A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Lynn, Eliza
LYNN, ELIZA,
Was born in the year 1828, at Crosthwaite, in Cumberland, of which place her father, the late Rev. James Lynn, D.D., was vicar. Her mother, whom she had the misfortune to lose when quite an infant, was the daughter of Dr. Goodenough, Bishop of Carlisle. Dr. Lynn, holding church preferments which rendered a change of residence occasionally necessary, the early years of his daughter were passed alternately amid the wild picturesque scenery of the lake district, and the more rich and fertile vales of Kent, Gad's Hill, near Rochester, being her abode in the latter county. She was quiet and contemplative as a child, and when her opportunities of study and research had opened to her the rich stores of ancient history, she appeared to live almost wholly on the past; hence her power of realizing and depicting so vividly as she has done, in "Azeth, the Egyptian," and "Amymone, a Romance of the days of Pericles"—the outer and inner life of bygone times. The first of these well-sustained stories of the antique world was Published in 1846; they have taken their place with Croley's "Salathiel," Bulwer's "Last Days of Pompeii," and become part of our standard literature. Miss Lynn is also the author of "Realities," a story of the present day; and numerous tales, essays, etc., contributed to the various leading periodicals.