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HASTINGS, FRANCIS RAWDON-HASTINGS, MARQUIS OF, Governor-General of India; entering the army in 1771, he saw active service in the American War and in Holland; succeeded his father in the earldom of Moira; was in 1813 appointed to the Governor-Generals.h.i.+p of India; he was instrumental in extending the Company's territories, and pacifying the warlike Goorkhas, for which, in 1816, he was created Marquis of Hastings; latterly he held the Governors.h.i.+p of Malta (1754-1826).
HASTINGS, WARREN, first Governor-General of India, born at Churchill, Oxfords.h.i.+re; early left an orphan, he was maintained at Westminster School by his uncle, and at 17 received a clerks.h.i.+p in the East India Company; for 14 years his life was occupied in mercantile and political work, at the close of which time he returned to England; in 1769 he was back in India as a member of the Madras Council; married the divorced wife of Baron Imhoff, and in 1772 was appointed President of the Council in Bengal; under the new arrangement for the governing of the provinces, Hastings was raised to the position of Governor-General in 1773; despite jealousies and misrepresentations both among his colleagues in India and the home authorities, he steadily, and with untiring energy, extended and brought into orderly government the British dominions; in 1785 he voluntarily resigned, and on his return he was impeached before the House of Lords for oppression of the natives, and for conniving at the plunder of the Begums or dowager-princesses of Oudh; the trial brought forth the greatest orators of the day, Burke, Fox, and Sheridan leading the impeachment, which, after dragging on for nearly eight years, resulted in the acquittal of Hastings on all the charges; his fortune having been consumed by the enormous expenses of the trial, he was awarded a handsome pension by the Company, and thereafter lived in honoured retirement (1732-1818).
HATCH, EDWIN, theologian, born at Derby; graduated at Oxford, and was for some years professor of Cla.s.sics in Trinity College, Toronto; in 1867 was appointed Vice-Princ.i.p.al of St. Mary Hall, Oxford; Rector of Purleigh, Ess.e.x, in 1883; reader in Ecclesiastical History at Oxford; he held the Grinfield, Bampton, and Hibbert lectures.h.i.+ps at different times, and established a reputation, both abroad and at home, for wide and accurate scholars.h.i.+p; HARNACK (q. v.) translated his learned lectures on "The Organisation of the Early Christian Churches"; and "The Growth of Church Inst.i.tutions" displayed his rare gift of combining profound scholars.h.i.+p with popular presentation (1835-1889).
HATFIELD, or BISHOP'S HATFIELD (4), a market-town of Hertfords.h.i.+re, 18 m. NW. of London; its parish church dates from the 13th century, and in the vicinity stands Hatfield House, a n.o.ble architectural pile of James I.'s time, the seat of the Marquis of Salisbury.
HATHERLEY, BARON, barrister, elected to represent Oxford in Parliament; in 1847 was Solicitor-General, in 1853 raised to the bench, and in 1868 made Lord Chancellor; retired in 1872 from failing sight (1801-1881).
HATHRAS (39), an important commercial town in the NW. Provinces, India, 97 m. SE. of Delhi; exports large quant.i.ties of sugar, grain, cotton, &c., and is famed for its beautiful carved stone-and-wood-work.
HATS AND CAPS, the name of two political factions in Sweden in the middle of the 18th century, the former favouring France and the latter Russia.
HATTERAS, CAPE, a low sandy headland of a small island separated from the mainland of N. Carolina, U.S., by Pimlico Sound; it is a storm-swept and treacherous point, and is marked by a powerful light, 190 ft. high.
HATTI-SHERIFF, a name given to an edict of the Sultan which is irrevocable, though many a one of them has proved a dead letter.
HATTO, archbishop of Mainz, of whom tradition alleges that he was a.s.sailed in his palace by an army of mice, to escape whose ravages he retired to a tower on the Rhine, whither the mice followed him and ate him up, a judgment due, as is alleged, to his having, during a great famine in 970, gathered the poor into a barn and burnt them to death, as "like mice, good only for devouring corn," he said.
HAUBERK, a coat or tunic of mail made of interwoven steel rings and extending below the knees.
HAUCH, HANS CARSTEN, Danish poet and novelist, born at Frederikshald, in Norway; in 1846 he became professor of Northern Literature at Kiel, and four years later of aesthetics at Copenhagen; his historical tragedies, lyrics, tales, and romances are instinct with true poetic feeling, and are widely popular in Denmark (1790-1872).
HAUFF, WILHELM, a German prose writer, born in Stuttgart, who died young; wrote "Memoirs of Satan" and "The Man in the Moon," and a number of charmingly told "Tales," which have made his name famous among ourselves (1802-1827).
HAUG, a German Orientalist, professor of Sanskrit at Poona, and afterwards at Munich; devoted himself to the exposition of the Zendavesta (1827-1876).
HAUSER, KASPAR, a young man of about 16 who mysteriously appeared in Nurnberg one day in 1828, was found to be as helpless and ignorant as a baby, and held a letter in his hand giving an account of his history. The mystery of his case interested Lord Stanhope, who charged himself with the care of him, but he was enticed out of the house he was boarded in one day, returned mortally wounded, and died soon after.
HAUSSA or HOUSSA, a subject people of Central Soudan, whose language has become the common speech of some 15 millions of people between the Mediterranean and the Gulf of Guinea. The language is allied to the Hamitic tongues, and is written in modified Arabic characters.
HAUSSMAN, GEORGE EUGeNE, a celebrated Prefect of the Seine, who, while holding that position (1853-70), carried through extensive architectural improvements in Paris, which transformed it into one of the handsomest cities of Europe; the enormous cost entailed brought about his dismissal, but not before he had received many distinctions, and been enn.o.bled by Napoleon III.; in 1881 he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies (1809-1891).
HAuY, RENe JUST, known as the Abbe Hauy, a French mineralogist, born at St. Just; propounded the theory of crystallisation founded on geometrical principles; absorbed in study, was caught napping during the Revolution; got consequently into trouble, but was extricated out of it by his friend and pupil, Geoffrey St.-Hilaire; was appointed professor of Mineralogy by Napoleon (1743-1823).
HAVANA (200), fortified capital of the island of Cuba, in the West Indies; has a s.p.a.cious and securely sheltered harbour, an old Spanish cathedral, a university, botanical garden, and several fine theatres; the town is ill laid out, badly drained, and subject to yellow fever; the staple industries are the raising of tobacco and sugar, and the manufacture of cigars.
HAVEL, an important tributary of the Lower Elbe, which it joins a few miles from Wittenberg; it rises in Mecklenburg, and takes a circuitous course past Potsdam of 180 m.
HAVELOCK, SIR HENRY, British general, born at Bishop Wearmouth; entered the army in 1815, and embarked in the service for India in 1823; served in the Afghan and Sikh Wars, as also in Persia; on the outbreak of the Mutiny he was in 1857 sent to the relief of Cawnpore and Lucknow, the latter of which places he entered on 25th Sept., where, being beleagured, he entrenched himself in the Residency, and held his own until November, when Sir Colin Campbell came to his relief, but his health had been undermined from his anxieties, and he died on the 22nd of that month; for his services on this occasion a baronetcy and a pension of 1000 was conferred on him, but it was too late, and the honour with the pension was transferred to his son; he was a Christian soldier, and a commander of the Puritan type (1795-1857).
HAVERFORDWEST (6), seaport and capital of Pembroke, Wales, prettily situated on the Cleddan, 10 m. NE. of Milford; has a 14th-century castle and a ruined priory; the chief industry is paper-making.
HAVERGAL, FRANCES RIDLEY, a hymn-writer, born at Astley, where her father, known as a musical composer, was rector; was auth.o.r.ess of "Ministry of Song," and collections which have been highly popular (1830-1879).
HAVERSIAN Ca.n.a.lS, ca.n.a.ls in the bones to convey the vessels that nourish them.
HAVRE, LE (116), the second commercial port in France, on the N.
side of the Seine estuary, 143 m. NW. of Paris, in the dep. of Seine-Inferieure; has a fine harbour, docks, &c., but s.h.i.+pping is incommoded by the s.h.i.+fting sandbanks of the estuary, and railway facilities are poor; it is an important centre of emigration, and its industries embrace s.h.i.+pbuilding, iron-works, flour-mills, &c.
HAWAIIAN ISLANDS (named by Cook the Sandwich Islands) (90), a group of volcanic islands, 12 in number, situated in the North Pacific; total area somewhat larger than Yorks.h.i.+re. Of the five inhabited islands Hawaii is the largest; it contains the famous volcano, Kilauea, whose crater is one of the world's wonders, being 9 m. in circ.u.mference, and filled with a glowing lake of molten lava which ebbs and flows like an ocean tide.
The island of Maui has the largest crater on the earth. The climate of the group is excellent, and vegetation (including forests) is abundant; sugar and rice are the chief crops. Honolulu (on Oahu), with a splendid harbour, is the capital. The islands are now under the jurisdiction of the United States.
HAWARDEN, a town 7 m. W. of Chester, near which is Hawarden Castle, where Mr. Gladstone resided and died.
HAWEIS, HUGH REGINALD, English churchman, born at Egham, Surrey, inc.u.mbent of St. James's, Marylebone; was present in Italy during the revolution there, and at several of the battles; is popular as a preacher and lecturer, and has written a number of works on the times, on music, Christ and Christianity, &c.; _b_. 1840.
HAWES, STEPHEN, an English poet; held a post In the household of Henry VII.; author of an allegorical poem on the right education of a knight, ent.i.tled "The Pastime of Pleasure"; _d_. _d_. 1503.
HAWICK (19), a prosperous and ancient town of Roxburghs.h.i.+re, at the confluence of the Teviot and Slitrig, 52 m. SE. of Edinburgh; is a flouris.h.i.+ng centre of the tweed, yarn, and hosiery trade, and has besides dye-works, tanneries, &c.
HAWK-EYE STATE, Iowa, U.S., so called from the name of an Indian chief once a terror in those parts.
HAWKE, LORD, an English admiral, born in London; entered the navy at an early age in 1747; defeated a French fleet off Finisterre and captured six s.h.i.+ps of the line in 1759; defeated Admiral Conflans off Belleisle; was made a peer in 1776; _d_. 1781.