IN DAYS THAT HAVE GONE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3043, 10 July 1912, Page 82

IN DAYS THAT HAVE GONE.

THE WEEK'S ANNIVERSARIES. July 7.—John Huss burnt at Constance, 1415. Treaty of Tilsit, 1807. Allies entered Paris, 1815. July B.—Edward Black Prince died, 1376. Sir H. Raeburn died, 1823. Joseph Chamberlain, born 1836. Sir Edward Parry died, 1855. Baron do Thierry died, 1861 11. K. Browne ("'Phiz") died, 1882. • July 9.—Battle of Sempach, 1356. General Zachary Taylor died, 185 Q. Prinea of Wales loft England for America, 1860. H. W. Cox died, 1910. July 10—Battle of Northampton, 1460. William Prince of Orange assassinated, 1584. Nov takes Ciudad Rodrigo. 1810. Sir' Arthur Helps born, 1813. Louis Daguerre died, IESI. Sir William Broadbent died, 1907. July 11.-Jack Cade killed, 1450. v Oudonarde, 1703. Bombardment of Alexandria, 1882. July 12.—Julius Cajsar born, B.C. 100. Richard Cromwell died, 1712. Joseph Bonaparte enters Madrid as King of Swain, 1808. Horace Smith died, 1849. Robert Stevenson died, 1850. Crimea evacuated by allies, 1856. Hon. C. S. Rolls killed, 1910. July 13. —Bertrand du Gueschin died, 1380. Titus Gates died, 1705. Jean Paul Marat slain by Charlotte Corday, 1793. Battle of Pyramids, 1798.

Alexander I of Russia and the Emperor Napoleon met to negotiate terms of a treaty in June, 1807, at Tilsit, raft moored in the middle of the River Niemen. The details of the conference are a secret, as Napoleon's subsequent account of it is untrustworthy, aud no witnesses were present. All that is certain is that Alexander I. whoso character was a curious mixture of nobility and weakness, was comoletely won over by his conqueror. Napoleon, instead of attempting to impose extreme terms upon a country which it was impossible to conquer, offered to share with Russia the supremacy in Europe, which had been won by French arms. Two interviews sufficed to arrange the basis of an agreement. Both Sovereigns abandoned their allies without scruple. By the Treaty of Tilsit, signed on July 7, Napoleon restored to the Prussian monarch one-half of his territories, and Russia recognised the confederation of the Rhine and the elevation of Napoleon's three brothers—Joseph, Louis, ana Jerome —to the thrones of Naples, Holland, and Westphalia. Sir William Edward Parry, Arctic navigator, was the son of a physician of some celebrity in Bath, where he was born in December, 1790. In 1806 he became a midshipman in the Tribune frigate, and 11 years later he obtained an appointment to the Alexander brig in the expedition of Sir John Ross to discover the probabilities of a north-west passage to the Pacific. The following year he had the chief command of two vessels, and did some notable exploring work, but his attempt in the spring to reach Behring Strait was frustrated by the state of the ice. Parry took command altogether in five expeditions to the Arctic regions, and won the £SOOO which Parliament had offered to the navigator who first crossed HOclcg. west longitude. In 1823 he was appointed hydrographcr to the navy, and later was made comptroller of the Naval Steam Department. He was knighted in 1829, and at the time of his death, which occurred on July 8, 1655, he held the rank of rear-admiral, and was Governor of Greenwich Hospital. Hablofc Knight Browne, English artist, is famous chiefly as " Phiz," the illustrator of the best-known books by Charles Dickens, Charles Lover, and Harrison Ainsworth in their original editions. Browne was ix facile draughtsman who readily grasped the intention of the writer he was illustrating. His illustrations are full of rollicking good-humour, and, having a tendency to caricature, they suit Dickens's and Lever's works admirably. Browne was in constant employment by publishers till 1867, when a shock of paralysis ruined his artistic career. In 1878 his affairs became so straitened that he was awarded an annuity bv the Royal Academy. He died on Julv 8/1882, at the age of 67. 6n July 9, 1386, was fought the battle of Sempach, ever-memorable in the history of Switzerland. The Swis s hod revolted against their Austrian oppressors, and tho Austrian army, under Duke Leopold, camo suddenly upon the Swiss force at the junction of roads near .Sempach. The onset was furious, and the Austrians rushed on the Swiss, drove them back a little, and nought to encoiri|)oss and crush them in then- midst. All the fortune of the battle seemed against tho patriots, till suddenly the scene was changed by the heroic deed of Arnold von Winkebried, who dashed on the enemy and caught hold of as many spears as his arms could encompass, bearing them to the ground with his body so that a gap might be made for his comrades. A fearful carnage followed, in which no mercy was shown, and there fell of the common soldiers 2000 men and no fewer than 700 of the nobility. The Swiss lost but 120 men. This victory established the independence of Switzerland, and the day is still commemorated in that country. Louis Daguerre. French painter and physicist, is entitled to fame as the chief pioneer of the modern art of photography. His discovery of the daguerreotype process was recognised by the French Government as of such importance that in 1839 he was appointed an officer of the Legion of Hono'ur. Irr consideration of his making known the. process to the Academy ho received an annuity of 6000 francs, which ho enjoyed till tho time of his death in July, 1851. , r , Under the leadership of Jack Cade, who was probably an Irishman by a formidable rebellion broke out in Kent in 1450. The movement wa s by no means of a distinctly plebeian or disorderly character, but was a general and organised rising of tho people at large. The insurgents made their way into London - on July 3. but re-

tired to Southwark, and on July 5, after a fierce struggle on London Bridge, the citizens prevented them from re-entering the city. Orr July 10 a proclamation was issued against Cade, and a reward was offered for his apprehension. Escaping into Sussex, he was captured at Heathfield on the following clay. During the scuft'lo he had been severely wounded, and on the day of his capture he died in the cart which was conveying him to London. William, surnamed the Silent, Prince of Orange and Count of Nassau, was born in Nassau in 1533. He was one of the hostages sent to Franco for tho duo execution of tho Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis in 1559, and during his stay in that country Henry 11, who entiroly misunderstood his character, revealed to him a plan for the mas sacre of all Protestants in France and the Netherlands. The prinoe was horriflcd at this disclosure, but said nothing; and it was on account of his extraordinary discretion on this occasion that he received the surname of "the Silent." He was a man of a singularly upright and noble character. He was a born statesman, with a will of iron; and to him chiefly belongs the honour of having permanently crippled the tyrannical power of Spam., and of having founded tho independence and greatness of the United Provinces. Ho was murdered in his house nt Delft on July. 10, 1584, by Balthazar Gerard one of the many assassins whom Philip II and Parma had so persistently sent against him. He was shot as ho placed his foot upon the first step of the great 6tair in his house, and he died in a. few moments.

Tho Hon. C. S. Rolls i s the most distinguished vicitim that the science of aeronautics has so far claimed from the ranks of British aviators. He was killed while aeroplaning at" the Bournemouth carnival on July 12, 1910. He was biplaning in an alighting competition, and the making of a sudden descent caused an overpressure on the rack ta'ils breaking the pivots. The machine fell from 100 ft at a terrific rate, leaving nothing -but a mass of matchwood and broken steel. Mr Rolls, when extricated, was foMnd to have broken his neck and fractured the base of his skull

Among those who at the time of the French Revolution placed faith in the Girondists and their ideals was a young woman cf Normandy, Charlotte Cordßv*. When they wero driven with insult from the Convention it was Jeair Paul Marat who was held especially responsible both for the expulsioi of the Girondists and for the tyranny which now began to weigh heavily upon the whole country. Charlotte Corday imagined that by putting an end # to this man's lifo she could also put an end to the system of government which he advocated. She purchased a knife, and obtained admission to his house in Paris, where she gave him the names of Girondist deputies who were in Caen - . "In a few days.' he said, as he wrote them hastily down, " I will have them all guillotined in Paris." At these words she plunged the knife into his body and killed him on the spot. Sho did not" attempt to escape, and was conveyed to prison amid the murmurs of an arrgry crowd. Death she met with stoical indifference, but her deed brought , about results contrary to those she had sought at the cost of her life to achieve.