Chapter C: O. H. Cl. Br. I. S (8)

_History._--Setting aside the numerous legends with regard to the existence of a British city on the site now occupied by Chester, the earliest authentic information relating to its history is furnished by the works of Ptolemy and Antoninus. As the Roman station of Deva it was probably founded about A.D. 48 by Ostorius Scapula, and from its advantageous position, both as the key to communication with Ireland and as a bulwark against the hostile tribes of the north, it became a military and commercial centre of considerable importance. In A.D. 78-79 it was the winter-quarters of Agricola, and later became illustrious as the permanent headquarters of Legio XX. Valeria Victrix. Many inscriptions and remains of the Roman military occupation have been found, and the north and east walls stand in great part on Roman foundations. The Saxon form of the name was Leganceaster. About 614 the city was captured and destroyed by Aethelfrith, and henceforth lay in ruins until Aethelflaed in 907 rebuilt the walls, restored the monastery of St Werburgh, and made the city "nigh two such as it was before." In the reign of Aethelstan a mint was set up at Chester, and in 973 it was the scene of Edgar's truimph when, it is said, he was rowed on the Dee by six subject kings. Chester opposed a determined resistance to the Conqueror, and did not finally surrender until 1070. On the erection of Cheshire to a county palatine after the Conquest, Chester became the seat of government of the palatine earls. The Domesday account of the city includes a description of the Saxon laws under which it had been governed in the time of Edward the Confessor. All the land, except the bishop's borough, was held of the earl, and assessed at fifty hides. There were seven mint-masters and twelve magistrates, and the city paid a fee-farm rent of L45. It had been much devastated since the time of Edward the Confessor, and the number of houses reduced by 205.

The earliest extant charter, granted by Henry II. in 1160, empowered the burgesses to trade with Durham as freely as they had done in the reign of Henry I. From this date a large collection of charters enumerates privileges granted by successive earls and later sovereigns. One from Ralph or Ranulf de Blundevill, granted between 1190 and 1211, confirms to the citizens a gild merchant and all liberties and free customs, and three from John protect their privilege of trading with Ireland. Edward I. empowered the citizens to elect coroners and to hold courts of justice, and granted them the fee-farm of the city at a yearly rent of L100. In the 14th century Chester began to lose its standing as a port through the gradual silting up of the estuary of the Dee, and the city was further impoverished by the inroads of the Welsh and by the necessity of rebuilding the Dee bridge, which had been swept away by an unusually high tide. In consideration of these misfortunes Richard II. remitted part of the fee-farm. Continued misfortunes led to a further reduction of the farm to L50 for a term of fifty years by Henry VI., who also made a grant for the completion of a new Dee bridge. Henry VII. reduced the fee-farm to L20, and in 1506 granted to the citizens what is known as "the Great Charter." This charter constituted the city a county by itself, and incorporated the governing body under the style of a mayor, twenty-four aldermen and forty common councilman; it also instituted two sheriffs, two coroners and a recorder, and the mayor, the ex-mayors and the recorder were appointed justices of the peace. This charter was confirmed by James I. and Charles II. A charter of George III. in 1804 instituted the office of deputy-mayor. The charter of Hugh Lupus to the abbey of St Werburgh includes a grant of the tolls of the fair at the feast of St Werburgh for three days, and a subsequent charter from Ranulf de Blundevill (12th century) licensed the abbot and monks to hold their fairs and markets before the abbey gates. A charter of John the Scot, earl of Chester, mentions fairs at the feasts of the Nativity of St John Baptist and St Michael. For many centuries the rights claimed by the abbot in connexion with the fairs gave rise to constant friction with the civic authorities, which lasted until, in the reign of Henry VIII., it was decreed that the right of holding fairs was vested exclusively in the citizens. Charles II. in 1685 granted a cattle-fair to be held on the first Thursday in February.

In 1553 Chester first returned two members to parliament, having hitherto been represented solely in the parliament of the palatinate. By the Redistribution Act of 1885 the representation was reduced to one member. The trades of tanners, skinners and glove-makers existed at the time of the Conquest, and the importation of marten skins is mentioned in Domesday. In the 14th century the woollen trade was considerable, and in 1674 weavers and wool-combers were introduced into Chester from Norwich. The restoration of the channel of the Dee opened up a flourishing trade in Irish linen, which in 1786 was at its height, but from that date gradually diminished.

See _Victoria County History, Cheshire_; R. H. Morris, _Chester in the
Plantagenet and Tudor Reigns_ (Chester, 1894); Joseph Hemingway,
_History of the City of Chester_ (2 vols., Chester, 1831).

CHESTER, a city of Delaware county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., on the Delaware river, about 13 m. S.W. of Philadelphia. Pop. (1800) 20,226; (1900) 33,988, of whom 5074 were foreign-born and 44O3 were negroes; (U. S. census, 1910) 38,537. It is served by the Baltimore & Ohio and the Philadelphia & Reading railways, by the Philadelphia, Baltimore & Washington division of the Pennsylvania system, and by steamboat lines. Chester has several interesting buildings dating from early in the 18th century--among them the city hall (1724), one of the oldest public buildings in the United States, and the house (1683) occupied for a time by William Penn. It is the seat of the Pennsylvania Military College (1862); and on the border of Chester, in the borough of Upland (pop. in 1900, 2131), is the Crozer Theological Seminary (Baptist), which was incorporated in 1867, opened in 1868, and named after John P. Crozer (1793-1866), by whose family it was founded. Chester has a large shipbuilding industry, and manufactories of cotton and worsted goods, iron and steel, the steel-casting industry being especially important, and large quantities of wrought iron and steel pipes being manufactured. Dye-stuffs and leather also are manufactured. The value of the city's factory products in 1905 was $16,644,842. Chester is the oldest town in Pennsylvania. It was settled by the Swedes about 1645, was called Upland and was the seat of the Swedish courts until 1682, when William Penn, soon after his landing at a spot in the town now marked by a memorial stone, gave it its present name. The first provincial assembly was convened here in December of the same year. After the battle of Brandywine in the War of Independence, Washington retreated to Chester, and in the "Washington House," still standing, wrote his account of the battle. Soon afterwards Chester was occupied by the British. In 1701 it was incorporated as a borough; in 1795 and again in 1850 it received a new borough charter; and in 1866 it was chartered as a city. For a long time it was chiefly a small fishing settlement, its population as late as 1820 being only 657; but after the introduction of large manufacturing interests in 1850, when its population was only 1667, its growth was rapid.

See H. G. Ashmead, _Historical Sketch of Chester_ (Chester, 1883).

CHESTERFIELD, PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE, 4TH EARL OF (1694-1773), son of Philip Stanhope, third earl (1673-1726), and Elizabeth Savile, daughter of George Savile, marquess of Halifax, was born in London on the 22nd of September 1694; Philip, the first earl (1584-1656), son of Sir John Stanhope of Shelford, was a royalist who in 1616 was created Baron Stanhope of Shelford, and in 1628 earl of Chesterfield; and his grandson the 2nd earl (1633-1714) was grandfather of the 4th earl. Deprived at an early age of his mother, the care of the boy devolved upon his grandmother, the marchioness of Halifax, a lady of culture and connexion, whose house was frequented by the most distinguished Whigs of the epoch. He soon began to prove himself possessed of that systematic spirit of conduct and effort which appeared so much in his life and character. His education, begun under a private tutor, was continued (1712) at Trinity Hall, Cambridge; here he remained little more than a year and seems to have read hard, and to have acquired a considerable knowledge of ancient and modern languages. The great orators of all times were a special object of study with him, and he describes his boyish pedantry pleasantly enough, but by no means without a touch of self-satisfaction in the memory. His university training was supplemented (1714) by a continental tour, untrammelled by a governor; at the Hague his ambition for the applause awarded to adventure made a gamester of him, and at Paris he began, from the same motive, that worship of the conventional Venus, the serious inculcation of which has earned for him the largest and most unenviable part of his reputation.

The death of Anne and the accession of George I. opened up a career for him and brought him back to England. His relative James Stanhope (afterwards first Earl Stanhope), the king's favourite minister, procured for him the place of gentleman of the bedchamber to the prince of Wales. In 1715 he entered the House of Commons as Lord Stanhope of Shelford and member for St Germans, and when the impeachment of James, duke of Ormonde, came before the House, he used the occasion (5th of August 1715) to put to proof his old rhetorical studies. His maiden speech was youthfully fluent and dogmatic; but on its conclusion the orator was reminded with many compliments, by an honourable member, that he wanted six weeks of his majority, and consequently that he was amenable to a fine of L500 for speaking in the House. Lord Stanhope quitted the Commons with a low bow and started for the continent. From Paris he rendered the government important service by gathering and transmitting information respecting the Jacobite plot; and in 1716 he returned to England, resumed his seat, and took frequent part in the debates. In that year came the quarrel between the king and the heir apparent. Stanhope, whose politic instinct obliged him to worship the rising rather than the setting sun, remained faithful to the prince, though he was too cautious to break entirely with the king's party. He was on friendly terms with the prince's mistress, Henrietta Howard, afterwards countess of Suffolk. He maintained a correspondence with this lady which won for him the hatred of the princess of Wales (afterwards Queen Caroline). In 1723 a vote for the government got him the place of captain of the Gentlemen Pensioners. In January 1725, on the revival of the Bath, the red riband was offered to him, but was declined.

In 1726 his father died, and Lord Stanhope became earl of Chesterfield. He took his seat in the Upper House, and his oratory, never effective in the Commons by reason of its want of force and excess of finish, at once became a power. In 1728 Chesterfield was sent to the Hague as ambassador. In this place his tact and temper, his dexterity and discrimination, enabled him to do good service, and he was rewarded with Walpole's friendship, a Garter and the place of lord high steward. In 1732 there was born to him, by a certain Mlle du Bouchet, the son, Philip Stanhope, for whose advice and instruction were afterwards written the famous _Letters_. He negotiated the second treaty of Vienna in 1731, and in the next year, being somewhat broken in health and fortune, he resigned his embassy and returned to England.

A few months' rest enabled him to resume his seat in the Lords, of which he was one of the acknowledged leaders. He supported the ministry, but his allegiance was not the blind fealty Walpole exacted of his followers. The Excise Bill, the great premier's favourite measure, was vehemently opposed by him in the Lords, and by his three brothers in the Commons. Walpole bent before the storm and abandoned the measure; but Chesterfield was summarily dismissed from his stewardship. For the next two years he led the opposition in the Upper House, leaving no stone unturned to effect Walpole's downfall. In 1741 he signed the protest for Walpole's dismissal and went abroad on account of his health. He visited Voltaire at Brussels and spent some time in Paris, where he associated with the younger Crebillon, Fontenelle and Montesquieu. In 1742 Walpole fell, and Carteret was his real, though not his nominal successor. Although Walpole's administration had been overthrown largely by Chesterfield's efforts the new ministry did not count Chesterfield either in its ranks or among its supporters. He remained in opposition, distinguishing himself by the courtly bitterness of his attacks on George II., who learned to hate him violently. In 1743 a new journal, _Old England; or, the Constitutional Journal_ appeared. For this paper Chesterfield wrote under the name of "Jeffrey Broadbottom." A number of pamphlets, in some of which Chesterfield had the help of Edmund Waller, followed. His energetic campaign against George II. and his government won the gratitude of the dowager duchess of Marlborough, who left him L20,000 as a mark of her appreciation. In 1744 the king was compelled to abandon Carteret, and the coalition or "Broad Bottom" party, led by Chesterfield and Pitt, came into office. In the troublous state of European politics the earl's conduct and experience were more useful abroad than at home, and he was sent to the Hague as ambassador a second time. The object of his mission was to persuade the Dutch to join in the War of the Austrian Succession and to arrange the details of their assistance. The success of his mission was complete; and on his return a few weeks afterwards he received the lord-lieutenancy of Ireland--a place he had long coveted.

Short as it was, Chesterfield's Irish administration was of great service to his country, and is unquestionably that part of his political life which does him most honour. To have conceived and carried out a policy which, with certain reservations, Burke himself might have originated and owned, is indeed no small title to regard. The earl showed himself finely capable in practice as in theory, vigorous and tolerant, a man to be feared and a leader to be followed; he took the government entirely into his own hands, repressed the jobbery traditional to the office, established schools and manufactures, and at once conciliated and kept in check the Orange and Roman Catholic factions. In 1746, however, he had to exchange the lord-lieutenancy for the place of secretary of state. With a curious respect for those theories his familiarity with the secret social history of France had caused him to entertain, he hoped and attempted to retain a hold over the king through the influence of Lady Yarmouth, though the futility of such means had already been demonstrated to him by his relations with Queen Caroline's "_ma bonne Howard_." The influence of Newcastle and Sandwich, however, was too strong for him; he was thwarted and over-reached; and in 1748 he resigned the seals, and returned to cards and his books with the admirable composure which was one of his most striking characteristics. He declined any knowledge of the _Apology for a late Resignation, in a Letter from an English Gentleman to his Friend at The Hague_, which ran through four editions in 1748, but there is little doubt that he was, at least in part, the author.

The dukedom offered him by George II., whose ill-will his fine tact had overcome, was refused. He continued for some years to attend the Upper House, and to take part in its proceedings. In 1751, seconded by Lord Macclesfield, president of the Royal Society, and Bradley, the eminent mathematician, he distinguished himself greatly in the debates on the calendar, and succeeded in making the new style a fact. Deafness, however, was gradually affecting him, and he withdrew little by little from society and the practice of politics. In 1755 occurred the famous dispute with Johnson over the dedication to the _English Dictionary_. In 1747 Johnson sent Chesterfield, who was then secretary of state, a prospectus of his _Dictionary_, which was acknowledged by a subscription of L10. Chesterfield apparently took no further interest in the enterprise, and the book was about to appear, when he wrote two papers in the _World_ in praise of it. It was said that Johnson was kept waiting in the anteroom when he called while Cibber was admitted. In any case the doctor had expected more help from a professed patron of literature, and wrote the earl the famous letter in defence of men of letters. Chesterfield's "respectable Hottentot," now identified with George, Lord Lyttelton, was long supposed, though on slender grounds, to be a portrait of Johnson. During the twenty years of life that followed this episode, Chesterfield wrote and read a great deal, but went little into society.

In 1768 died Philip Stanhope, the child of so many hopes. The constant care bestowed by his father on his education resulted in an honourable but not particularly distinguished career for young Stanhope. His death was an overwhelming grief to Chesterfield, and the discovery that he had long been married to a lady of humble origin must have been galling in the extreme to his father after his careful instruction in worldly wisdom. Chesterfield, who had no children by his wife, Melusina von Schulemberg, illegitimate daughter of George I., whom he married in 1733, adopted his godson, a distant cousin, named Philip Stanhope (1755-1815), as heir to the title and estates. His famous jest (which even Johnson allowed to have merit)--"Tyrawley and I have been dead these two years, but we don't choose to have it known"--is the best description possible of his humour and condition during the latter part of this period of decline. To the deafness was added blindness, but his memory and his fine manners only left him with life; his last words ("Give Dayrolles a chair") prove that he had neither forgotten his friend nor the way to receive him. He died on the 24th of March 1773.

Chesterfield was selfish, calculating and contemptuous; he was not naturally generous, and he practised dissimulation till it became part of his nature. In spite of his brilliant talents and of the admirable training he received, his life, on the whole, cannot be pronounced a success. His anxiety and the pains he took to become an orator have been already noticed, and Horace Walpole, who had heard all the great orators, preferred a speech of Chesterfield's to any other; yet the earl's eloquence is not to be compared with that of Pitt. Samuel Johnson, who was not perhaps the best judge in the world, pronounced his manners to have been "exquisitely elegant"; yet as a courtier he was utterly worsted by Robert Walpole, whose manners were anything but refined, and even by Newcastle. He desired to be known as a protector of letters and literary men; and his want of heart or head over the _Dictionary_ dedication, though explained and excused by Croker, none the less inspired the famous change in a famous line--"Toil, envy, want, _the patron_, and the jail." His published writings have had with posterity a very indifferent success; his literary reputation rests on a volume of letters never designed to appear in print. The son for whom he worked so hard and thought so deeply failed especially where his father had most desired he should succeed.

As a politician and statesman, Chesterfield's fame rests on his short but brilliant administration of Ireland. As an author he was a clever essayist and epigrammatist. But he stands or falls by the _Letters to his Son_, first published by Stanhope's widow in 1774, and the _Letters to his Godson_ (1890). The _Letters_ are brilliantly written--full of elegant wisdom, of keen wit, of admirable portrait-painting, of exquisite observation and deduction. Against the charge of an undue insistence on the external graces of manner Chesterfield has been adequately defended by Lord Stanhope (_History_, iii. 34). Against the often iterated accusation of immorality, it should be remembered that the _Letters_ reflected the morality of the age, and that their author only systematized and reduced to writing the principles of conduct by which, deliberately or unconsciously, the best and the worst of his contemporaries were governed.

The earldom of Chesterfield passed at his death to his godson, already mentioned, as 5th earl, and so to the latter's son and grandson. On the death of the latter unmarried in 1871, it passed in succession to two collateral heirs, the 8th and 9th earls, and so in 1887 to the latter's son as 10th earl.

See Chesterfield's _Miscellaneous Works_ (London, 1777, 2 vols. 4to);
_Letters to his Son, &c._, edited by Lord Mahon (London, 1845-1853, 5
vols.); and _Letters to his Godson_ (1890) (edited by the earl of
Carnarvon). There are also editions of the first series of letters by
J. Bradshaw (3 vols., 1892) and Mr C. Strachey (2 vols., 1901). In
1893 a biography, including numerous letters first published from the
Newcastle Papers, was issued by Mr W. Ernst; and in 1907 appeared an
elaborate _Life_ by W.H. Craig. (A.D.)

CHESTERFIELD, a market town and municipal borough in the Chesterfield parliamentary division of Derbyshire, England, 24 m. N. by E. of Derby, on the Midland and the Great Central railways. Pop. (1891) 22,009; (1901) 27,185. It lies at the junction of two streams, the Rother and Hipper, in a populous industrial district. It is irregularly built, with narrow streets, but has a spacious market-place. The church of St Mary and All Saints is a large and beautiful cruciform building principally of the Decorated period. Its central tower carries a remarkable twisted spire of wood covered with lead, 230 ft. high; the distortion has evidently taken place through the use of unseasoned timber and consequent warping of the woodwork. The church, which contains numerous interesting monuments, possesses also the unusual feature of an apsidal Decorated chapel. There is an example of flamboyant tracery in one of the windows. Among public buildings, the Stephenson memorial hall (1879), containing a free library, art and science class-rooms, a theatre and the rooms of the Chesterfield Institute, commemorates George Stephenson, the engineer, who resided at Tapton House, close to Chesterfield, in his later life; he died here in 1848, and was buried in Trinity church. Chesterfield grammar school was founded in 1574. The industries of the town include manufactures of cotton, silk, earthenware, machinery and tobacco, with brass and iron founding; while slate and stone are quarried, and there are coal, iron and lead mines in the neighbourhood. The town is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 1216 acres. In the immediate neighbourhood of Chesterfield on the west is the urban district of Brampton and Walton (pop. 2698), to the south-east is Hasland (7427), and to the north-east Brimington (4569).

In spite of the Roman origin suggested by its name, so few remains have been found here that it is doubtful whether Chesterfield was a Roman station. Chesterfield (_Cestrefeld_) owes its present name to the Saxons. It is mentioned in Domesday only as a bailiwick of Newbold belonging to the king, and granted to William Peverell. In 1204 John gave the manor to William Bruere and granted to the town all the privileges of a free borough which were enjoyed by Nottingham and Derby; but before this it seems to have had prescriptive borough rights. Later charters were granted by various sovereigns, and it was incorporated by Elizabeth in 1598 under the style of a mayor, 6 brethren and 12 capital burgesses. This charter was confirmed by Charles II. (1662), and the town was so governed till the Municipal Act 1835 appointed a mayor, 3 aldermen and 12 councillors. In 1204 John granted two weekly markets, on Tuesday and Saturday, and an annual fair of eight days at the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Sept. 14). This fair, which is still held, and another on Palm Tuesday, are mentioned in the _Quo Warranto_ roll of 1330. The Tuesday market has long been discontinued. That Chesterfield was early a thriving centre is shown by the charter of John Lord Wake, lord of the manor, granting a gild merchant to the town. In 1266 the town was the scene of a battle between the royal forces and the barons, when Robert de Ferrers, earl of Derby, was taken prisoner. In 1586 there was a terrible visitation of the plague; and the parliamentarian forces were overthrown here in the Civil War. With the development of cotton and silk industries the town has increased enormously, and is now second in importance only to Derby among the towns of the county. There is no record that it ever returned representatives to parliament.

See Stephen Glover, _History and Gazetteer of the County of Derby_
(Derby, 1831-1833); J. Pym Yeatman, _Records of the Borough of
Chesterfield_ (Chesterfield and Sheffield, 1884); Thomas Ford,
_History of Chesterfield_ (London, 1839).

CHESTER-LE-STREET, a town in the Chester-le-Street parliamentary division of Durham, England, near the river Wear, 6 m. N. of the city of Durham on the North-Eastern railway. Pop. (1901) 11,753. The parish church of St Mary and St Cuthbert is an interesting building, formerly collegiate, with a tower 156 ft. high, and a remarkable series of monumental tombs of the Lumley family, collected here from Durham cathedral and various ruined monasteries, and in some cases remade. About 1 m. along the river is Lumley Castle, the seat of the earl of Scarborough, and about 2 m. north lies Lambton Castle, the residence of the earl of Durham, built in 1797 on the site of the old House of Harraton. Collieries and iron-works employ the industrial population. Chester-le-Street is a place of considerable antiquity. It lies on a branch of the Roman north road, on which it was a station, but the name is not known. Under the name of _Cunecastre_ it was made the seat of a bishop in 882, and continued to be the head of the diocese till the Danish invasion of 995. During that time the church was the repository of the shrine of St Cuthbert, which was then removed to Durham.

CHESTERTON, GILBERT KEITH (1874- ), English journalist and author, who came of a family of estate-agents, was born in London on the 29th of May 1874. He was educated at St Paul's school, which he left in 1891 with the idea of studying art. But his natural bent was literary, and he devoted himself mainly to cultivating that means of expression, both in prose and verse; he did occasional reviewing, and had some experience in a publisher's office. In 1900, having already produced a volume of clever poems, _The Wild Knight_, he definitely took to journalism as a career, and became a regular contributor of signed articles to the Liberal journals, the _Speaker_ and _Daily News_. He established himself from the first as a writer with a distinct personality, combative to a swashbuckling degree, unconventional and dogmatic; and the republication of much of his work in a series of volumes (e.g. _Twelve Types_, _Heretics_, _Orthodoxy_), characterized by much acuteness of criticism, a pungent style, and the capacity of laying down the law with unflagging impetuosity and humour, enhanced his reputation. His powers as a writer are best shown in his studies of Browning (in the "English Men of Letters" series) and of Dickens; but these were only rather more ambitious essays among a medley of characteristic utterances, ranging from fiction (including _The Napoleon of Notting-hill_) to fugitive verse, and from artistic criticism to discussions of ethics and religion. The interest excited by his work and views was indicated and analysed in an anonymous volume (_G.K. Chesterton: a Criticism_) published in 1908.

CHESTERTON, an urban district in the Chesterton parliamentary division of Cambridgeshire, England, 1-1/2 m. N. from Cambridge station, on the north bank of the Cam. Pop. (1901) 9591. The church of St Andrew is Decorated and Perpendicular, retaining ancient woodwork and remains of fresco painting. Along the river are several boat-houses erected by the Cambridge University Boat Club. Boat-building and tile manufacture are local industries.

CHESTNUT (_nux Castanea_), the common name given to two sorts of trees and their fruit, (1) the so-called "horse-chestnut," and (2) the sweet or "Spanish" chestnut.

(1) The common horse-chestnut, _Aesculus Hippocastanum_ (Ger. _Rosskastanie_; Fr. _marronnier d'Inde_), has been stated to be a native of Tibet, and to have been brought thence to England in 1550; it is now, however, thought to be indigenous in the mountains of northern Greece, where it occurs wild at 3000 to 4000 ft. above sea-level. Matthiolus, who attributes the origin of the name of the tree to the use of the nuts by the inhabitants of Constantinople for the relief of short-windedness and cough in horses, remarks that no ancient writer appears to have made mention of the horse-chestnut. Clusius (_Rariorum plantarum hist._ i. p. 8, 1601) describes it as a vegetable curiosity, of which in 1588 he had left in Vienna a living specimen, but of which he had not yet seen either the flowers or recent fruit. The dry fruit, he says, had frequently been brought from Constantinople into Europe.

The tree grows rapidly; it flourishes best in a sandy, somewhat moist loam, and attains a height of 50 to 60 or more ft., assuming a pyramidal outline. Its boughs are strong and spreading. The buds, conspicuous for their size, are protected by a coat of a glutinous substance, which is impervious to water; in spring this melts, and the bud-scales are then cast off. The leaves are composed of seven radiating leaflets (long-wedge-shaped); when young they are downy and drooping. From the early date of its leafing year by year, a horse-chestnut in the Tuileries is known as the "Marronnier du 20 mars." The flowers of the horse-chestnut, which are white dashed with red and yellow, appear in May, and sometimes, but quite exceptionally, again in autumn; they form a handsome erect panicle, but comparatively few of them afford mature fruit. The fruit is ripe in or shortly before the first week in October, when it falls to the ground, and the three-valved thorny capsule divides, disclosing the brown and at first beautifully glossy seeds, the so-called nuts, having a resemblance to sweet chestnuts, and commonly three or else two in number. For propagation of the tree, the seeds may be sown either when fresh, or, if preserved in sand or earth, in spring. Drying by exposure to the air for a month has been found to prevent their germination. Rooks are wont to remove the nuts from the tree just before they fall, and to disperse them in various directions. The tree is rarely planted in mixed plantations where profit is an object; it interferes with its neighbours and occupies too much room. It is generally introduced near mansion-houses for ornament and shade, and the celebrated avenues at Richmond and Bushey Park in England are objects of great beauty at the time of flowering.

The bark of the horse-chestnut contains a greenish oil, resin, a yellow body, a tannin, C26H24O12, existing likewise in the seeds and various parts of the tree, and decomposable into _phloroglucin_ and _aesciglyoxalic acid_, C7H5O3, also _aesculetin hydrate_, and the crystalline fluorescent compound _aesculin_, of the formula C21H24O13 (Rochleder and Schwarz), with which occurs a similar substance _fraxin_, the _paviin_ of Sir G.G. Stokes (_Q.J. Chem. Soc._ xi. 17, 1859; xii. 126, 1860), who suggests that its presence may perhaps account for the discrepancies in the analyses of aesculin given by different authors. From the seeds have been obtained starch (about 14%), gum, mucilage, a non-drying oil, phosphoric acid, salts of calcium, _saponin_, by boiling which with dilute hydrochloric or sulphuric acid _aesculic acid_ is obtained, _quercitrin_, present also in the fully developed leaves, _aescigenin_, C12H26O2, and _aesculetin_, C9H6O4, which is procurable also, but in small quantity only, from the bark. Friedrich Rochleder has described as constituent principles of the cotyledons _aphrodaescin_, C52H82O23, a bitter glucoside, _argyraescin_, C27H42O12, _aescinic acid_, C24H40O12, and _queraescitrin_, C41H46O25, found also in the leaves. To prepare pure starch from the seeds, Flandin (_Compt. rend._ xxvii. 391, 1848; xxviii. 138, 1849) recommends kneading them, when peeled and bruised, in an aqueous solution of 1/100 to 1/60 of their weight of sodium carbonate. E. Staffel (_Ann. d. Chem. u. Pharm._ lxxvi., 1850, p. 379) after drying found, in spring and autumn respectively, 10.9 and 3.38% of ash in the wood, 8.68 and 6.57 in the bark, and 7.68 and 7.52 in the leaves of the horse-chestnut. The ash of the unripe fruit contains 58.77, that of the ripe kernel 61.74, and that of the green shell 75.91% of potash (E. Wolff).

The wood of the horse-chestnut is soft, and serves only for the making of water-pipes, for turner's work and common carpentry, as a source of charcoal for gunpowder, and as fuel. Newly cut it weighs 60 lb, and dry 35 lb. per cub. ft. approximately. The bark has been employed for dyeing yellow and for tanning, and was formerly in popular repute as a febrifuge and tonic. The powder of the dried nuts was at one time prescribed as a sternutatory (to encourage sneezing) in the Edinburgh _Pharmacopoeia_. It is stated to form with alum-water a size or cement highly offensive to vermin, and with two parts of wheaten flour the material for a strong bookbinder's paste. Infusion of horse-chestnuts is found to expel worms from soil, and soon to kill them if they are left in it. The nuts furthermore have been applied to the manufacture of an oil for burning, cosmetic preparations and starch, and in Switzerland, France and Ireland, when rasped on ground, to the bleaching of flax, hemp, silk and wool. In Geneva horse-chestnuts are largely consumed by grazing stock, a single sheep receiving 2 lb. crushed morning and evening. Given to cows in moderate quantity, they have been found to enhance both the yield and flavour of milk. Deer readily eat them, and, after a preliminary steeping in lime-water, pigs also. For poultry they should be used boiled, and mixed with other nourishment. The fallen leaves are relished by sheep and deer, and afford a good litter for flocks and herds.

One variety of the horse-chestnut has variegated leaves, and another double flowers. Darwin observed that _Ae. Pavia_, the red buckeye of North America, shows a special tendency, under unfavourable conditions, to be double-blossomed. The seeds of this species are used to stupefy fish. The scarlet-flowered horse-chestnut, _Ae. rubicunda_, is a handsome tree, less in height and having a rounder head than the common form; it is a native of North America. Another species, possessing flowers with the lower petals white with a red tinge, and the upper yellow and red with a white border, and fruit unarmed, is _Ae. indica_, a native of the western Himalayas. Among the North American species are the foetid or Ohio buckeye, _Ae. glabra_, and _Ae. flava_, the sweet buckeye. _Ae. californica_, when full-grown and in flower, is a beautiful tree, but its leaves often fall before midsummer.

(2) The Spanish or sweet chestnut, _Castanea sativa_ (natural order, Fagaceae), is a stately and magnificent tree, native of the countries bordering on the Mediterranean, but also ripening its fruit in sheltered situations as far north as Scotland. It lives very long, and attains a large size, spreading its branches widely. It has large glossy lanceolate leaves with a toothed margin. The flowers, which appear in early summer, are in pendulous, slender yellowish catkins, which bear a number of staminate flowers with a few pistillate flowers at the base. The staminate contain 8 to 20 stamens which produce an enormous amount of dusty yellow pollen, some of which gets carried by wind to the protruding stigmas of the pistillate flowers. The latter are borne three together, invested by a cupule of four green bracts, which, as the fruit matures, grow to form the tough green prickly envelope surrounding the group of generally three nuts. The largest known chestnut tree is the famous _Castagno di cento cavalli_, or the chestnut of a hundred horses, on the slopes of Mount Etna, a tree which, when measured about 1780 by Count Borch, was found to have a circumference of 190 ft. The timber bears a striking resemblance to that of the oak, which has been mistaken for chestnut; but it may be distinguished by the numerous fine medullary rays. Unlike oak, the wood is more valuable while young than old. When not more than fifty years old it forms durable posts for fences and gates; but at that age it often begins to deteriorate, having ring-shakes and central hollows. In a young state, when the stems are not above 2 in. in diameter at the ground, the chestnut is found to make durable hoops for casks and props for vines; and of a larger size it makes good hop-poles.

Chestnuts (the fruit of the tree) are extensively imported into Great Britain, and are eaten roasted or boiled, and mashed or otherwise as a vegetable. In a raw state they have a sweet taste, but are difficult of digestion. The trees are very abundant in the south of Europe, and chestnuts bulk largely in the food resources of the poor in Spain, Italy, Switzerland and Germany. In Italy the kernels are ground into meal, and used for thickening soups, and even for bread-making. In North America the fruits of an allied species, _C. americana_, are eaten both raw and cooked.

CHETTLE, HENRY (1564?-1607?), English dramatist and miscellaneous writer, was the son of Robert Chettle, a London dyer. He was apprenticed in 1577 to a stationer, and in 1591 became a partner with William Hoskins and John Danter. In 1592 he published Robert Greene's _Groatsworth of Wit_. In the preface to his _Kind Herts Dreame_ (end of 1592) he found it necessary to disavow any share in that pamphlet, and incidentally he apologized to three persons (one of them commonly identified with Shakespeare) who had been abused in it. _Piers Plainnes Seaven Yeres Prentiship_, the story of a fictitious apprenticeship in Crete and Thrace, appeared in 1595. As early as 1598 Francis Meres includes him in his _Palladis Tamia_ as one of the "best for comedy," and between that year and 1603 he wrote or collaborated in some forty-nine pieces. He seems to have been generally in debt, judging from numerous entries in Henslowe's diary of advances for various purposes, on one occasion (17th of January 1599) to pay his expenses in the Marshalsea prison, on another (7th of March 1603) to get his play out of pawn. Of the thirteen plays usually attributed to Chettle's sole authorship only one was printed. This was _The Tragedy of Hoffmann: or a Revenge for a Father_ (played 1602; printed 1631), a share in which Mr Fleay assigns to Thomas Heywood. It has been suggested that this piece was put forward as a rival to Shakespeare's _Hamlet_. Among the plays in which Chettle had a share is catalogued _The Danish Tragedy_, which was probably either identical with _Hoffmann_ or another version of the same story. _The Pleasant Comedie of Patient Grissill_ (1599), in which he collaborated with Thomas Dekker and William Haughton, was reprinted by the Shakespeare Society in 1841. It contains the lyric "Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers," which is probably Dekker's. In November 1599 Chettle receives ten shillings for mending the first part of "Robin Hood," i.e. _The Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntingdon_, by Anthony Munday; and in the second part, which followed soon after and was printed in 1601, _The Death of Robert, Earle of Huntingdon_, he collaborated with Munday. Both plays are printed in Dodsley's _Select Collection of Old English Plays_ (ed. W. C. Hazlitt, vol. viii.). In 1603 Chettle published _England's Mourning Garment_, in which are included some verses alluding to the chief poets of the time. His death took place before the appearance of Dekker's _Knight's Conjurer_ in 1607, for he is there mentioned as a recent arrival in limbo.

_Hoffmann_ was edited by H. B(arrett) L(ennard) (1852) and by Richard Ackermann (Bamberg, 1894).

CHEVALIER, ALBERT (1861- ), English comedian, began a connexion with the stage while still a child. In 1877 he was engaged as an actor under the Bancrofts in London, and for some years played "legitimate" parts at the Court theatre and elsewhere. In 1891, however, he began a successful music-hall career as a singer of coster songs of his own invention, a new type in which he had an immediate success, both in England and America. He subsequently organized an entertainment of his own, with sketches and songs, with which he went on tour, establishing a wide popularity as an original artist in his special line.

CHEVALIER, MICHEL (1806-1879), French economist, was born at Limoges on the 13th of January 1806. In his early manhood, while employed as an engineer, he became a convert to the theories of Saint Simon; these he ardently advocated in the _Globe_, the organ of the Saint Simonians, which he edited until his arrest in 1832 on a charge of outraging public morality by its publication. He was sentenced to a year's imprisonment, but was released in six months through the intervention of Thiers, who sent him on a special mission to the United States to study the question of land and water transport. In 1836 he published, in two volumes, the letters he wrote from America to the _Journal des debats_. These attracted so much attention that he was sent in the same year on an economic mission to England, which resulted in his publication (in 1838) of _Des interets materiels de la France_. The success of this made his position secure, and in 1840 he was appointed professor of political economy in the College de France. He sat for a short time (1845-1846) as a member of the Chamber of Deputies, but lost his seat owing to his enthusiastic adoption of the principles of free trade. Under Napoleon III. he was restored to the position of which the revolution of 1848 had temporarily deprived him. In 1850 he became a member of the Institute, and in the following year published an important work in favour of free trade, under the title of _Examen du systeme commercial connu sous le nom de systeme protecteur_. His chief public triumph was the important part he played in bringing about the conclusion of the commercial treaty between France and Great Britain in 1860. Previously to this he had served, in 1855, upon the commission for organizing the Exhibition of 1855, and his services there led to his forming one of the French jury of awards in the London Exhibition of 1862. He was created a member of the Senate in 1860, and continued for some years to take an active part in its discussions. He retired from public life in 1870, but was unceasingly industrious with his pen. He became grand officer of the Legion of Honour in 1861, and during the later years of his life received from many quarters public recognition of his eminence as a political economist. He died at his chateau near Montpellier (Herault) on the 28th of November 1879. Many of his works have been translated into English and other languages. Besides those already mentioned the more important are: _Cours d'economie politique_ (1842-1850); _Essais de politique industrielle_ (1843); _De la baisse probable d'or_(1859, translated into English by Cobden, _On the Probable Fall of the Value of Gold_, Manchester, 1859); _L'Expedition du Mexique_ (1862); _Introduction aux rapports du jury international_ (1868).

CHEVALIER, ULYSSE (1841- ), French bibliographer, was born at Rambouillet on the 24th of February 1841. He published a great number of documents relating to the history of Dauphine, e.g. the cartularies of the church and the town of Die (1868), of the abbey of St Andre le-Bas at Vienne (1869), of the abbey of Notre Dame at Bonnevaux in the diocese of Vienne (1889), of the abbey of St Chaffre at Le Monestier (1884), the inventories and several collections of archives of the dauphins of Viennais, and a _Bibliotheque liturgique_ in six volumes (1893-1897), the third and fourth volumes of which constitute the _Repertorium hymnologicum_, containing more than 20,000 articles. But his principal work is the _Repertoire des sources historiques du moyen age_. The first part, _Bio-bibliographie_ (1877-1886; 2nd ed., 1905), contains the names of all the historical personages alive between the years 1 and 1500 who are mentioned in printed books, together with the precise indication of all the places where they are mentioned. The second part, _Topo-bibliographie_ (1894-1903), contains not only the names of places mentioned in books on the history of the middle ages, but, in a general way, everything not included in the _Bio-bibliographie_. The _Repertoire_ as a whole contains an enormous mass of useful information, and is one of the most important bibliographical monuments ever devoted to the study of medieval history. Though a Catholic priest and professor of history at the Catholic university of Lyons, the Abbe (afterwards Canon) Chevalier knew how to maintain an independent critical attitude even in religious questions. In the controversy on the authenticity of the Holy Shroud (_sudario_) at Turin, he worked in the true scientific spirit by tracing back the history of that piece of stuff, which was undoubtedly used as a shroud, but which was not produced before the 14th century and is probably no older (See _Le Saint Suaire de Lirey-Chambery-Turin et les defenseurs de son authenticite_). Similarly, in _Notre Dame de Lorette; etude critique sur l'authenticite de la Santa Casa_ (1906), he dissipated by the aid of authentic documents the legend which had embellished and falsified the primitive history of that sanctuary.

CHEVAUX-DE-FRISE (French for "Friesland horses"; the Dutch _Vriesse ruyters_, "Frisian horsemen," and German _Spanische Reiter_, "Spanish horsemen"), a military obstacle, originating apparently in the Dutch War of Independence, and used to close the breach of a fortress, streets, &c. It was formerly often used in field operations as a defence against cavalry; hence the name, as the Dutch were weak in the mounted arm and had therefore to check the enemy's cavalry by an artificial obstacle. Chevaux-de-frise consist of beams in which are fixed a number of spears, sword-blades, &c., with the points projecting outwards on all sides.

CHEVERUS, JEAN LOUIS ANNE MAGDELEINE LEFEBVRE DE (1768-1836), French ecclesiastic, was born on the 28th of January 1768, in Mayenne, France, where his father was general civil judge and lieutenant of police. He studied at the college of Mayenne, received the tonsure when twelve, became prior of Torbechet while still little more than a child, thence derived sufficient income for his education, entered the College of Louis le Grand in 1781, and after completing his theological studies at the Seminary of St Magloire, was ordained deacon in October 1790, and priest by special dispensation on the 18th of December. He was immediately made canon of the cathedral of Le Mans and began to act as vicar to his uncle in Mayenne, who died in 1792. Owing to the progress of the Revolution he emigrated in 1792 to England, and thence in 1796 to America, settling in Boston, Mass. His interest had been aroused by Francois Antoine Matignon, a former professor at Orleans, now in charge under Bishop John Carroll of all the Catholic churches and missions in New England. Cheverus, although at first appointed to an Indian mission in Maine, remained in Boston for nearly a year, and returned thither after several months in the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy missions and visits to scattered Catholic families along the way. During the epidemic of yellow fever in 1798 he won great praise and respect for his courage and charity; and his preaching was listened to by many Protestants--indeed the subscriptions for the Church of the Holy Cross which he founded in 1803 were largely from non-Catholics. In 1808 the papal brief was issued making Boston a bishopric, suffragan to Baltimore, and Cheverus its bishop. He was consecrated on All Saints' day in 1810, at St Peter's, Baltimore, by Archbishop Carroll. On the death of the latter his assistant bishop, Neale, urged the appointment of Cheverus as assistant to himself; Cheverus refused and warmly asserted his desire to remain in Boston; but, much broken by the death of Matignon in 1818 and with impaired health, he soon found it necessary to leave the seat of his bishopric. In 1823, Louis XVIII. having insisted on his return to France, Cheverus became bishop of Montauban, where his tolerance captivated the Protestant clergy and laymen of the city. He was made archbishop of Bordeaux in 1826; and on the 1st of February 1836, in accordance with the wish of Louis Philippe, he was made a cardinal. He died in Bordeaux on the 19th of July 1836. To Cheverus, more than to any other, is due the position that Boston now holds in the Roman Catholic Church of America, as well as the general growth of that church in New England. His character was essentially lovable: the Jews of Bordeaux and Protestants everywhere delighted to honour him.

See the rather extravagant biography by J. Huen-Dubourg, _Vie du
cardinal de Cheverus_ (Bordeaux, 1838; English version by E. Stewart,
Boston, 1839).

CHEVET, the term employed in French architecture to distinguish the apsidal end of a church, in which the apses or chapels radiate round the choir aisle. The two earliest examples (11th and 12th century) are found in the churches of St Hilaire, Poitiers, and Notre Dame-du-Port, Clermont, where there are four apses. A more usual number is five, and the central apse, being of larger dimensions, becomes the Lady chapel. This was the case in Westminster Abbey, where Henry III. introduced the chevet into England; Henry VII.'s chapel is built on the site of the original Lady chapel, which must have been of exceptional size, as it extended the whole length of the present structure. In Solignac, Fontevrault and Paray-le-Monial there are only three, in these cases sufficiently distant one from the other to allow of a window between. The usual number in all the great cathedrals of the 13th century, as in Bourges, Chartres, Reims, Troyes, Tours, Bayeux, Antwerp and Bruges, is five. In Beauvais, Amiens and Cologne there are seven apsidal chapels, and in Clairvaux nine radiating but rectangular chapels. In the 14th and 15th centuries the central apse was increased in size and dedicated to the Virgin Mary, as in St Ouen at Rouen.

CHEVIOT HILLS, a range forming about 35 m. of the border between England and Scotland. The boundary generally follows the line of greatest elevation, but as the slope is more gradual southward and northward the larger part of the range is in Northumberland, England, and the lesser in Roxburghshire, Scotland. The axis runs from N.E. to S.W., with a northward tendency at the eastern end, where the ridge culminates in the Cheviot, 2676 ft. Its chief elevations from this point south-westward fall abruptly to 2034 ft. in Windygate Hill, and then more gradually to about 1600 ft. above the pass, followed by a high road from Redesdale. Beyond this are Carter Fell (1815) and Peel Fell (1964), after which two lines of lesser elevation branch westward and southward to enclose Liddesdale. The hills are finely grouped, of conical and high-arched forms, and generally grass-covered. Their flanks are scored with deep narrow glens in every direction, carrying the headwaters of the Till, Coquet and North Tyne on the south, and tributaries of the Tweed on the north. The range is famous for a valuable breed of sheep, which find abundant pasture on its smooth declivities. In earlier days it was the scene of many episodes of border warfare, and its name is inseparably associated with the ballad of _Chevy Chase_. The main route into Scotland from England lies along the low coastal belt east of the Till; the Till itself provided another, and Redesdale a third. There are numerous ruins of castles and "peel towers" or forts on the English side in this district.

_Geology._--The rocks entering into the geological structure of the
Cheviots belong to the Silurian, Old Red Sandstone and Carboniferous
systems. The oldest strata, which are of Upper Silurian age, form
inliers that have been exposed by the denudation of the younger
palaeozoic rocks. One of these which occurs high up on the slopes of
the Cheviots is drained by the Kale Water and the river Coquet and is
covered towards the north by the Old Red Sandstone volcanic series and
on the south by Carboniferous strata. Another area is traversed by the
Jed Water and the Edgerston Burn and is surrounded by rocks of Old Red
Sandstone age. The strata consist of greywackes, flags and shales with
seams and zones of graptolite shale which yield fossils sparingly.