and robust. What Shelley justly termed "the lightness, strength and chastity "of his diction secures him an honourable rank among those English writers whose claims to remembrance depend not only upon matter but upon style. |