TO-DAY'S ANNIVERSARIES.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 14029, 28 April 1911, Page 7

TO-DAY'S ANNIVERSARIES.

■ii ' i.^■ ■ 1 1. » APKIL 28. Charles Cotton, poet, born ... ~.. 1630 Uhomas Bctterton, actor, died .. 1710 , Mutiny of tho Bounty .. .. 178tf 'She title of "Exnpreas of India" pro- , claimed .. .. 1876 Charles Cotton. —The translator of Montaigne and friend of Izaak Walton, Cotton devoted himself from his youth to a life of letters. Ho appears to have been a sincere loyalist, yet lived securely enough under the Commonwealth, and tho decay of his father's estate was due mainly to unprospCrous lawsuits. His first productions have little interest except, for the antiquary. Ho was approaching middle age when hn contributed a treatise on fly-fishing to tho fifth edition of Walton's "Com{tleat Angler," and here he commends lis old friend and master, its author, a.-; "tho best and truest friend ever man had." Further marks of affection were Ins commendatory verses in the 1675 edition of Walton's "Lives" ; his poem, '"The Contestation,'' as well as an earlier ono of invitation to Walton to visit him; and the twisted cipher of his own and his master's names above the door of his fishing-house on the Ilove. Cotton in his fifty-fifth year when he published his translation of Montaigno's "Easays," that masterpiece of quaint phraseology which still . remains the standard text for Englishmen. Ho died two years later. Cotton's verses, it has been said, are full of raro felicities of thought and phrase, . and aro Teally more poetical than some far more pretentious poetry. His prose is simple and clear, direct and - vigorous. "His character was eminently lovable; his only troubles, his debts; bis only enemies, his duns." Thomas Betterton.—Tho actor was born at London, and served, among ' "'other duties, as a bookseller's apprentice till his thirty-fourth year, when * (the year after tho Restoration) ho l joined the dramatist Davenant's theay tricaL company. Tho best contemporary -•V'judges, such as Addison, Gibber, Dryi' , den, etc.» bear admiring witness to his "'.dramatic powers, which overcame the ;-, natural disadvantages of a low voice '~'Mid an ungainly figure. Samuel Pepys V' thought him the best actor in the world y* ' —praise somewhat discounted by the .'- ."fact of tho diarist having never been i' , out of England—and he was patronised ;■-■. by Royalty. His private character was r' " highly estimable, cheerful, modest, and *T ~ generous. In an unfortunate specula- . ,-. tion in his fifty-seventh year, Betterton lost all his satings. When the was in straightened circumstances and able to act less , freqoeutly, a public benefit was got tip ' for him some seventeen years after this event, and he acted several times , again before his death in his seventy- - " fifth year. Ho was buried in West- ,, siinsfccr Abbey. His wife was an - 7. equally famous actress. Mutiny of the Bounty.—The circumstances attending this extraordinary , affair were as follows. The Bounty, a British warship, quitted Otaheite, with - a cargo of bread-fruit trees for the West Indies, on April 7th, 1789; on «*e above date the mutineers put their captain, Bligh, and nineteen men into 8a open boat, with a small stock t f provisions, near Annamooka. one of the •'iriendly Isles. Bb'gh and his party ". Mutually reached safety, after a boat • jwarney of 3600 miles, and he wa3 destined to become tho unpopular governor of New South Wales. As to the ,'. Wiutiineers, six were condemned and ; three others executed, and the fate of '-" +S 8 ot; ' ler °f *k fl mutineers completes ~.tw> romance. In the year following '. tne mutiny, 1790, they, with six Tamen and a dozen women, tosk I |«s«sion of Pitcairn Island in the ;, pacific. Four years later tho nativo ' lrt one meht murdered all the Eng<r&' en except Alexander Smith, who - ; ;/ ¥j Rrards assumed the name of John & ***ro-3. Thereupon tho women, in reUn g6 ' mnr dered all the Tahitian men : tradition. Certain it is that at en ,d of ten years John Adams wns : ,'" : ~[i a'one, with eight or nine women ■ "'& k SeTcra ' children. Adams appears ;v'~/ I }»ye turned over a new leaf, and L.' *tablwbed a model colony, which rej. yarned unknown until 18i4. when a ■ - ""ash ship arrived ot the island. r f »'*>d iri 1529. and was succeeded ' -Aft H cn 'oftains?»ir> by an Enelishmaa. Hunn Nobbs, who bad arrived years previously. The colony I- iP removed to Norfolk Island, where -*■ &V, °f tne mutineers are. be found to-d.ov. A few of them f Wtmifid to Pitcairn Tsland, which 's :■*»]■* Peopled by a small colony.