Chapter VIII: Part 8

HOOD, SAMUEL HOOD, VISCOUNT (1724-1816), British admiral, was the son of Samuel Hood, vicar of Butleigh in Somerset, and prebendary of Wells. He was born on the 12th of December 1724, and entered the navy on the 6th of May 1741. He served part of his time as midshipman with Rodney in the "Ludlow," and became lieutenant in 1746. He was fortunate in serving under active officers, and had opportunities of seeing service in the North Sea. In 1753 he was made commander of the "Jamaica" sloop, and served in her on the North American station. In 1756, while still on the North American station, he attained to post rank. In 1757, while in temporary command of the "Antelope" (50), he drove a French ship ashore in Audierne Bay, and captured two privateers. His zeal attracted the favourable notice of the Admiralty and he was appointed to a ship of his own. In 1759, when captain of the "Vestal" (32), he captured the French "Bellona" (32) after a sharp action. During the war his services were wholly in the Channel, and he was engaged under Rodney in 1759 in destroying the vessels collected by the French to serve as transports in the proposed invasion of England. In 1778 he accepted a command which in the ordinary course would have terminated his active career. He became commissioner of the dockyard at Portsmouth and governor of the Naval Academy. These posts were generally given to officers who were retiring from the sea. In 1780, on the occasion of the king's visit to Portsmouth, he was made a baronet. The circumstances of the time were not ordinary. Many admirals declined to serve under Lord Sandwich, and Rodney, who then commanded in the West Indies, had complained of want of proper support from his subordinates, whom he accused of disaffection. The Admiralty was naturally anxious to secure the services of trustworthy flag officers, and having confidence in Hood promoted him rear-admiral out of the usual course on the 26th of September 1780, and sent him to the West Indies to act as second in command under Rodney, to whom he was personally known. He joined Rodney in January 1781, and remained in the West Indies or on the coast of North America till the close of the War of American Independence. The calculation that he would work harmoniously with Rodney was not altogether justified by the results. The correspondence of the two shows that they were far from being on cordial personal terms with one another, but Hood always discharged his duty punctually, and his capacity was so great, and so signally proved, that no question of removing him from the station ever arose. The unfortunate turn taken by the campaign of 1781 was largely due to Rodney's neglect of his advice. If he had been allowed to choose his own position there can be no doubt that he could have prevented the comte de Grasse (1722-1788) from reaching Fort Royal with the reinforcements from France in April (see RODNEY, LORD). When the fleet went on to the coast of North America during the hurricane months of 1781 he was sent to serve with Admiral Graves (1725?-1802) in the unsuccessful effort to relieve the army at Yorktown. But his subordinate rank gave him no chance to impart a greater measure of energy to the naval operations. When, however, he returned to the West Indies he was for a time in independent command owing to Rodney's absence in England for the sake of his health. The French admiral, the comte de Grasse, attacked the British islands of St Kitts and Nevis with a much superior force to the squadron under Hood's command. The attempt Hood made in January 1782 to save them from capture, with 22 ships to 29, was not successful, but the series of bold movements by which he first turned the French out of their anchorage at the Basse Terre of St Kitts, and then beat off the attacks of the enemy, were the most brilliant things done by any British admiral during the war. He was made an Irish peer for his share in the defeat of the comte de Grasse on the 9th and 12th of April near Dominica. During the peace he entered parliament as member for Westminster in the fiercely contested election of 1784, was promoted vice-admiral in 1787, and in July of 1788 was appointed to the Board of Admiralty under the second earl of Chatham. On the outbreak of the revolutionary war he was sent to the Mediterranean as commander-in-chief. His period of command, which lasted from May 1793 to October 1794, was very busy. In August he occupied Toulon on the invitation of the French royalists, and in co-operation with the Spaniards. In December of the same year the allies, who did not work harmoniously together, were driven out, mainly by the generalship of Napoleon. Hood now turned to the occupation of Corsica, which he had been invited to take in the name of the king of England by Paoli. The island was for a short time added to the dominions of George III., chiefly by the exertions of the fleet and the co-operation of Paoli. While the occupation of Corsica was being effected, the French at Toulon had so far recovered that they were able to send a fleet to sea. In June Hood sailed in the hope of bringing it to action. The plan which he laid to attack it in the Golfe Jouan in June may possibly have served to some extent as an inspiration, if not as a model, to Nelson for the battle of the Nile, but the wind was unfavourable, and the attack could not be carried out. In October he was recalled to England in consequence of some misunderstanding with the admiralty, or the ministry, which has never been explained. He had attained the rank of full admiral in April of 1794. He held no further command at sea, but in 1796 he was named governor of Greenwich Hospital, a post which he held till his death on the 27th of January 1816. A peerage of Great Britain was conferred on his wife as Baroness Hood of Catherington in 1795, and he was himself created Viscount Hood of Whitley in 1796. The titles descended to his son, Henry (1753-1836), the ancestor of the present Viscount Hood. There are several portraits of Lord Hood by Abbot in the Guildhall and in the National Portrait Gallery. He was also painted by Reynolds and Gainsborough.

There is no good life of Lord Hood, but a biographical notice of him
by M'Arthur, his secretary during the Mediterranean command, is in the
_Naval Chronicle_, vol. ii. Charnock's _Biogr. Nav._ vi., Ralfe, _Nav.
Biog._ i., may also be consulted. His correspondence during his
command in America has been published by the Navy Record Society. The
history of his campaigns will be found in the historians of the wars
in which he served: for the earlier years, Beatson's _Naval and
Military Memoirs_; for the later, James's _Naval History_, vol. i.,
for the English side, and for the French, Troudes, _Batailles navales
de la France_, ii. and iii., and Chevalier's _Histoire de la marine
francaise pendant la guerre de l'independance americaine and Pendant
la Republique_. (D. H.)

HOOD, SIR SAMUEL (1762-1814), British vice-admiral, cousin of Lord Hood and of Lord Bridport, entered the Royal Navy in 1776. His first engagement was the battle off Ushant in 1778, and, soon afterwards transferred to the West Indies, he was present, under the command of his cousin Sir Samuel Hood, at all the actions which culminated in Rodney's victory of April 12th, 1782. After the peace, like many other British naval officers, he spent some time in France, and on his return to England was given the command of a sloop, from which he proceeded in succession to various frigates. In the "Juno" his gallant rescue of some shipwrecked seamen won him a vote of thanks and a sword of honour from the Jamaica assembly. Early in 1793 the "Juno" went to the Mediterranean under Lord Hood, and her captain distinguished himself by an audacious feat of coolness and seamanship in extricating his vessel from the harbour of Toulon, which he had entered in ignorance of Lord Hood's withdrawal. Soon afterwards he was put in command of a frigate squadron for the protection of Levantine commerce, and in 1797 he was given the "Zealous" (74), in which he was present at Nelson's unsuccessful attack on Santa Cruz. It was Captain Hood who conducted the negotiations which relieved the squadron from the consequences of its failure. The part played by the "Zealous" at the battle of the Nile was brilliant. Her first opponent she put out of action in twelve minutes, and, passing on, Hood immediately engaged other ships, the "Guerrier" being left powerless to fire a shot. When Nelson left the coast of Egypt, Hood commanded the blockading force off Alexandria and Rosetta. Later he rejoined Nelson on the coast of the two Sicilies, receiving for his services the order of St Ferdinand.

In the "Venerable" Hood was present at the action of Algesiras and the battle in the Straits of Gibraltar (1801). In the Straits his ship suffered heavily, losing 130 officers and men. A year later Captain Hood was employed in Trinidad as a commissioner, and, upon the death of the flag officer commanding the Leeward station, he succeeded him as Commodore. Island after island fell to him, and soon, outside Martinique, the French had scarcely a foothold in the West Indies. Amongst other measures taken by Hood may be mentioned the garrisoning of Diamond Rock, which he commissioned as a sloop-of-war to blockade the approaches of Martinique (see James, _Naval History_, iii, 245). For these successes he received, amongst other rewards, the K.B. In command next of the squadron blockading Rochefort, Sir Samuel Hood had a sharp fight, on 25th September 1805, with a small French squadron which was trying to escape. Amongst the few casualties on this occasion was the Commodore, who lost an arm. Promoted rear-admiral a few days after this action, Hood was in 1807 entrusted with the operations against Madeira, which he brought to a successful conclusion, and a year later went to the Baltic, with his flag in the "Centaur," to take part in the war between Russia and Sweden. In one of the actions of this war the "Centaur" and "Implacable," unsupported by the Swedish ships (which lay to leeward), cut out the Russian 80-gun ship "Sevolod" from the enemy's line and, after a desperate fight, forced her to strike. The king of Sweden rewarded the admiral with the Grand Cross of the Order of the Sword. Present in the roads of Corunna at the re-embarkation of the army of Sir John Moore, Hood thence returned to the Mediterranean, where for two years he commanded a division of the British fleet. In 1811 he became vice-admiral. In his last command, that of the East Indies station, he carried out many salutary reforms, especially in matters of discipline and victualling. He died at Madras, 24th December 1814. A lofty column was raised to his memory on a hill near Butleigh, Somersetshire, and in Butleigh Church is another memorial, with an inscription written by Southey.

See _Naval Chronicle_, xvii. 1 (the material was furnished by Hood
himself; it does not go beyond 1806).

His elder brother, Captain ALEXANDER HOOD (1758-1798), entered the Royal Navy in 1767, and accompanied Captain Cook in his second voyage round the world. Under Howe and Rodney he distinguished himself in the West Indies, and at the victory of April 12th, 1782, he was in command of one of Rodney's frigates. Under Sir Samuel Hood he then proceeded to the Mona passage, where he captured the French corvette "Ceres." With the commander of his prize, the Baron de Peroy, Hood became very intimate, and during the peace he paid a long visit to France as his late prisoner's guest. In the early part of the Revolutionary war, ill health kept him at home, and it was not until 1797 that he went afloat again. His first experience was bitter; his ship, the "Mars," was unenviably prominent in the mutiny at Spithead. On April 21st, 1798, occurred the famous duel of the "Mars" with the "Hercule," fought in the dusk near the Bec du Raz. The two ships were of equal force, but the "Hercule" was newly commissioned, and after over an hour's fighting at close quarters she struck her flag, having lost over three hundred men. The captain of the "Mars" was mortally wounded early in the fight, and died as the sword of the French captain was being put in his hand. The latter, L'Heritier, also died of his wounds.

See _Naval Chronicle_, vi. 175; Ralfe, _Naval Biographies_, iv. 48;
James, _Naval History_, and Chevalier, _Hist. de la marine francaise
sous la premiere republique_.

HOOD, THOMAS (1799-1845), British humorist and poet, the son of Thomas Hood, bookseller, was born in London on the 23rd of May 1799. "Next to being a citizen of the world," writes Thomas Hood in his _Literary Reminiscences_, "it must be the best thing to be born a citizen of the world's greatest city." On the death of her husband in 1811 Mrs Hood removed to Islington, where Thomas Hood had a schoolmaster who appreciated his talents, and, as he says, "made him feel it impossible not to take an interest in learning while he seemed so interested in teaching." Under the care of this "decayed dominie," whom he has so affectionately recorded, he earned a few guineas--his first literary fee--by revising for the press a new edition of _Paul and Virginia_. Admitted soon after into the counting-house of a friend of his family, he "turned his stool into a Pegasus on three legs, every foot, of course, being a dactyl or a spondee"; but the uncongenial profession affected his health, which was never strong, and he was transferred to the care of his father's relations at Dundee. There he led a healthy outdoor life, and also became a large and indiscriminate reader, and before long contributed humorous and poetical articles to the provincial newspapers and magazines. As a proof of the seriousness with which he regarded the literary vocation, it may be mentioned that he used to write out his poems in printed characters, believing that that process best enabled him to understand his own peculiarities and faults, and probably unconscious that Coleridge had recommended some such method of criticism when he said he thought "print settles it." On his return to London in 1818 he applied himself assiduously to the art of engraving, in which he acquired a skill that in after years became a most valuable assistant to his literary labours, and enabled him to illustrate his various humours and fancies by a profusion of quaint devices, which not only repeated to the eye the impressions of the text, but, by suggesting amusing analogies and contrasts, added considerably to the sense and effect of the work.

In 1821 Mr John Scott, the editor of the _London Magazine_, was killed in a duel, and that periodical passed into the hands of some friends of Hood, who proposed to make him sub-editor. His installation into this congenial post at once introduced him to the best literary society of the time; and in becoming the associate of Charles Lamb, Cary, de Quincey, Allan Cunningham, Proctor, Talfourd, Hartley Coleridge, the peasant-poet Clare and other contributors to the magazine, he gradually developed his own intellectual powers, and enjoyed that happy intercourse with superior minds for which his cordial and genial character was so well adapted, and which he has described in his best manner in several chapters of _Hood's Own_. He had married in 1825, and _Odes and Addresses_--his first work--was written in conjunction with his brother-in-law Mr J. H. Reynolds, the friend of Keats. S. T. Coleridge wrote to Charles Lamb averring that the book must be his work. _The Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ (1827) and a dramatic romance, Lamia, published later, belong to this time. _The Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ was a volume of serious verse, in which Hood showed himself a by no means despicable follower of Keats. But he was known as a humorist, and the public, which had learned to expect jokes from him, rejected this little book almost entirely. There was much true poetry in the verse, and much sound sense and keen observation in the prose of these works; but the poetical feeling and lyrical facility of the one, and the more solid qualities of the other, seemed best employed when they were subservient to his rapid wit, and to the ingenious coruscations of his fancy. This impression was confirmed by the series of the _Comic Annual_, dating from 1830, a kind of publication at that time popular, which Hood undertook and continued, almost unassisted, for several years. Under that somewhat frivolous title he treated all the leading events of the day in a fine spirit of caricature, entirely free from grossness and vulgarity, without a trait of personal malice, and with an under-current of true sympathy and honest purpose that will preserve these papers, like the sketches of Hogarth, long after the events and manners they illustrate have passed from the minds of men. But just as the agreeable jester rose into the earnest satirist, one of the most striking peculiarities of his style became a more manifest defect. The attention of the reader was distracted, and his good taste annoyed, by the incessant use of puns, of which Hood had written in his own vindication:--

"However critics may take offence,
A double meaning has double sense."

Now it is true that the critic must be unconscious of some of the subtlest charms and nicest delicacies of language who would exclude from humorous writing all those impressions and surprises which depend on the use of the diverse sense of words. The history, indeed, of many a word lies hid in its equivocal uses; and it in no way derogates from the dignity of the highest poetry to gain strength and variety from the ingenious application of the same sounds to different senses, any more than from the contrivances of rhythm or the accompaniment of imitative sounds. But when this habit becomes the characteristic of any wit, it is impossible to prevent it from degenerating into occasional buffoonery, and from supplying a cheap and ready resource, whenever the true vein of humour becomes thin or rare. Artists have been known to use the left hand in the hope of checking the fatal facility which practice had conferred on the right; and if Hood had been able to place under some restraint the curious and complex machinery of words and syllables which his fancy was incessantly producing, his style would have been a great gainer, and much real earnestness of object, which now lies confused by the brilliant kaleidoscope of language, would have remained definite and clear. He was probably not unconscious of this danger; for, as he gained experience as a writer, his diction became more simple, and his ludicrous illustrations less frequent. In another annual called the _Gem_ appeared the poem on the story of "Eugene Aram," which first manifested the full extent of that poetical vigour which seemed to advance just in proportion as his physical health declined. He started a magazine in his own name, for which he secured the assistance of many literary men of reputation and authority, but which was mainly sustained by his own intellectual activity. From a sick-bed, from which he never rose, he conducted this work with surprising energy, and there composed those poems, too few in number, but immortal in the English language, such as the "Song of the Shirt" (which appeared anonymously in the Christmas number of _Punch_, 1843), the "Bridge of Sighs" and the "Song of the Labourer," which seized the deep human interests of the time, and transported them from the ground of social philosophy into the loftier domain of the imagination. They are no clamorous expressions of anger at the discrepancies and contrasts of humanity, but plain, solemn pictures of conditions of life, which neither the politician nor the moralist can deny to exist, and which they are imperatively called upon to remedy. Woman, in her wasted life, in her hurried death, here stands appealing to the society that degrades her, with a combination of eloquence and poetry, of forms of art at once instantaneous and permanent, and with great metrical energy and variety.

Hood was associated with the _Athenaeum_, started in 1828 by J. Silk Buckingham, and he was a regular contributor for the rest of his life. Prolonged illness brought on straitened circumstances; and application was made to Sir Robert Peel to place Hood's name on the pension list with which the British state so moderately rewards the national services of literary men. This was done without delay, and the pension was continued to his wife and family after his death, which occurred on the 3rd of May 1845. Nine years after a monument, raised by public subscription, in the cemetery of Kensal Green, was inaugurated by Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton) with a concourse of spectators that showed how well the memory of the poet stood the test of time. Artisans came from a great distance to view and honour the image of the popular writer whose best efforts had been dedicated to the cause and the sufferings of the workers of the world; and literary men of all opinions gathered round the grave of one of their brethren whose writings were at once the delight of every boy and the instruction of every man who read them. Happy the humorist whose works and life are an illustration of the great moral truth that the sense of humour is the just balance of all the faculties of man, the best security against the pride of knowledge and the conceits of the imagination, the strongest inducement to submit with a wise and pious patience to the vicissitudes of human existence. This was the lesson that Thomas Hood left behind him. (H.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--The list of Hood's separately published works is as
follows: _Odes and Addresses to Great People_ (1825); _Whims and
Oddities_ (two series, 1826 and 1827); _The Plea of the Midsummer
Fairies, Hero and Leander, Lycus the Centaur and other Poems_ (1827),
his only collection of serious verse; _The Dream of Eugene Aram, the
Murderer_ (1831); _Tylney Hall_, a novel (3 vols., 1834); _The Comic
Annual_ (1830-1842); _Hood's Own; or, Laughter from Year to Year_
(1838, second series, 1861); _Up the Rhine_ (1840); _Hood's Magazine
and Comic Miscellany_ (1844-1848); _National Tales_ (2 vols., 1837), a
collection of short novelettes; _Whimsicalities_ (1844), with
illustrations from Leech's designs; and many contributions to
contemporary periodicals.

The chief sources of his biography are: _Memorials of Thomas Hood,
collected, arranged and edited by his daughter_ (1860); his "Literary
Reminiscences" in _Hood's Own_; Alexander Elliot, _Hood in Scotland_
(1885). See also the memoir of Hood's friend C. W. Dilke, by his
grandson Sir Charles Dilke, prefixed to _Papers of a Critic_; and M.
H. Spielmann's _History of Punch_. There is an excellent edition of
the _Poems of Thomas Hood_ (2 vols., 1897), with a biographical
introduction of great interest by Canon Alfred Ainger.

HOOD, TOM (1835-1874), English humorist, son of the poet Thomas Hood, was born at Lake House, Wanstead, Essex, on the 19th of January 1835. After attending University College School and Louth Grammar School he entered Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1853, where he passed all the examinations for the degree of B.A., but did not graduate. At Oxford he wrote his _Farewell to the Swallows_ (1853) and _Pen and Pencil Pictures_ (1857). He began to write for the _Liskeard Gazette_ in 1856, and edited that paper in 1858-1859. He then obtained a position in the War Office, which he filled for five years, leaving in 1865 to become editor of _Fun_, the comic paper, which became very popular under his direction. In 1867 he first issued _Tom Hood's Comic Annual_. In 1861 had appeared _The Daughters of King Daker, and other Poems_, after which he published in conjunction with his sister, Frances Freeling Broderip, a number of amusing books for children. His serious novels, of which _Captain Masters's Children_ (1865) is the best, were not so successful. Hood drew with considerable facility, among his illustrations being those of several of his father's comic verses. In private life his geniality and sincere friendliness secured him the affection and esteem of a wide circle of acquaintance. He died on the 20th of November 1874.

A memoir by his sister, F. F. Broderip, is prefixed to the edition of
his poems published in 1877.

HOOD OF AVALON, ARTHUR WILLIAM ACLAND HOOD, BARON (1824-1901), English admiral, born on the 14th of July 1824, was the younger son of Sir Alexander Hood of St Andries, Somerset, 2nd baronet, and grandson of Captain Alexander Hood, R.N., who, when in command of the "Mars," fell in action with the French 74-gun ship "Hercule," 21st of April 1798. At the age of twelve Hood entered the navy, and whilst still a boy saw active service on the north coast of Spain, and afterwards on the coast of Syria. After passing through the established course of gunnery on board the "Excellent" in 1844-1845, he went out to the Cape of Good Hope as gunnery mate of the "President," the flagship of Rear-Admiral Dacres, by whom, on the 9th of January 1846, he was promoted to be lieutenant. As gunnery lieutenant he continued in the "President" till 1849; and in the following year he was appointed to the "Arethusa" frigate, then commissioned for the Mediterranean by Captain Symonds, afterwards the well-known admiral of the fleet. The outbreak of the Russian war made the commission a very long one; and on the 27th of November 1854 Hood was promoted to be commander in recognition of his service with the naval brigade before Sebastopol. In 1855 he married Fanny Henrietta, daughter of Sir C. F. Maclean. In 1856 he commissioned the "Acorn" brig for the China station, and arrived in time to take part in the destruction of the junks in Fatshan creek on the 1st of June 1857, and in the capture of Canton in the following December, for which, in February 1858, he received a post-captain's commission. From 1862 to 1866 he commanded, the "Pylades" on the North American station, and was then appointed to the command of the "Excellent" and the government of the Royal Naval College at Portsmouth. This was essentially a gunnery appointment, and on the expiration of three years Hood was made Director of Naval Ordnance. He was thoroughly acquainted with the routine work of the office and the established armament of the navy, but he had not the power of adapting himself to the changes which were being called for, and still less of initiating them; so that during his period of office the armament of the ships remained sadly behind the general advance. In June 1874 he was appointed to the command of the "Monarch" in the Channel Fleet, from which he was relieved in March 1876 by his promotion to flag rank. From 1877 to 1879 he was a junior lord of the Admiralty, and from 1880 to 1882 he commanded the Channel Fleet, becoming vice-admiral on 23rd July 1880. In June 1885 he was appointed first sea lord of the Admiralty. The intense conservatism of his character, however, and his antagonistic attitude towards every change, regardless of whether it was necessary or not, had much to do with the alarming state of the navy towards 1889. In that year, on attaining the age of sixty-five, he was placed on the retired list and resigned his post at the Admiralty. After two years of continued ill-health, he died on the 15th of November 1901, and was buried at Butleigh on the 23rd. He had been promoted to the rank of admiral on the 18th of January 1886; was made K.C.B, in December 1885; G.C.B. in September 1889; and in February 1892 was raised to the peerage as Lord Hood of Avalon, but on his death the title became extinct. (J. K. L.)

HOOD, a covering for the head. The word is in O. Eng. _hod_, cognate with Dutch _hoed_ and Ger. _Hut_, hat, both masculine; "hood" and "hat" are distantly related; they may be connected with the feminine _hoed_ or _Hut_, meaning charge, care, Eng. "heed." Some form of hood as a loose covering easily drawn on or off the head has formed a natural part of outdoor costume both for men and women at all times and in all quarters of the globe where climatic conditions called for it. In the middle ages and later both men and women are found wearing it, but with men it tended to be superseded by the hat before it became merely an occasional and additional head-covering in time of bad weather or in particularly rigorous climates. For illustrations and examples of the hood as worn by men and women in medieval and later times see the article COSTUME; for the hood or cowl as part of the dress of a religious see COWL, and as forming a distinctive mark of degree in academic costume see Robes. The word is applied to many objects resembling a hood in function or shape, such as a folding cover for a carriage to protect the occupants from rain or wind, the belled covering for the head of a hawk trained for falconry, the endmost planks in a ship's bottom at bow or stern, and, in botany and zoology, certain parts of a flower or of the neck of an animal which in arrangement of structure or of colour recall this article of dress.

In architecture a "hood-mould" is a projecting moulding carried outside the arch of a door or window; it is weathered underneath, and when continued horizontally is better known as a dripstone. The ends of the hood-mould are generally stopped on a corbel, plain or carved with heads in European churches, but in those of central Syria terminating in scrolls. Although in its origin the object of the projecting and weathered hood-mould was to protect the face of the wall below from rain, it gives more importance to, and emphasizes, the arch-moulds, so that it is often employed decoratively inside churches.

The suffix "-hood," like the cognate "-head," was originally a
substantive meaning rank, status or quality, and was constantly used
in combination with other substantives; cf. in O. Eng. _cild-hod_,
child-hood; later it ceased to be used separately and became a mere
suffix denoting condition added to adjectives; cf. "falsehood," as
well as to substantives.

HOOFT, PIETER CORNELISSEN (1581-1647), Dutch poet and historian, was born at Amsterdam on the 16th of March 1581. His father was one of the leading citizens of Holland, both in politics and in the patronage of letters, and for some time burgomaster of Amsterdam. As early as 1598 the young man was made a member of the chamber of rhetoric _In Liefde bloeiende_, and produced before that body his tragedy of _Achilles and Polyxena_, not printed until 1614. In June 1598 he left Holland and proceeded to Paris, where on the 10th of April 1599 he saw the body of Gabrielle d'Estrees lying in state. He went a few months later to Venice, Florence and Rome, and in 1600 to Naples. During his Italian sojourn he made a deep and fruitful study of the best literature of Italy. In July 1600 he sent home to the _In Liefde bloeiende_ a very fine letter in verse, expressing his aspirations for the development of Dutch poetry. He returned through Germany, and after an absence of three years and a half found himself in Amsterdam again on the 8th of May 1601. In 1602 he brought out his second tragedy, _Theseus and Ariadne_, printed at Amsterdam in 1614. In 1605 he completed his beautiful pastoral drama _Granida_, not published until 1615. He studied law and history at Leiden from 1606 to 1609, and in June of the latter year received from Prince Maurice of Orange the appointment of steward of Muiden, bailiff of Gooiland, and lord of Weesp, a joint office of great emolument. He occupied himself with repairing and adorning the decayed castle of Muiden, which was his residence during the remainder of his life. There he entertained the poet Vondel, the scholar Barlaeus,[1] Constantin Huygens, Vossius, Laurens Reael and others. Hooft had been a suitor for the hand of Anna Roemer Visscher, and after the death of Roemer Visscher both the sisters visited Muiden. Anna's sympathies were in time diverted to the school of Jacob Cats, but Marie Tesselschade maintained close ties with Hooft, who revised her translation of Tasso. In August 1610 he married Christina van Erp, an accomplished lady who died in 1623, and four years later he married Eleonora Hellemans. In 1612 Hooft produced his national tragedy of _Geeraerdt van Velzen_ (pr. 1613), a story of the reign of Count Floris V. In 1614 was performed at Coster's academy Hooft's comedy of _Ware-nar_, an adaptation of the _Aulularia_ of Plautus, first printed in 1617. In 1616 he wrote another tragedy, _Baeto, or the Origin of the Dutch_, not printed until 1626. It was in 1618 that he abandoned poetry for history, and in 1626 he published the first of his great prose works, the _History of Henry the Great_ (Henry IV. of France). His next production was his _Miseries of the Princes of the House of Medici_ (Amsterdam, 1638). In 1642 he published at Amsterdam a folio comprising the first twenty books of his _Dutch History_, embracing the period from 1555 to 1585, a magnificent performance, to the perfecting of which he had given fifteen years of labour. The seven concluding books were published posthumously in 1654. His idea of history was gained from Tacitus, whose works he translated. Hooft died on a visit to the Hague, whither he had gone to attend the funeral of Prince Frederick Henry, on the 21st of May 1647, and was buried in the New Church at Amsterdam.

Hooft is one of the most brilliant figures that adorn Dutch literature at its best period. He was the first writer to introduce a modern and European tone into belles lettres, and the first to refresh the sources of native thought from the springs of antique and Renaissance poetry. His lyrics and his pastoral of _Granida_ are strongly marked by the influence of Tasso and Sannazaro; his later tragedies belong more exactly to the familiar tone of his native country. But high as Hooft stands among the Dutch poets, he stands higher--he holds perhaps the highest place--among writers of Dutch prose. His historical style has won the warmest eulogy from so temperate a critic as Motley, and his letters are the most charming ever published in the Dutch language. After Vondel, he may on the whole be considered the most considerable author that Holland has produced.

Hooft's poetical and dramatic works were collected in two volumes
(1871, 1875) by P. Leendertz. His letters were edited by B. Huydecoper
(Leiden, 1738) and by van Vloten (Leiden, 4 vols., 1855). The best
original account of Hooft is given by G. Bradt in his _Leven van P. C.
Hooft_ (1677), and his funeral address (1647), edited together by J.
C. Matthes (Groningen, 1874). There is an account of the Muiden circle
in Edmund Gosse's _Literatures of Northern Europe_. Many editions
exist of his prose works.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] Kaspar van Baerle (1584-1648), professor of rhetoric at
Amsterdam, and famous as a Latin poet.

HOOGSTRATEN, SAMUEL DIRKSZ VAN, Dutch painter, was born, it is said, in 1627 at the Hague, and died at Dort on the 19th of October 1678. This artist, who was first a pupil of his father, lived at the Hague and at Dort till about 1640, when on the death of Dirk Hoogstraten he changed his residence to Amsterdam and entered the school of Rembrandt. A short time afterwards he started as a master and painter of portraits, set out on a round of travels which took him (1651) to Vienna, Rome and London, and finally retired to Dort, where he married in 1656, and held an appointment as "provost of the mint." Hoogstraten's works are scarce; but a sufficient number of them has been preserved to show that he strove to imitate different styles at different times. In a portrait dated 1645 in the Lichtenstein collection at Vienna he imitates Rembrandt; and he continues in this vein as late as 1653, when he produced that wonderful figure of a Jew looking out of a casement, which is one of the most characteristic examples of his manner in the Belvedere at Vienna. A view of the Vienna Hofburg, dated 1652, in the same gallery displays his skill as a painter of architecture, whilst in a piece at the Hague representing a Lady Reading a Letter as she crosses a Courtyard, or a Lady Consulting a Doctor, in the Van der Hoop Museum at Amsterdam, he imitates de Hooch. One of his latest works is a portrait of Mathys van den Brouck, dated 1670, in the gallery of Amsterdam. The scarcity of Hoogstraten's pictures is probably due to his versatility. Besides directing a mint, he devoted some time to literary labours, wrote a book on the theory of painting (1678) and composed sonnets and a tragedy. We are indebted to him for some of the familiar sayings of Rembrandt. He was an etcher too, and some of his plates are still preserved. His portrait, engraved by himself at the age of fifty, still exists.

HOOK, JAMES CLARKE (1819-1907), English painter, was born in London on the 21st of November 1819. His father, James Hook, a Northumbrian by descent, Judge Arbitrator of Sierra Leone, married the second daughter of Dr Adam Clarke, the commentator on the Bible, who gave to the painter his second name. Young Hook's first taste of the sea was on board the Berwick smacks which took him on his way to Wooler. He drew with rare facility, and determined to become an artist; and accordingly, without any supervision, he set to work for more than a year in the sculpture galleries of the British Museum. In 1836 he was admitted a student of the Royal Academy, where he worked for three years, and elsewhere learned a good deal of the scientific technique of painting from a nephew of Opie. His first picture, called "The Hard Task," was exhibited in 1837, and represented a girl helping her sister with a lesson. Unusual facility in portraiture and a desire to earn his own living took the student into Ireland to paint likenesses of the Waterford family and others; here he produced landscapes of the Vale of Avoca, and much developed his taste for pastoral art; later, he was similarly engaged in Kent and Somersetshire. In 1842 his second exhibited work was a portrait of "Master J. Finch Smith": in this year he gained silver medals at the Royal Academy, and in 1843 he was one of the competitors in the exhibition of cartoons in Westminster Hall, with a 10 by 7 ft. design of "Satan in Paradise." In 1844 the Academy contained a picture of a kind with which his name was long associated, an illustration of the _Decameron_, called "Pamphilius relating his Story," a meadow scene in bright light, with sumptuous ladies, richly clad, reclining on the grass. The British Institution, 1844 and 1845, set forth two of Hook's idylls, subjects taken from Shakespeare and Burns, which, with the above, showed him to be cultivating those veins of romantic sentiment and the picturesque which were then in vogue, but in a characteristically fresh and vigorous manner. "The Song of Olden Times" (Royal Academy, 1845) marked the artist's future path distinctly in most technical respects. It was in this year Hook won the Academy gold medal for an oil picture of "The Finding the Body of Harold." The travelling studentship in painting was awarded to him for "Rizpah watching the Dead Sons of Saul" in 1846; and he went for three years to Italy, having married Miss Rosalie Burton before he left England. Hook passed through Paris, worked diligently for some time in the Louvre, traversed Switzerland, and, though he stayed only part of three years in Italy, gained much from studies of Titian, Tintoret, Carpaccio, Mansueti and other Venetians. Their influence thenceforth dominated the coloration of his pictures, and enabled him to apply the principles to which they had attained to the representation (as Bonington before him had done) of romantic subjects and to those English themes of the land and sea with which the name of the artist is inseparably associated. "A Dream of Ancient Venice" (R.A., 1848)--the first fruit of these Italian studies--"Bayard of Brescia" (R.A., 1849), "Venice" (B.I., 1849) and other works assured for Hook the Associateship of the Royal Academy in 1851. Soon afterwards an incomparable series of English subjects was begun, in many pastorals and fine brilliant idylls of the sea and rocks. "A Rest by the Wayside" and "A Few Minutes to Wait before Twelve o'clock" proved his title to appear, in 1854, as a new and original painter. After these came "A Signal on the Horizon" (1857), "A Widow's Son going to Sea," "The Ship-boy's Letter," "Children's Children are the Crown of Old Men," "A Coast-boy gathering Eggs," a scene at Lundy; the perfect "Luff, Boy!" (1859), about which Ruskin broke into a dithyrambic chant, "The Brook," "Stand Clear!" "O Well for the Fisherman's Boy!" (1860), "Leaving Cornwall for the Whitby Fishing," "Sea Urchins," and a score more as fine as these. The artist was elected a full Academician on the 6th of March 1860, in the place of James Ward. He died on the 14th of April 1907.

See A. H. Palmer, "J. C. Hook, R.A.," _Portfolio_ (1888); F. G.
Stephens, "J. C. Hook, Royal Academician: His Life and Work," _Art
Annual_ (London, 1888); P. G. Hamerton, _Etching and Etchers_ (London,
1877).

HOOK, THEODORE EDWARD (1788-1841), English author, was born in London on the 22nd of September 1788. He spent a year at Harrow, and subsequently matriculated at Oxford, but he never actually resided at the university. His father, James Hook (1746-1827), the composer of numerous popular songs, took great delight in exhibiting the boy's extraordinary musical and metrical gifts, and the precocious Theodore became "the little pet lion of the green room." At the age of sixteen, in conjunction with his father, he scored a dramatic success with _The Soldier's Return_, a comic opera, and this he rapidly followed up with a series of over a dozen sparkling ventures, the instant popularity of which was hardly dependent on the inimitable acting of John Liston and Charles Mathews. But Hook gave himself up for some ten of the best years of his life to the pleasures of the town, winning a foremost place in the world of fashion by his matchless powers of improvisation and mimicry, and startling the public by the audacity of his practical jokes. His unique gift of improvising the words and the music of songs eventually charmed the prince Regent into a declaration that "something must be done for Hook." The prince was as good as his word, and Hook, in spite of a total ignorance of accounts, was appointed accountant-general and treasurer of the Mauritius with a salary of L2000 a year. For five delightful years he was the life and soul of the island, but in 1817, a serious deficiency having been discovered in the treasury accounts, he was arrested and brought to England on a criminal charge. A sum of about L12,000 had been abstracted by a deputy official, and for this amount Hook was held responsible.

During the tardy scrutiny of the audit board he lived obscurely and maintained himself by writing for magazines and newspapers. In 1820 he launched the newspaper _John Bull_, the champion of high Toryism and the virulent detractor of Queen Caroline. Witty, incisive criticism and pitiless invective secured it a large circulation, and from this source alone Hook derived, for the first year at least, an income of L2000. He was, however, arrested for the second time on account of his debt to the state, which he made no effort to defray. In a sponging-house, where he was confined for two years, he wrote the nine volumes of stories afterwards collected under the title of _Sayings and Doings_ (1826-1829). In the remaining twenty-three years of his life he poured forth no fewer than thirty-eight volumes, besides numberless articles, squibs and sketches. His novels are not works of enduring interest, but they are saved from mediocrity by frequent passages of racy narrative and vivid portraiture. The best are _Maxwell_ (1830), _Love and Pride_ (1833), the autobiographic _Gilbert Gurney_ (1836), _Jack Brag_ (1837), _Gurney Married_ (1838), and _Peregrine Bunce_ (1842). Incessant work had already begun to tell on his health, when Hook returned to his old social habits, and a prolonged attempt to combine industry and dissipation resulted in the confession that he was "done up in purse, in mind and in body too at last." He died on the 24th of August 1841. His writings in great part are of a purely ephemeral character; and the greatest triumphs of the improvisatore may be said to have been writ in wine. Putting aside, however, his claim to literary greatness, Hook will be remembered as one of the most brilliant, genial and original figures of Georgian times.

See the Rev. R. H. D. Barham's _Life and Remains of Hook_ (3rd ed.,
1877); and an article by J. G. Lockhart in the _Quarterly Review_ (May
1843).

HOOK, WALTER FARQUHAR (1798-1875), English divine, nephew of the witty Theodore, was born in London on the 13th of March 1798. Educated at Tiverton and Winchester, he graduated at Oxford (Christ Church) in 1821, and after holding an incumbency in Coventry, 1829-1837, and in Leeds, 1837-1859, was nominated dean of Chichester by Lord Derby. He received the degree of D.D. in 1837. His friendship towards the Tractarians exposed him to considerable persecution, but his simple manly character and zealous devotion to parochial work gained him the support of widely divergent classes. His stay in Leeds was marked by vigorous and far-reaching church extension, and his views on education were far in advance of his time. Among his many writings are _An Ecclesiastical Biography, containing the Lives of Ancient Fathers and Modern Divines_ (8 vols., 1845-1852), _A Church Dictionary, The Means of Rendering more Effectual the Education of the People, The Cross of Christ_ (1873), _The Church and its Ordinances_ (sermons, 4 vols., 1876), and _Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury_ (12 vols., 1860-1876). He died on the 20th of October 1875.

See _Life and Letters of Dean Hook_, by his son-in-law, W. R. W.
Stephens (2 vols., 1878).

HOOKAH (the English spelling of the Persian and Hindustani _huqqu_, an adaptation of the Arabic _huqqah_, a vase or casket, and by transference a pipe for smoking, probably derived from the Arabie _huqq_, a hollow place), a pipe with a long flexible tube attached to a large bowl containing water, often scented, and resting upon a tripod or stand. The smoke of the tobacco is made to pass through the water in the bowl, and is thus cooled before reaching the smoker. The _narghile_ of India is in principle the same as that of the hookah; the word is derived from _nargil_, an Indian name for the coco-nut tree, as when the _narghile_ was first made the water was placed in a coco-nut. This receptacle is now often made of porcelain, glass or metal. In the _hubble-bubble_ the pipe is so contrived that the water in the bowl makes a bubbling noise while the pipe is being smoked. This pipe is common in India, Egypt and the East generally.

HOOKE, ROBERT (1635-1703), English experimental philosopher, was born on the 18th of July 1635 at Freshwater, in the Isle of Wight, where his father, John Hooke, was minister of the parish. After working for a short time with Sir Peter Lely, he went to Westminster school; and in 1653 he entered Christ Church, Oxford, as servitor. After 1655 he was employed and patronized by the Hon. Robert Boyle, who turned his skill to account in the construction of his air-pump. On the 12th of November 1662 he was appointed curator of experiments to the Royal Society, of which he was elected a fellow in 1663, and filled the office during the remainder of his life. In 1664 Sir John Cutler instituted for his benefit a mechanical lectureship of L50 a year, and in the following year he was nominated professor of geometry in Gresham College, where he subsequently resided. After the Great Fire of 1666 he constructed a model for the rebuilding of this city, which was highly approved, although the design of Sir C. Wren was preferred. During the progress of the works, however, he acted as surveyor, and accumulated in that lucrative employment a sum of several thousand pounds, discovered after his death in an old iron chest, which had evidently lain unopened for above thirty years. He fulfilled the duties of secretary to the Royal Society during five years after the death of Henry Oldenburg in 1677, publishing in 1681-1682 the papers read before that body under the title of _Philosophical Collections_. A protracted controversy with Johann Hevelius, in which Hooke urged the advantages of telescopic over plain sights, brought him little but discredit. His reasons were good; but his offensive style of argument rendered them unpalatable and himself unpopular. Many circumstances concurred to embitter the latter years of his life. The death, in 1687, of his niece, Mrs Grace Hooke, who had lived with him for many years, caused him deep affliction; a law-suit with Sir John Cutler about his salary (decided, however, in his favour in 1696) occasioned him prolonged anxiety; and the repeated anticipation of his discoveries inspired him with a morbid jealousy. Marks of public respect were not indeed wanting to him. A degree of M.D. was conferred on him at Doctors' Commons in 1691, and the Royal Society made him, in 1696, a grant to enable him to complete his philosophical inventions. While engaged on this task he died, worn out with disease, on the 3rd of March 1703 in London, and was buried in St Helen's Church, Bishopsgate Street.

In personal appearance Hooke made but a sorry show. His figure was crooked, his limbs shrunken; his hair hung in dishevelled locks over his haggard countenance. His temper was irritable, his habits penurious and solitary. He was, however, blameless in morals and reverent in religion. His scientific achievements would probably have been more striking if they had been less varied. He originated much, but perfected little. His optical investigations led him to adopt in an imperfect form the undulatory theory of light, to anticipate the doctrine of interference, and to observe, independently of though subsequently to F. M. Grimaldi (1618-1663), the phenomenon of diffraction. He was the first to state clearly that the motions of the heavenly bodies must be regarded as a mechanical problem, and he approached in a remarkable manner the discovery of universal gravitation. He invented the wheel barometer, discussed the application of barometrical indications to meteorological forecasting, suggested a system of optical telegraphy, anticipated E. F. F. Chladni's experiment of strewing a vibrating bell with flour, investigated the nature of sound and the function of the air in respiration and combustion, and originated the idea of using the pendulum as a measure of gravity. He is credited with the invention of the anchor escapement for clocks, and also with the application of spiral springs to the balances of watches, together with the explanation of their action by the principle _Ut tensio sic vis_ (1676).

His principal writings are _Micrographia_ (1664); _Lectiones
Cutlerianae_ (1674-1679); and _Posthumous Works_, containing a sketch
of his "Philosophical Algebra," published by R. Waller in 1705.