Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol II (1901).djvu/185

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
Eastlake
173
Eastlake

ber of papers written for antiquarian societies, were as follows:

  1. 'Index to the Wills and Inventories at Chester from 1545 to 1760,' Record Society, 1879-92, 7 vols.
  2. 'Lancashire and Cheshire Wills and Inventories,' Chetham Society, 1884-93, 2 vols.
  3. 'A Lancashire Pedigree Case; or a History of the various Trials for the Recovery of the Harrison Estates from 1873 to 1886,' 1887.
  4. 'The Recent Discoveries of Roman Remains found in repairing the North Wall of the City of Chester,' a series of papers by various writers, edited by Earwaker, 1888.
  5. 'History of the Ancient Parish of Sandbach,' 1890, 4to.
  6. 'The Cheshire Sheaf,' new series, reprinted from the 'Chester Courant,' 1891.
  7. 'History of the Church and Parish of St. Mary-on-the-Hill, Chester,' completed by Dr. R. H. Morris, 1898.

He had in contemplation at the time of his death a history of the county of Lancaster upon an unusually extended scale.

[Manchester Guardian, 31 Jan. 1895; Journal of the Chester Architectural &c. Society, new series, v. 317; Transactions Lane, and Cheshire Antiq. Society, xiii. 143 (portrait); Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715-1886; Furnivall's Child Marriages &c. in the Diocese of Chester, 1897; personal knowledge.]

EASTLAKE, ELIZABETH, Lady (1809–1893), authoress, born at Norwich on 17 Nov. 1809, was the fifth child and fourth daughter of Dr. Edward Rigby [q. v.] by his second wife, Anne (1777–1872), daughter of William Palgrave of Yarmouth. Edward Rigby [q. v.], the obstetrician, was her brother. After her father's death in 1821 she went to reside with her mother at Framingham, near Norwich, until in 1827 she went with her family for a sojourn of over two years at Heidelberg, where she acquired a thorough knowledge of German. In 1836, after another visit to Germany, she wrote a solid but unfriendly article on 'Goethe' for the 'Foreign Quarterly Review.' In October 1838 she went to Reval in Russia upon a long visit to a married sister, and upon her return, early in 1841, the letters written thence to her mother were accepted for publication by Murray, and issued anonymously in two volumes as 'A Residence on Shores of Baltic.' The book was freshly written, proved attractive, and went through several editions under the slightly altered title, 'Letters from the Shores of the Baltic.'

The letters served as an introduction to Lockhart, and in April 1842 Miss Rigby appeared as a writer for the 'Quarterly' upon 'Jesse, Kohl, and Sterling on Russia.' In the same year she accompanied her mother to a new home at Edinburgh, where she had introductions from the Murrays, and was introduced to the circle of Christopher North (John Wilson) as one of the right sort. She continued to write for the 'Quarterly,' her articles on 'Evangelical Novels' and 'Children's Books,' on 'German Life,' and on 'Lady Travellers' being widely appreciated. In 1844 she went to London on a visit to the Murrays in Albemarle Street, met Caryle and disagreed with his calling Luther 'a nice man,' and saw something of Miss Strickland and Miss Edgeworth. In May 1844 she left London for another visit to Russia. 'The Jewess' had appeared in 1843, and in 1846 she again drew upon her Russian experiences for 'Livonian Tales.' Returning to Edinburgh she worked conscientiously upon 'Quarterly' articles (including in 1846 'German Painting' and 'Cologne Cathedral'), and attracted in December 1848 much attention by one in which she attacked 'Jane Eyre' as a vulgar though powerful work of 'an anti-Christian' tendency. She preferred to think that the novel was by a man, the alternative supposition being that it was the work of a woman who 'for some sufficient reason had forfeited the society of her own sex.' Elsewhere she expressed her conviction that Currer, Acton, and Ellis Bell were three Lancashire brothers of the weaving order. In January 1849 she became engaged to Sir Charles Lock Eastlake [q. v.], whose acquaintance she had made at the Murrays'; she was then forty, while he was fifty-six. The marriage took place on 9 April 1849, when the wedded pair settled at 7 Fitzroy Square. Her handsome, regular features, and magnificent figure (she was within an inch of six feet high) are to be traced henceforth in several of Eastlake's compositions.

In February 1850 Lady Eastlake first heard Macaulay 'talk all dinner' at the Longmans', and among those whom she met at this time and deftly individualised in her journals were Sir Robert Peel, the Duke of Wellington, Samuel Rogers, Cobden, Dr. Waagen, Ruskin, the Miss Berrys, Mrs. Norton, and, a little later, Charles Dickens, 'whose company I always enjoy.' In 1852 she had reprinted two articles from the 'Quarterly' on 'Music and the Art of Dress' (London, 8vo), and in the same year she accompanied her husband to Italy, an expedition repeated annually until his death, and varied by subsidiary excursions to France, the Low Countries, Germany, and Spain. At the close of the year, her interest in art having been quickened by her tour, on which she made a number of first-rate sketches (she avowed to Lockhart in defiance