Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

The subsequent history of duelling in France may be more shortly treated. In the preamble to the edict of 1704 Louis XIV. records his satisfaction at seeing under his reign an almost entire cessation of those fatal combats which by the inveterate force of custom had so long prevailed. Addison (_Spectator_, 99) notes it as one of the most glorious exploits of his reign to have banished the false point of honour. Under the regency of Louis XV. there was a brief revival. The last legislative act for the suppression of duels was passed on the 12th of April 1723. Then came the Revolution, which in abolishing the _ancien regime_ fondly trusted that with it would go the duel, one of the privileges and abuses of an aristocratic society. Dupleix, in his _Military Law concerning the Duel_ (1611), premises that these have no application to lawyers, merchants, financiers or justices. This explains why in the legislation of the National Assembly there is no mention of duels. Camille Desmoulins when challenged shrugged his shoulders and replied to the charge of cowardice that he would prove his courage on other fields than the Bois de Boulogne. The two great Frenchmen whose writings preluded the French Revolution both set their faces against it. Voltaire had indeed, as a young man, in obedience to the dictates of society, once sought satisfaction from a nobleman for a brutal insult, and had reflected on his temerity in the solitude of the Bastille.[1] Henceforward he inveighed against the practice, not only for its absurdity, but also for its aristocratic exclusiveness. Rousseau had said of duelling, "It is not an institution of honour, but a horrible and barbarous custom, which a courageous man despises and a good man abhors." Napoleon was a sworn foe to it. "Bon duelliste mauvais soldat" is one of his best known sayings; and, when the king of Sweden sent him a challenge, he replied that he would order a fencing-master to attend him as plenipotentiary. After the battle of Waterloo duels such as Lever loves to depict were frequent between disbanded French officers and those of the allies in occupation. The restoration of the Bourbons brought with it a fresh crop of duels. Since then duels have been frequent in France--more frequent, however, in novels than in real life--fought mainly between politicians and journalists, and with rare exceptions bloodless affairs. If fought with pistols, the distance and the weapons chosen render a hit improbable; and, if fought with rapiers, honour is generally satisfied with the first blood drawn. Among Frenchmen famous in politics or letters who have "gone out" may be mentioned Armand Carrel, who fell in an encounter with Emile Girardin; Thiers, who thus atoned for a youthful indiscretion; the elder Dumas; Lamartine; Ste Beuve, who to show at once his sangfroid and his sense of humour, fought under an umbrella; Ledru Rollin; Edmond About; Clement Thomas; Veuillot, the representative of the church militant; Rochefort; and Boulanger, the Bonapartist _fanfaron_, whose discomfiture in a duel with Floquet resulted in a notable loss of popular respect.

In England.

Duelling did not begin in England till some hundred years after it had arisen in France. There is no instance of a private duel fought in England before the 16th century, and they are rare before the reign of James I. A very fair notion of the comparative popularity of duelling, and of the feeling with which it was regarded at various periods, might be gathered by examining the part it plays in the novels and lighter literature of the times. The earliest duels we remember in fiction are that in the _Monastery_ between Sir Piercie Shafton and Halbert Glendinning, and that in _Kenilworth_ between Tressilian and Varney. (That in _Anne of Geierstein_ either is an anachronism or must reckon as a wager by battle.) Under James I. we have the encounter between Nigel and Lord Dalgarno. The greater evil of war, as we observed in French history, expels the lesser, and the literature of the Commonwealth is in this respect a blank. With the Restoration there came a reaction against Puritan morality, and a return to the gallantry and loose manners of French society, which is best represented by the theatre of the day. The drama of the Restoration abounds in duels. Passing on to the reign of Queen Anne, we find the subject frequently discussed in the _Tatler_ and the _Spectator_, and Addison points in his happiest way the moral to a contemporary duel between Mr Thornhill and Sir Cholmeley Dering. "I come not," says Spinomont to King Pharamond, "I come not to implore your pardon, I come to relate my sorrow, a sorrow too great for human life to support. Know that this morning I have killed in a duel the man whom of all men living I love best." No reader of _Esmond_ can forget Thackeray's description of the doubly fatal duel between the duke of Hamilton and Lord Mohun, which is historical, or the no less life-like though fictitious duel between Lord Mohun and Lord Castlewood. The duel between the two brothers in Stevenson's _Master of Ballantrae_ is one of the best conceived in fiction. Throughout the reigns of the Georges they are frequent. Richardson expresses his opinion on the subject in six voluminous letters to the _Literary Repositor_. Sheridan, like Farquhar in a previous generation, not only dramatized a duel, but fought two himself. Byron thus commemorates the bloodless duel between Tom Moore and Lord Jeffrey:--

"Can none remember that eventful day,
That ever glorious almost fatal fray,
When Little's leadless pistols met the eye,
And Bow Street myrmidons stood laughing by?"

There are no duels in Miss Austen's novels, but in those of Miss Edgeworth, her contemporary, there are three or four. As we approach the 19th century they become rarer in fiction. Thackeray's novels, indeed, abound in duels. "His royal highness the late lamented commander-in-chief" had the greatest respect for Major Macmurdo, as a man who had conducted scores of affairs for his acquaintance with the greatest prudence and skill; and Rawdon Crawley's duelling pistols, "the same which I shot Captain Marker," have become a household word. Dickens, on the other hand, who depicts contemporary English life, and mostly in the middle classes, in all his numerous works has only three; and George Eliot never once refers to a duel. Tennyson, using a poet's privilege, laid the scene of a duel in the year of the Crimean War, but he echoes the spirit of the times when he stigmatizes "the Christless code that must have life for a blow." Browning, who delights in cases of conscience, has given admirably the double moral aspect of the duel in his two lyrics entitled "Before" and "After."

To pass from fiction to fact we will select the most memorable English duels of the last century and a half. Lord Byron killed Mr Chaworth in 1765; Charles James Fox and Mr Adams fought in 1779; duke of York and Colonel Lennox, 1789; William Pitt and George Tierney, 1796; George Canning and Lord Castlereagh, 1809; Mr Christie killed John Scott, editor of the _London Magazine_, 1821; duke of Wellington and earl of Winchelsea, 1829; Mr Roebuck and Mr Black, editor of _Morning Chronicle_, 1835; Lord Alvanley and a son of Daniel O'Connell in the same year; Earl Cardigan wounded Captain Tuckett, was tried by his peers, and acquitted on a legal quibble, 1840.

The year 1808 is memorable in the annals of duelling in England. Major Campbell was sentenced to death and executed for killing Captain Boyd in a duel. In this case it is true that there was a suspicion of foul play; but in the case of Lieutenant Blundell, who was killed in a duel in 1813, though all had been conducted with perfect fairness, the surviving principal and the seconds were all convicted of murder and sentenced to death, and, although the royal pardon was obtained, they were all cashiered. The next important date is the year 1843, when public attention was painfully called to the subject by a duel in which Colonel Fawcett was shot by his brother-in-law, Lieutenant Monro. The survivor, whose career was thereby blasted, had, it was well known, gone out most reluctantly, in obedience to the then prevailing military code. A full account of the steps taken by the prince consort, and of the correspondence which passed between him and the duke of Wellington, will be found in the _Life of the Prince_ by Sir Theodore Martin. The duke, unfortunately, was not an unprejudiced counsellor. Not only had he been out himself, but, in writing to Lord Londonderry on the occasion of the duel between the marquess and Ensign Battier in 1824, he had gone so far as to state that he considered the probability of the Hussars having to fight a duel or two a matter of no consequence. In the previous year there had been formed in London the association for the suppression of duelling. It included leading members of both houses of parliament and distinguished officers of both services. The first report, issued in 1844, gives a memorial of the association presented to Queen Victoria through Sir James Graham, and in a debate in the House of Commons (15th of March 1844) Sir H. Hardinge, the secretary of war, announced to the House that Her Majesty had expressed herself desirous of devising some expedient by which the barbarous practice of duelling should be as much as possible discouraged. In the same debate Mr Turner reckoned the number of duels fought during the reign of George III. at 172, of which 91 had been attended with fatal results; yet in only two of these cases had the punishment of death been inflicted. But though the proposal of the prince consort to establish courts of honour met with no favour, yet it led to an important amendment of the articles of war (April 1844). The 98th article ordains that "every person who shall fight or promote a duel, or take any steps thereto, or who shall not do his best to prevent duel, shall, if an officer, be cashiered, or suffer such other penalty as a general court-martial may award." These articles, with a few verbal changes, were incorporated in the consolidated Army Act of 1879 (section 38), which is still in force.

In Germany.

In the German army duels are still authorized by the military code as a last resort in grave cases. A German officer who is involved in a difficulty with another is bound to notify the circumstance to a council of honour at the latest as soon as he has either given or received a challenge. A council of honour consists of three officers of different ranks and is instructed, if possible, to bring about a reconciliation. If unsuccessful it must see that the conditions of the duel are not out of proportion to the gravity of the quarrel. Public opinion was greatly roused by a tragic duel fought by two officers of the reserve in 1896; and the German emperor in a cabinet order of 1897, confirmed in 1901, enforced the regulation of the military court of honour, and gave warning that any infringement would be visited with the full penalties of the law. It is, notwithstanding, still the fact that a German officer who is not prepared to accept a challenge and fight, if the opinion of his regiment demands it, must leave the service. The German penal code (_Reichsstrafgesetzbuch_, pars. 101-110) only punishes a duel when it is fought with lethal weapons; and much controversy has raged round the question of the _Mensuren_ or students' duels, which, as being conducted with sharpened rapiers, have, despite the precautions taken, in the way of bandaging the vital parts of the body which a cut would reach, to reduce the risk of a fatal issue to a minimum, been declared by the Supreme Court of the Empire to fall under the head of duels, and as such to be punishable.

The _Mensuren_ (German students' duels) above referred to are frequently misunderstood. They bear little resemblance, save in form, to the duel _a outrance_, and should rather be considered in the light of athletic games, in which the overflow of high animal spirits in young Germany finds its outlet. These combats are indulged in principally by picked representatives of the "corps" (recognized clubs), and according to the position and value of the _Schmisse_ (cuts which have landed) points are awarded to either side. Formerly these so-called duels could be openly indulged in at most universities without let or hindrance. Gradually, however, the academic authorities took cognizance of the illegality of the practice, and in many cases inflicted punishment for the offence. Nowadays, owing to the decision of the supreme court reserving to the common law tribunals the power to deal with such cases, the governing bodies at the universities have only a disciplinary control, which is exercised at the various seats of learning in various degrees: in some the practice is silently tolerated, or at most visited by reprimand; in others, again, by relegation or _carcer_--with the result that the students of one university frequently visit another, in order to be able to fight out their battles under less rigorous surveillance.

Modern views.

Any formal discussion of the morality of duelling is, in England at least, happily superfluous. No fashionable vice has been so unanimously condemned both by moralists and divines, and in tracing its history we are reminded of the words of Tacitus, "in civitate nostra et vetabitur semper et retinebitur." Some, however, of the problems, moral and social, which it suggests may be shortly noticed. That duelling flourished so long in England the law is, perhaps, as much to blame as society. It was doubtless from the fact that duels were at first a form of legal procedure that English law has refused to take cognizance of private duels. A duel in the eye of the law differs nothing from an ordinary murder. The greatest English legal authorities, from the time of Elizabeth downwards, such as Coke, Bacon and Hale, have all distinctly affirmed this interpretation of the law. But here as elsewhere the severity of the penalty defeated its own object. The public conscience revolted against a Draconian code which made no distinction between wilful murder and a deadly combat wherein each party consented to his own death or submitted to the risk of it. No jury could be found to convict when conviction involved in the same penalty a Fox or a Pitt and a Turpin or a Brownrigg. Such, however, was the conservatism of English publicists that Bentham was the first to point out clearly this defect of the law, and propose a remedy. In his _Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation_, published in 1789, Bentham discusses the subject with his usual boldness and logical precision. In his exposition of the absurdity of duelling considered as a branch of penal justice, and its inefficiency as a punishment, he only restates in a clearer form the arguments of Paley. So far there is nothing novel in his treatment of the subject. But he soon parts company with the Christian moralist, and proceeds to show that duelling does, however rudely and imperfectly, correct and repress a real social evil. "It entirely effaces a blot which an insult imprints upon the honour. Vulgar moralists, by condemning public opinion upon this point, only confirm the fact." He then points out the true remedy for the evil. It is to extend the same legal protection to offences against honour as to offences against the person. The legal satisfactions which he suggests are some of them extremely grotesque. Thus for an insult to a woman, the man is to be dressed in a woman's clothes, and the retort to be inflicted by the hand of a woman. But the principle indicated is a sound one, that in offences against honour the punishment must be analogous to the injury. Doubtless, if Bentham were now alive, he would allow that the necessity for such a scheme of legislation had in a great measure passed away. That duels have since become extinct is no doubt principally owing to social changes, but it may be in part ascribed to improvements in legal remedies in the sense which Bentham indicated. A notable instance is Lord Campbell's Act of 1843, by which, in the case of a newspaper libel, a public apology coupled with a pecuniary payment is allowed to bar a plea. In the Indian Code there are special enactments concerning duelling, which is punishable not as murder but as homicide.

Suggestions have from time to time been made for the establishment of courts of honour, but the need of such tribunals is doubtful, while the objections to them are obvious. The present tendency of political philosophy is to contract rather than extend the province of law, and any interference with social life is justly resented. Real offences against reputation are sufficiently punished, and the rule of the lawyers, that mere scurrility or opprobrious words, which neither of themselves import nor are attended with any hurtful effects, are not punishable, seems on the whole a wise one. What in a higher rank is looked upon as a gross insult may in a lower rank be regarded as a mere pleasantry or a harmless joke. Among the lower orders offences against honour can hardly be said to exist; the learned professions have each its own tribunal to which its members are amenable; and the highest ranks of society, however imperfect their standard of morality may be, are perfectly competent to enforce that standard by means of social penalties without resorting either to trial by law or trial by battle.

The duel, which in a barbarous age may be excused as "a sort of wild justice," was condemned by Bacon as "a direct affront of law and tending to the dissolution of magistracy." It survived in more civilized times as a class distinction and as an ultimate court of appeal to punish violations of the social code. In a democratic age and under a settled government it is doomed to extinction. The military duels of the European continent, and the so-called American duel, where the lot decides which of the two parties shall end his life, are singular survivals. For real offences against reputation law will provide a sufficient remedy The learned professions will have each its own tribunal to which its members are amenable. Social stigma is at once a surer and a juster defence against conduct unworthy of a gentleman. Yet the duel dies hard, and even to-day it is approved or palliated by some notable publicists and professors in France and Germany. M.H. Marion (_La Grande Encyclopedie_), in an article strongly condemnatory of duels, still holds that the wrongdoer is bound to accept a challenge, though he may not take the offensive, and further allows that obligatory duels may be the only way of evoking a sense of honour and of maintaining discipline in the army. Dr Paulsen goes much further, and not only defends the duels of university students (_Mensuren_) as an encouragement of physical exercise, a proof of courage and a protest of worth against wealth, but maintains generally that the duel should be retained as an expedient in those exceptional cases when a man cannot bring himself to drag before a law court the outrage done to his personal honour. But in such cases Dr Paulsen would have the courts hold the injured person scathless, whether he be challenger or challenged, and visit the aggressor with condign punishment.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Castillo, _Tractatus de duello_ (Turin, 1525); J.P.
Pigna, _Il Duello_ (1554); Muzio Girolamo, _Traite du duel_ (Venice,
1553): Boyssat, _Recherches sur les duels_ (Lyons, 1610); J. Savaron,
_Traite contre les duels_ (Paris, 1610); Brantome, _Memoire sur les
duels rodomontades_; F. Bacon, _Charge concerning Duels_, &c. (1614);
d'Audiguier, _Le Vray et ancien usage des duels_ (Paris, 1617); _His
Majesties Edict and severe Censure against private combats_ (London,
1618); Cockburn, _History of Duels_ (London, 1720); Brillat Savarin,
_Essai sur le duel_ (1819); Chateauvillard, _Essai sur le duel_
(1836); Colombey, _Histoire anecdotique du duel_ (Paris); Fourgeroux
de Champigneules, _Histoire des duels anciens et modernes_ (2 vols.,
Paris, 1835-1837); Millingen, _History of Duelling_ (London, 1841); L.
Sabine, _Notes on Duels_ (Boston, 1855); Steinmetz, _Romance of
Duelling_ (London, 1868). See also Eugene Cauchy, _Du duel_, &c.
(1846), a learned and philosophic treatise by a French lawyer; G.
Letainturier-Fradin, _Le Duel a travers les ages_ (Paris, 1892);
Mackay, _History of Popular Delusions, Duels and Ordeals_; and for a
valuable list of authorities, Buckle, _History of Civilization in
England_, ii. 137, note 71. For judicial combats see Gibbon, _Decline
and Fall_, ch. xxxviii. For courts of honour see _Armed Strength of
the German Empire_ (1876). For _Mensur_, see Paulsen, _The German
Universities_ (1906), ch. vi. (F. S.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] Voltaire met the chevalier Rohan-Chabot at the house of the
Marquis of Sully. The chevalier, offended by Voltaire's free speech,
insolently asked the marquis, "Who is that young man?" "One," replied
Voltaire, "who if he does not parade a great name, honours that he
bears." The chevalier said nothing at the time, but, seizing his
opportunity, inveigled Voltaire into his coach, and had him beaten by
six of his footmen. Voltaire set to work to learn fencing, and then
sought the chevalier in the theatre, and publicly challenged him. A
_bon-mot_ at the chevalier's expense was the only satisfaction that
the philosopher could obtain. "Monsieur, si quelque affaire d'interet
ne vous a point fait oublier l'outrage dont j'ai a me plaindre,
j'espere que vous m'en rendrez raison." The chevalier was said to
employ his capital in petty usury.

DUENNA (Span. _duena_, a married lady or mistress, Lat. _domina_), specifically the chief lady-in-waiting upon the queen of Spain. The word is more widely applied, however, to an elderly lady in Spanish and Portuguese households (holding a position midway between a governess and companion) appointed to take charge of the young girls of the family; and "duenna" is thus used in English as a synonym for chaperon (q.v.).

DUET (an adaptation of the Ital. _duetto_, from Lat. _duo_, two), a term in music for a composition for two performers, both either vocal or instrumental. The term is not properly applied to a composition for one voice and one instrument, the latter being regarded as an accompaniment, though in the modern evolution of this latter form of composition it often has the same character. Both parts must be of equal importance; if one is subordinated to the other it becomes an accompaniment and the work ceases to be a duet. Instrumental duets are written either for two different instruments, such as Mozart's duets for violin and piano, or for two similar instruments. Duets written for the pianoforte are either for two performers on two separate instruments or for two performers on the same instrument, when they are termed "_duets a quatre mains_."

DUFAURE, JULES ARMAND STANISLAS (1798-1881), French statesman, was born at Saujon (Charente-Inferieure) on the 4th of December 1798. He became an advocate at Bordeaux, where he won a great reputation by his oratorical gifts, but soon abandoned law for politics, and in 1834 was elected deputy. In 1839 he became minister of public works in the Soult ministry, and succeeded in freeing railway construction in France from the obstacles which till then had hampered it. Losing office in 1840, Dufaure became one of the leaders of the Opposition, and on the outbreak of the revolution of 1848 he frankly accepted the Republic, and joined the party of moderate republicans. On October 13th he became minister of the interior under G. Cavaignac, but retired on the latter's defeat in the presidential election. During the Second Empire Dufaure abstained from public life, and practised at the Paris bar with such success that he was elected _batonnier_ in 1862. In 1863 he succeeded to Pasquier's seat in the French Academy. In 1871 he became a member of the Assembly, and it was on his motion that Thiers was elected President of the Republic. Dufaure became the minister of justice as chief of the party of the "left-centre," and his tenure of office was distinguished by the passage of the jury-law. In 1873 he fell with Thiers, but in 1875 resumed his former post under L.J. Buffet, whom he succeeded on the 9th of March 1876 as president of the council. In the same year he was elected a life senator. On December the 12th he withdrew from the ministry owing to the attacks of the republicans of the left in the chamber and of the conservatives in the senate. After the check which the conservatives received on the 16th of May he returned to power on the 24th of December 1877. Early in 1879 Dufaure took part in compelling the resignation of Marshal MacMahon, but immediately afterwards (1st February), worn out by opposition, he himself retired. He died in Paris on the 28th of June 1881.

See G. Picot, _M. Dufaure, sa vie et ses discours_ (Paris, 1883).

DUFF, ALEXANDER (1806-1878), Scottish missionary in India, was born on the 26th of April 1806, at Auchnahyle in the parish of Moulin, Perthshire. At St Andrews University he came under the influence of Dr Chalmers. He then accepted an offer made by the foreign mission committee of the general assembly to become their first missionary to India. He was ordained in August 1829, and started at once for India, but was twice shipwrecked before he reached Calcutta in May 1830, and lost all his books and other property. Making Calcutta the base of his operations, he at once identified himself with a policy which had far-reaching results. Up to this time Protestant missions in India had been successful only in reaching low-caste and outcaste peoples, particularly in Tinevelly and south Travancore. The Hindu and Mahommedan communities had been practically untouched. Duff saw that, to reach these communities, educational must take the place of evangelizing methods, and he devised the policy of an educational mission. The success of his work had the effect (1) of altering the policy of the government of India in matters of education, (2) of securing the recognition of education as a missionary agency by Christian churches at home, and (3) of securing entrance for Christian ideas into the minds of high-caste Hindus. He first opened an English school in which the Bible was the centre of the school work, and along with it all kinds of secular knowledge were taught from the rudiments upwards to a university standard. The English language was used on the ground that it was destined to be the great instrument of higher education in India, and also as giving the Hindu the key of Western knowledge. The school soon began to expand into a missionary college, and a government minute was adopted on the 7th of March 1835, to the effect that in higher education the object of the British government should be the promotion of European science and literature among the natives of India, and that all funds appropriated for purposes of education would be best employed on English education alone. Duff wrote a pamphlet on the question, entitled "A New Era of the English Language and Literature in India." He returned home in 1834 broken in health, but succeeded in securing the approval of his church for his educational plans, and also in arousing much interest in the work of foreign missions.

In 1840 he returned to India. In the previous year the earl of Auckland, governor-general, had yielded to the "Orientalists" who opposed Duff, and adopted a policy which was a compromise between the two. At the Disruption of 1843 Duff sided with the Free Church, gave up the college buildings, with all their effects, and with unabated courage set to work to provide a new institution. He had the support of Sir James Outram and Sir Henry Lawrence, and the encouragement of seeing a new band of converts, including several young men of high caste. In 1844 Viscount Hardinge opened government appointments to all who had studied in institutions similar to Duff's foundation. In the same year Duff took part in founding the _Calcutta Review_, of which from 1845 to 1849 he was editor. In 1849 he returned home. He was moderator of the Free Church assembly in 1851. He gave evidence before various Indian committees of parliament on matters of education. This led to an important despatch by Viscount Halifax, president of the board of control, to the marquess of Dalhousie, the governor-general, authorizing an educational advance in primary and secondary schools, the provision of technical and scientific teaching, and the establishment of schools for girls.

In 1854 Duff visited the United States, where what is now New York University gave him the degree of LL.D.; he was already D.D. of Aberdeen. In 1856 he returned to India, where the mutiny soon broke out; his descriptive letters were collected in a volume entitled _The Indian Mutiny, its Causes and Results_ (1858). Duff gave much thought and time to the university of Calcutta, which owes its examination system and the prominence given to physical sciences to his influence. In 1863 Sir Charles Trevelyan offered him the post of vice-chancellor of the University, but his health compelled him to leave India. As a memorial of his work the Duff Hall was erected in the centre of the educational buildings of Calcutta; and a fund of L11,000 was raised for his disposal, the capital of which was afterwards to be used for invalided missionaries of his own church. In 1864 Duff visited South Africa, and on his return became convener of the foreign missions committee of the Free Church. He raised L10,000 to endow a missionary chair at New College, Edinburgh, and himself became first professor. Among other missionary labours of his later years, he helped the Free Church mission on Lake Nyassa, travelled to Syria to inspect a mission at Lebanon, and assisted Lady Aberdeen and Lord Polwarth to establish the Gordon Memorial Mission in Natal. In 1873 the Free Church was threatened with a schism owing to negotiations for union with the United Presbyterian Church. Duff was called to the chair, and guided the church happily through this crisis. He also took part in forming the alliance of Reformed Churches holding the Presbyterian system. He died on the 12th of February 1878. By his will he devoted his personal property to found a lectureship on foreign missions on the model of the Bampton Lectures.

See his _Life_, by George Smith (2 vols.). (D. Mn.)

DUFFERIN AND AVA, FREDERICK TEMPLE HAMILTON-TEMPLE-BLACKWOOD, 1ST MARQUESS OF (1826-1902), British diplomatist, son of Price Blackwood, 4th Baron Dufferin, was born at Florence, Italy, on the 21st of June 1826. The Irish Blackwoods were of old Scottish stock,[1] tracing their descent back to the 14th century. John Blackwood of Bangor (1591-1663), the ancestor of the Irish line, made a fortune and acquired landed property in county Down, and his great-grandson Robert was created a baronet in 1763. Sir Robert's son, Sir John, married the heiress of the Hamiltons, earls of Clanbrassil and viscounts of Clandeboye ("clan of yellow Hugh"), and thus brought into the family a large property in the borough of Killyleagh and barony of Dufferin, county Down. Sir John Blackwood (d. 1799) declined a peerage, and so did his heir James at the time of the Union, but the Irish title of Baroness Dufferin was conferred (1800) on Sir John's widow, and James (d. 1836) succeeded as second baron in 1808. His brother Hans (d. 1839) became third baron, and by his marriage with Miss Temple (a descendant of the Temples of Stowe) was the father of Price Blackwood, 4th baron. Among other distinguished members of the family was Admiral Sir Henry Blackwood, Bart. (1770-1832)--a brother of James and Hans--one of Nelson's captains, who commanded the "Euryalus" at Trafalgar. Price Blackwood, too, was in the Navy; his marriage in 1825 with Helen Selina Sheridan, a daughter of Thomas Sheridan, and granddaughter of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the dramatist and politician, was against his parents' wishes, but his young wife's talents and beauty soon won them over.

Frederick went to Eton (1839-1843) and Christ Church, Oxford (1845-1847), where he took a pass school and was President of the Union. His father died in 1841, and the influence of his mother--one of three unusually accomplished sisters, the other two being the duchess of Somerset and Mrs Norton (q.v.)--was very marked on his mental development; she lived till 1867 and is commemorated by the "Helen's Tower" erected by her son in her honour at Clandeboye (the Irish seat of the Blackwoods) in 1861, and adorned with epigraphical verses written by Tennyson, Browning and others. On leaving Oxford Lord Dufferin busied himself for some little while with the management of his Irish estates. In 1846-1848 he was active in relieving the distress in Ireland due to the famine, and he was always generous and liberal in his relations with his tenants. In 1855 he already advocated compensation for disturbance and for improvements; but while supporting reasonable reform, he demanded justice for the landowners. In later years (1868-1881) he wrote much, in opposition to J.S. Mill, on behalf of Irish landlordism, and, when Gladstone adopted Home Rule, Lord Dufferin, who had been attached throughout his career to the Liberal party, regarded the new policy as fatal both to Ireland and to the United Kingdom, though, being then an ambassador, he took no public part in opposing it.

Starting with every personal and social advantage, Lord Dufferin quickly became a favourite both at Court and in London society; and in 1849 he was made a lord-in-waiting. In political life he followed Lord John Russell, and in 1850 was further attached to the party by being created a peer of the United Kingdom as Baron Clandeboye. In 1855 Lord John Russell took him as attache on his special mission to the Vienna Conference. Meanwhile Lord Dufferin was enlarging his experience by foreign travel, and in 1856 he went on a yachting-tour to Iceland, which he described with much humour and graphic power in his successful book, _Letters from High Latitudes_; this volume made his reputation as a writer, though his only other purely literary publication was his memorial edition (1894) of his mother's _Poems and Verses_. In 1860 Lord John Russell sent him as British representative on a joint commission of the powers appointed to inquire into the affairs of the Lebanon (Syria), where the massacres of Christian Maronites by the Mussulman Druses had resulted in the landing of a French force and the possibility of a French occupation. Lord Dufferin was associated with French, Russian, Prussian and Turkish colleagues, and his difficult diplomatic position was made none the less delicate by his conscientious endeavour to be just to all parties. Even if he had not satisfied himself that the Mahommedans were by no means wholly to blame, the question of punishment was in any case complicated by the problem of future administration. His own proposal to put the whole Syrian province under a responsible governor, appointed by the sultan for a term of years, with unfettered jurisdiction, was rejected; but at last it was agreed to place a Christian governor, subordinate to the Porte, over the Lebanon district, and to set up local administrative councils. In May 1861 the French forces departed, and Lord Dufferin was thanked for his services by the government.

In 1862 he married Hariot, daughter of Captain A. Rowan Hamilton, of Killyleagh Castle, Down. He held successively the posts of under-secretary for India (1864-1866) and under-secretary for war (1866) in Lord Palmerston's and Earl Russell's ministries; and he was chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, outside the cabinet, under Mr Gladstone (1868-1872). In 1871 he was created earl of Dufferin.

In 1872 he was appointed governor-general of Canada. There his tact and personal charm and genial hospitality were invaluable. He had already become known as a powerful and graceful orator, and a man of culture and political distinction; and his abilities were brilliantly displayed in dealing with the problems of the newly united provinces of the Canadian Dominion. At a time when a weak or unattractive governor-general might easily have damaged the imperial connexion, he admittedly strengthened and consolidated it. Lord Dufferin left Canada in 1878, and in 1879, rather to the annoyance of his old party leader, he accepted from the conservative prime minister, Lord Beaconsfield, the appointment of ambassador to Russia. At St Petersburg he did useful diplomatic work for a couple of years, and then, in 1881, was transferred to Constantinople as ambassador to Turkey. He was soon involved in the negotiations connected with the situation in Egypt caused by Arabi's revolt and the intervention of Great Britain. It was Lord Dufferin's task to arrange matters at Constantinople, so that no international friction should be created by any inconvenient assertion by the sultan of his position as suzerain, while it was also necessary to avoid offending either the sultan or the other powers by any appearance of ignoring their rights. He was considerably helped by Turkish ineptitude, and by the accomplished fact of British military successes in Egypt, but his own diplomacy was responsible for securing the necessary freedom of action for the British government.

From October 1882 to May 1883 he was himself in Egypt as British commissioner to report on a scheme of reorganization; and his recommendations--drawn up in a somewhat elaborate State paper--formed the basis of the subsequent reforms. In 1884 he was appointed viceroy of India, succeeding Lord Ripon, whose zeal on behalf of the natives had created a good deal of antagonism among the officials and the Anglo-Indian community. Lord Dufferin, though agreeing in the main with Lord Ripon's policy, was excellently fitted for the task of restoring confidence without producing any undesirable reaction, and in domestic affairs his viceroyalty was a period of substantial progress, in the reform of the evils of land tenure and in other directions. He was responsible also for initiating stable relations with Afghanistan, and settling the crisis with Russia arising out of the Panjdeh incident (1885), which led to the delimitation of the north-west frontier (1887). The most striking event of his administration was, however, the annexation of Burma, resulting from the Burmese War of 1885; and this procured him, on his resignation, the title of marquess of Dufferin and Ava (1888). His viceroyalty was also memorable for Lady Dufferin's work, and the starting of a fund called by her name, for providing better medical treatment for native women. In 1888 he was made ambassador at Rome, and in 1892 he was promoted to be ambassador in Paris, a post which he retained till 1896, when he retired from the public service.

Lord Dufferin was one of the most admired public servants of his time. A man of great natural gifts, he had a special talent for diplomacy, though he has no claim to a place in the first rank of statesmen. He was remarkable for tact and amiability, and had a florid and rather elaborately literary style of oratory, which also characterized his despatches and reports. For purposes of ceremony his courtliness, dignity and charm of manner were invaluable, and both in public and in private life he was a conspicuous "great gentleman." His last years, spent mainly at his Irish home, were clouded by the death of his eldest son, the earl of Ava, at Ladysmith in the Boer War (1900), and by business troubles. He was so ill-advised as to become chairman in 1897 of the "London and Globe Finance Corporation," a financial company which most good judges in the city of London thought to be too much in the hands of its managing director, Mr Whitaker Wright, whose methods had been a good deal criticized. At last there came a complete crash, and an exposure before the liquidator, which ultimately led to Mr Whitaker Wright's trial for fraud in 1904, and his suicide within the precincts of the court on being found guilty. Lord Dufferin did not live to see this final catastrophe. The affairs of the company were still under investigation in bankruptcy when, on the 12th of February 1902, he died. He had been in failing health for two or three years, but, having once become chairman of the "London and Globe," he had insisted upon standing by his colleagues when difficulties arose. Incautious as he had been in accepting the position, no reflections were felt to be possible on Lord Dufferin's personal honour; he was a serious loser by the failure, and he had followed his predecessor in the chairmanship, Lord Loch, in confiding too wholly in the masterful personality of Mr Wright. He was succeeded in the title by his second son Terence (b. 1866).

The official _Life_ of Lord Dufferin, by Sir Alfred Lyall, appeared in
1905. There are two Canadian histories of his Canadian administration,
one by George Stewart (1878), the other by W. Leggo (1878). Lady
Dufferin brought out _Our Viceregal Life in India_ in 1889, and _My
Canadian Journal_ in 1891. See also the articles on INDIA; _History_;
CANADA: _History_; and EGYPT: _History_. (H. Ch.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] One branch of the Blackwood family emigrated to France; the head
of this line being Adam Blackwood (d. 1613), jurist, poet and divine,
and senator of the presidial court of Poitiers.

DUFF-GORDON, LUCIE (1821-1869), English woman of letters, daughter of John and Sarah Austin (q.v.), was born on the 24th of June 1821. Her chief playfellows as a child were her cousin, Henry Reeve, and John Stuart Mill, who lived next door in Queen Square, London. In 1834 the Austins went to Boulogne, and at table d'hote Lucie found herself next to Heinrich Heine. The poet and the little girl became fast friends, and years afterwards she contributed to Lord Houghton's _Monographs Personal and Social_ a touching account of a renewal of their friendship when Heine lay dying in Paris. Her parents went to Malta in 1836, and Lucie Austin was left in England at school, but her unconventional education made the restrictions of a girls' school exceedingly irksome. She showed her independence of character by joining the English Church, though this step was certain to cause pain to her parents, who were Unitarians, and to many of her friends. She married in 1840 Sir Alexander Duff-Gordon (1811-1872). With her mother's beauty she had inherited her social gifts, and she gathered round her a brilliant circle of friends. George Meredith has analysed and described her extraordinary success as a hostess, and the process by which she reduced too ardent admirers to "happy crust-munching devotees." "In England, in her day," he says, "while health was with her, there was one house where men and women conversed. When that house perforce was closed, a light had gone out in our country." After her father's death, she fell into weak health and was obliged to seek sunnier climes. She went in 1860 to the Cape of Good Hope, and later to Egypt, where she died on the 14th of July 1869. She had translated among other works _Ancient Grecian Mythology_ (1839) from the German of Niebuhr; _Mary Schweidler_; _The Amber Witch_ (1844) from the German of Wilhelm Meinhold; and _Stella and Vanessa_ (1850) from the French of A.F.L. de Wailly. Her _Letters from the Cape_ (1862-1863) appeared in 1865; and in 1865 her _Letters from Egypt_, edited by her mother, attracted much attention. _Last Letters from Egypt_ (1875) contained a memoir by her daughter, Mrs Janet Ross. Lady Duff-Gordon won the hearts of her Arab dependents and neighbours. She doctored their sick, taught their children, and sympathized with their sorrows.

The _Letters front Egypt_ were not originally published in a complete
form. A fuller edition than had before been possible, with an
introduction by George Meredith, was edited in 1902 by Mrs Janet Ross.
See also Mrs Ross's _Three Generations of Englishwomen_ (1886).

DUFFTOWN, a municipal and police burgh of Banffshire, Scotland, on the Fiddich, 64 m. W.N.W. of Aberdeen by the Great North of Scotland railway. Pop. (1901) 1823. It dates from 1817 and bears the name of its founder, James Duff, 4th earl of Fife. Although planned in the shape of a cross, with a square and tower in the middle, the arms of the cross are not straight, the constructor holding the ingenious opinion that, in order to prevent little towns from being taken in at a glance, their streets should be crooked. The leading industries are lime-works and distilleries, the water being specially fitted for the making of whisky. The town has considerable repute as a health resort, owing partly to its elevation (737 ft.) and partly to the natural charms of the district. The parish of Mortlach, in which Dufftown is situated, is rich in archaeological and historical associations. What is called the Stone of Mortlach is traditionally believed to have been erected to commemorate the success of Malcolm II. over the Danes in 1010. The three large stones known as "The King's Grave," a hill-fort, and cairns are of interest to the antiquary. The old church of Mortlach, though restored and almost renewed, still contains some lancet windows and a round-headed doorway, besides monuments dating from 1417. A portion of old Balvenie Castle, a ruin, is considered to be of Pictish origin, but most of it is in the Scots Baronial. It has associations with Alexander Stewart, earl of Buchan and lord of Badenoch (1343-1405), son of Robert II., whose ruffianly conduct in Elginshire earned him the designation of the Wolf of Badenoch, the Comyns, the Douglases (to whom it gave the title of baron in the 15th century), the Stuarts and the Duffs. The new castle, an uninteresting building, was erected in 1724 by the earl of Fife, and though untenanted is maintained in repair. Two miles to the S.E. of Dufftown is the ruined castle of Auchindown, finely situated on a limestone crag, 200 ft. high, of which three sides are washed by the Fiddich and the fourth was protected by a moat. It dates from the 11th century, and once belonged to the Ogilvies, from whom it passed in 1535 to the Gordons. The Gothic hall with rows of fluted pillars is in fair preservation. Ben Rinnes (2755 ft.) and several other hills of lesser altitude all lie within a few miles of Dufftown. About 4 m. to the N.W. is Craigellachie--Gaelic for "the rock of alarm"--(pop. 454), on the confines of Elginshire. It is situated on the Spey amidst scenery of surpassing loveliness. The slogan of the Grants is "Stand fast Craigellachie!" The place has become an important junction of the Great North of Scotland railway system.

DUFFY, SIR CHARLES GAVAN (1816-1903), Irish and colonial politician, was born in Monaghan, Ireland, on the 12th of April 1816. At an early age he became connected with the press, and was one of the founders (1842) of the _Nation_, a Dublin weekly which was remarkable for its talent, for its seditious tendencies, and for the fire and spirit of its political poetry. In 1844 Duffy was included in the same indictment with O'Connell, and shared his conviction in Dublin and his acquittal by the House of Lords upon a point of law. His ideas, nevertheless, were too revolutionary for O'Connell; a schism took place in 1846, and Duffy united himself to the "Young Ireland" party. He was tried for treason-felony in 1848, but the jury were unable to agree. Duffy continued to agitate in the press and in parliament, to which he was elected in 1852, but his failure to bring about an alliance between Catholics and Protestants upon the land question determined him in 1856 to emigrate to Victoria. There he became in 1857 minister of public works, and after an active political career, in the course of which he was prime minister from 1871 to 1873, when he was knighted, he was elected speaker of the House of Assembly in 1877, being made K.C.M.G. in the same year. In 1880 he resigned and returned to Europe, residing mostly in the south of France. He published _The Ballad Poetry of Ireland_ (1845), several works on Irish history, _Conversations with Carlyle_ (1892), _Memoirs_ (1898), &c. In 1891 he became first president of the Irish Literary Society. He was married three times, his third wife dying in 1889. He died on the 9th of February 1903.

DUFOUR, WILHELM HEINRICH [GUILLAUME HENRI] (1787-1875), Swiss general, was born at Constance of Genevese parents temporarily in exile, on the 15th of September 1787. In 1807 he went to the Ecole Polytechnique at Paris, Switzerland being then under French rule, taking the 140th place only in his entrance examination. By two years' close study he so greatly improved his position that he was ranked fifth in the exit examination. Immediately on leaving the school he received a commission in the engineers, and was sent to serve in Corfu, which was blockaded by the English. During the Hundred Days he attained the rank of captain, and was employed in raising fortifications at Grenoble. After the peace that followed Waterloo he resumed his status as a Swiss citizen, and devoted himself to the military service of his native land. From 1819 to 1830 he was chief instructor in the military school of Thun, which had been founded mainly through his instrumentality. Among other distinguished foreign pupils he instructed Louis Napoleon, afterwards emperor of the French. In 1827 he was raised to the rank of colonel, and commanded the Federal army in a series of field manoeuvres. In 1831 he became chief of the staff, and soon afterwards he was appointed quartermaster-general. Two years later the diet commissioned him to superintend the execution of a complete trigonometrical survey of Switzerland. He had already made a cadastral survey of the canton of Geneva, and published a map of the canton on the scale of 1/25000. The larger work occupied thirty-two years, and was accomplished with complete success. The map in 25 sheets on the scale of 1/100000 was published at intervals between 1842 and 1865, and is an admirable specimen of cartography. In recognition of the ability with which Dufour had carried out his task, the Federal Council in 1868 ordered the highest peak of Monte Rosa to be named Dufour Spitze. In 1847 Dufour was made general of the Federal Army, which was employed in reducing the revolted Catholic cantons. The quickness and thoroughness with which he performed the painful task, and the wise moderation with which he treated his vanquished fellow-countrymen, were acknowledged by a gift of 60,000 francs from the diet and various honours from different cities and cantons of the confederation. In politics he belonged to the moderate conservative party, and he consequently lost a good deal of his popularity in 1848. In 1864 he presided over the international conference which framed the Geneva Convention as to the treatment of the wounded in time of war, &c. He died on the 14th of July 1875. His _De la fortification permanente_ (1850) is an important and original contribution to the science of fortification, and he was also the author of a _Memoire sur l'artillerie des anciens et sur celle du moyen age_ (1840), _Manuel de tactique pour les officiers de toutes armes_ (1842), and various other works in military science. His memoir, _La Campagne du Sonderbund_ (Paris, 1876), is prefaced by a biographical notice. An equestrian statue of General Dufour was erected after his death at Geneva by national subscription.

DUFRENOY, OURS PIERRE ARMAND PETIT (1792-1857), French geologist and mineralogist, was born at Sevran, in the department of Seine-et-Oise, in France, on the 5th of September 1792. After leaving the Imperial Lyceum, in 1811, he studied till 1813 at the Ecole Polytechnique, and then entered the Corps des Mines. He subsequently assisted in the management of the Ecole des Mines, of which he was professor of mineralogy and afterwards director. He was also professor of geology at the Ecole des Ponts et Chausses. In conjunction with Elie de Beaumont he in 1841 published a great geological map of France, the result of investigations carried on during thirteen years (1823-1836). Five years (1836-1841) were spent in writing the text to accompany the map, the publication of the work with two quarto vols. of text extending from 1841-1848; a third volume was issued in 1873. The two authors had already together published _Voyage metallurgique en Angleterre_ (1827, 2nd ed. 1837-1839), _Memoires pour servir a une description geologique de la France_, in four vols. (1830-1838), and a _Memoire_ on Cantal and Mont-Dore (1833). Other literary productions of Dufrenoy are an account of the iron mines of the eastern Pyrenees (1834), and a treatise on mineralogy (3 vols. and atlas, 1844-1845; 2nd ed., 4 vols. and atlas, 1856-1859), in which the geological relations as well as the physical and chemical properties of minerals were dealt with; he likewise contributed numerous papers to the Annales des mines and other scientific publications, one of the most interesting of which is entitled _Des terrains volcaniques des environs de Naples_. Dufrenoy was a member of the Academy of Sciences, a commander of the Legion of Honour, and an inspector-general of mines. He died in Paris on the 20th of March 1857.