Part 170 (1/2)
DOUBTING CASTLE, a castle belonging to Giant Despair in the ”Pilgrim's Progress,” which only one key could open, the key Promise.
DOUCE, FRANCIS, a learned antiquary, born in London; for a time keeper of MSS. in the British Museum; author of ”Ill.u.s.trations of Shakespeare,” and an ill.u.s.trated volume, ”The Dance of Death”; left in the Museum a chest of books and MSS. not to be opened till 1900; was a man of independent means, and a devoted archaeologist (1757-1834).
DOUGLAS (19), the largest town and capital as well as chief port of the Isle of Man, 74 m. from Liverpool; much frequented as a bathing-place; contains an old residence of the Dukes of Atholl, ent.i.tled Castle Mona, now a hotel. See MAN, ISLE OF.
DOUGLAS, the name of an old Scotch family, believed to be of Celtic origin, and that played a conspicuous part at one time in the internal and external struggles of the country; they figure in Scottish history in two branches, the elder called the Black and the later the Red Douglases or the Angus branch, now represented by the houses of Hamilton and Home.
The eldest of the Douglases, William, was a kinsman of the house of Murray, and appears to have lived about the end of the 12th century. One of the most ill.u.s.trious of the family was the Good Sir James, distinguished specially as the ”Black” Douglas, the pink of knighthood and the a.s.sociate of Bruce, who carried the Bruce's heart in a casket to bury it in Palestine, but died fighting in Spain, 1330.
DOUGLAS, GAWIN or GAVIN, a Scottish poet and bishop of Dunkeld, third son of Archibald, Earl of Angus, surnamed ”Bell-the-Cat”; political troubles obliged him to leave the country and take refuge at the Court of Henry VII., where he was held in high regard; died here of the plague, and was buried by his own wish in the Savoy; besides Ovid's ”Art of Love,” now lost, he translated (1512-1513) the ”aeneid” of Virgil into English verse, to each book of which he prefixed a prologue, in certain of which there are descriptions that evince a poet's love of nature combined with his love as a Scotchman for the scenery of his native land; besides this translation, which is his chief work, he indited two allegorical poems, ent.i.tled the ”Palace of Honour,” addressed to James IV., and ”King Hart” (1474-1522).
DOUGLAS, SIR HOWARD, an English general and writer on military subjects, born at Gosport; saw service in the Peninsula; was Governor of New Brunswick and Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands (1776-1861).
DOUGLAS, JOHN, bishop of Salisbury, born at Pittenweem, Fife; wrote ”The Criterion of, or a Discourse on, Miracles” against Hume; was a friend of Samuel Johnson's (1721-1807).
DOUGLAS, STEPHEN ARNOLD, an American statesman, born in Brandon, Vermont; a lawyer by profession, and a judge; a member of Congress and the Senate; was a Democrat; stood for the Presidency when Lincoln was elected; was a leader in the Western States; a splendid monument is erected to his memory in Chicago (1813-1861).
DOUGLa.s.s, FREDERICK, American orator, born a slave in Maryland; wrought as a slave in a Baltimore s.h.i.+pbuilder's yard; escaped at the age of 21 to New York; attended an anti-slavery meeting, where he spoke so eloquently that he was appointed by the Anti-Slavery Society to lecture in its behalf, which he did with success and much appreciation in England as well as America; published an Autobiography, which gives a thrilling account of his life (1817-1895).
DOULTON, SIR HENRY, the reviver of art pottery, born in Lambeth; knighted in the Jubilee year for his eminence in that department; _b_.
1820.
DOURO, a river, and the largest, of the Spanish Peninsula, which rises in the Cantabrian Mountains; forms for 40 m. the northern boundary of Portugal, and after a course of 500 m. falls into the Atlantic at Oporto; is navigable only where it traverses Portugal.
DOUSTER-SWIVEL, a German swindling schemer in the ”Antiquary.”
DOVE, in Christian art the symbol of the Holy Ghost, or of a pure, or a purified soul, and with an olive branch, the symbol of peace and the gospel of peace.
DOVE, HEINRICH WILHELM, a German physicist, born at Liegnitz, Silesia; professor of Natural Philosophy in Berlin; was eminent chiefly in the departments of meteorology and optics; he discovered how by the stereoscope to detect forged bank-notes (1803-1879).
DOVER (33), a seaport on the E. coast of Kent, and the nearest in England to the coast of France, 60 m. SE. of London, and with a mail service to Calais and Ostend; is strongly fortified, and the chief station in the SE. military district of England; was the chief of the Cinque Ports.
DOVER, STRAIT OF, divides France from England and connects the English Channel with the North Sea, and at the narrowest 20 m. across; forms a busy sea highway; is called by the French _Pas de Calais_.
DOVREFELD, a range of mountains in Norway, stretching NE. and extending between 62 and 63 N. lat., average height 3000 ft.