diary, recording memories of many distinguished people, such as John Stuart Mill, John Sterling and Carlyle. Selections from her diary and correspondence (1835–1871) were published under the title of Memories of Old Friends (ed. by H. N. Pym, 1881; 2nd ed., 1882). She died on the 12th of January 1871.
FOX, SIR STEPHEN (1627–1716), English statesman, born
on the 27th of March 1627, was the son of William Fox, of
Farley, in Wiltshire, a yeoman farmer. At the age of fifteen he
first obtained a situation in the household of the earl of Northumberland;
then he entered the service of Lord Percy, the earl’s
brother, and was present with the royalist army at the battle
of Worcester as Lord Percy’s deputy at the ordnance board.
Accompanying Charles II. in his flight to the continent, he was
appointed manager of the royal household, on Clarendon’s
recommendation as “a young man bred under the severe
discipline of Lord Percy . . . very well qualified with languages,
and all other parts of clerkship, honesty and discretion.” The
skill with which he managed the exiguous finances of the exiled
court earned him further confidence and promotion. He was
employed on several important missions, and acted eventually
as intermediary between the king and General Monk. Honours
and emolument were his reward after the Restoration; he was
appointed to the lucrative offices of first clerk of the board of
green cloth and paymaster-general of the forces. In November
1661 he became member of parliament for Salisbury. In 1665
he was knighted, was returned as M. P. for Westminster on the
27th of February 1679, and succeeded the earl of Rochester as
a commissioner of the treasury, filling that office for twenty-three
years and during three reigns. In 1680 he resigned the paymastership
and was made first commissioner of horse. In 1684
he became sole commissioner of horse. He was offered a peerage
by James II., on condition of turning Roman Catholic, but
refused, in spite of which he was allowed to retain his commissionerships.
In 1685 he was again M. P. for Salisbury, and
opposed the bill for a standing army supported by the king.
During the Revolution he maintained an attitude of decent
reserve, but on James’s flight, submitted to William III., who
confirmed him in his offices. He was again elected for Westminster
in 1691 and 1695, for Cricklade in 1698, and finally in
1713 once more for Salisbury. He died on the 28th of October
1716. It is his distinction to have founded Chelsea hospital,
and to have contributed £13,000 in aid of this laudable public
work. Though his place as a statesman is in the second or even
the third rank, yet he was a useful man in his generation, and a
public servant who creditably discharged all the duties with
which he was entrusted. Unlike other statesmen of his day,
he grew rich in the service of the nation without being suspected
of corruption, and without forfeiting the esteem of his contemporaries.
He was twice married (1651 and 1703); by his first wife, Elizabeth Whittle, he had seven sons, who predeceased him, and three daughters; by his second, Christian Hopes, he had two sons and two daughters. The elder son by the second marriage, Stephen (1704–1776), was created Lord Ilchester and Stavordale in 1747 and earl of Ilchester in 1756; in 1758 he took the additional name of Strangways, and his descendants, the family of Fox-Strangways, still hold the earldom of Ilchester. The younger son, Henry, became the 1st Lord Holland (q.v.).
FOX, SIR WILLIAM (1812–1893), New Zealand statesman,
third son of George Townshend Fox, deputy-lieutenant for
Durham county, was born in England on the 9th of June 1812,
and educated at Wadham College, Oxford, where he took his
degree in 1832. Called to the bar in 1842, he emigrated immediately
thereafter to New Zealand, where, on the death of
Captain Arthur Wakefield, killed in 1843 in the Wairau massacre,
he became the New Zealand Company’s agent for the South
Island. While holding this position he made a memorable
exploring march on foot from Nelson to Canterbury, through
Cannibal Gorge, in the course of which he discovered the fertile
pastoral country of Amuri. In 1848 Governor Grey made Fox
attorney-general, but he gave up the post almost at once in
order to join the agitation, then at its height, for a free constitution.
As the political agent of the Wellington settlers he sailed
to London in 1850 to urge their demands in Downing Street.
The colonial office, however, refused to recognize him, and,
after publishing a sketch of the New Zealand settlements, The
Six Colonies of New Zealand, and travelling in the United States,
he returned to New Zealand and again threw himself with energy
into public affairs. When government by responsible ministers
was at last initiated, in 1856, Fox ousted the first ministry and
formed a cabinet, only to be himself beaten in turn after holding
office but thirteen days. In 1861 he regained office, and was
somewhat more fortunate, for he remained premier for nearly
thirteen months. Again, in the latter part of 1863 he took office:
this time with Sir Frederick Whitaker as premier, an arrangement
which endured for another thirteen months. Fox’s third premiership
began in 1869 and lasted until 1872. His fourth, which was
a matter of temporary convenience to his party, lasted only
five weeks in March and April 1873. Soon afterwards he left
politics, and, though he reappeared after some years and led the
attack which overthrew Sir George Grey’s ministry in 1879, he
lost his seat in the dissolution which followed in that year and
did not again enter parliament. He was made K.C.M.G. in 1880.
For the thirty years between 1850 and 1880 Sir William Fox was one of the half-dozen most notable public men in the colony. Impulsive and controversial, a fluent and rousing speaker, and a ready writer, his warm and sympathetic nature made him a good friend and a troublesome foe. He was considered for many years to be the most dangerous leader of the Opposition in the colony’s parliament, though as premier he was at a disadvantage when measured against more patient and more astute party managers. His activities were first devoted to secure self-government for the New Zealand colonists. Afterwards his sympathies made him prominent among the champions of the Maori race, and he laboured indefatigably for their rights and to secure permanent peace with the tribes and a just settlement of their claims. It was during his third premiership that this peace, so long deferred, was at last gained, mainly through the influence and skill of Sir Donald M‘Lean, native minister in the Fox cabinet. Finally, after Fox had left parliament he devoted himself, as joint-commissioner with Sir Francis Dillon Bell, to the adjustment of the native land-claims on the west coast of the North Island. The able reports of the commissioners were his last public service, and the carrying out of their recommendations gradually removed the last serious native trouble in New Zealand. When, however, in the course of the native wars from 1860 to 1870 the colonists of New Zealand were exposed to cruel and unjust imputations in England, Fox zealously defended them in a book, The War in New Zealand (1866), which was not only a spirited vindication of his fellow-settlers, but a scathing criticism of the generalship of the officers commanding the imperial troops in New Zealand. Throughout his life Fox was a consistent advocate of total abstinence. It was he who founded the New Zealand Alliance, and he undoubtedly aided the growth of the prohibition movement afterwards so strong in the colony. He died on the 23rd of June 1893, exactly twelve months after his wife, Sarah, daughter of William Halcombe. (W. P. R.)
FOX, a name (female, “vixen”[1]) properly applicable to the
single wild British representative of the family Canidae (see
Carnivora), but in a wider sense used to denote fox-like species
from all parts of the world, inclusive of many from South America
which do not really belong to the same group. The fox was
included by Linnaeus in the same genus with the dog and the
wolf, under the name of Canis vulpes, but at the present day is
regarded by most naturalists as the type of a separate genus, and
should then be known as Vulpes alopex or Vulpes vulpes. From
- ↑ The word is common to the Teutonic languages, cf. Dutch vos, Ger. Fuchs; the ultimate origin is unknown, but a connexion has been suggested with Sanskrit puccha, tail. The feminine “vixen” represents the O. Eng. fyxen, due to the change from o to y, and addition of the feminine termination -en, cf. O. Eng. gyden, goddess, and Ger. Füchsin, vixen. The v, for f, is common in southern English pronunciation; vox, for fox, is found in the Ancren Riwle, c. 1230.
