GRESHAM, WALTER QUINTON (1832–1895), American statesman and jurist, was born near Lanesville, Harrison county, Indiana, on the 17th of March 1832. He spent two years in an academy at Corydon, Indiana, and one year at the Indiana State University at Bloomington, then studied law, and in 1854 was admitted to the bar. He was active as a campaign speaker for the Republican ticket in 1856, and in 1860 was elected to the State House of Representatives as a Republican in a strong Democratic district. In the House, as chairman of the committee on military affairs, he did much to prepare the Indiana troops for service in the Federal army; in 1861 he became colonel of the 53rd Indiana Volunteer Infantry, and subsequently took part in Grant’s Tennessee campaign of 1862, and in the operations against Corinth and Vicksburg, where he commanded a brigade. In August 1863 he was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers, and was placed in command of the Federal forces at Natchez. In 1864 he commanded a division of the 17th Army Corps in Sherman’s Atlanta campaign, and before Atlanta, on the 20th of July, he received a wound which forced him to retire from active service, and left him lame for life. In 1865 he was brevetted major-general of volunteers. After the war he practised law at New Albany, Indiana, and in 1869 was appointed by President Grant United States District Judge for Indiana. In April 1883 he succeeded Timothy O. Howe (1816–1883) as postmaster-general in President Arthur’s cabinet, taking an active part in the suppression of the Louisiana Lottery, and in September 1884 succeeded Charles J. Folger as secretary of the treasury. In the following month he resigned to accept an appointment as United States Judge for the Seventh Judicial Circuit. Gresham was a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 1884 and 1888, in the latter year leading for some time in the balloting. Gradually, however, he grew out of sympathy with the Republican leaders and policy, and in 1892 advocated the election of the Democratic candidate, Grover Cleveland, for the presidency. From the 7th of March 1893 until his death at Washington on the 28th of May 1895, he was secretary of state in President Cleveland’s cabinet.
GRESHAM’S LAW, in economics, the name suggested in 1857
by H. D. Macleod for the principle of currency which may be
briefly summarized—“bad money drives out good.” Macleod
gave it this name, which has been universally adopted, under the
impression that the principle was first explained by Sir Thomas
Gresham in 1558. In reality it had been well set forth by earlier
economic writers, notably Oresme and Copernicus. Macleod
states the law in these terms: the worst form of currency in
circulation regulates the value of the whole currency and drives
all other forms of currency out of circulation. Gresham’s law
applies where there is under-weight or debased coin in circulation
with full-weight coin of the same metal; where there are two
metals in circulation, and one is undervalued as compared with
the other, and where inconvertible paper money is put into
circulation side by side with a metallic currency. See further
Bimetallism; Money.
GRESSET, JEAN BAPTISTE LOUIS (1709–1777), French
poet and dramatist, was born at Amiens on the 29th of August
1709. His poem Vert Vert is his main title to fame. He spent,
however, the last twenty-five years of his life in regretting the
frivolity which enabled him to produce this most charming of
poems. He was brought up by the Jesuits of Amiens. He was
accepted as a novice at the age of sixteen, and sent to pursue his
studies at the Collège Louis le Grand in Paris. After completing
his course he was appointed, being then under twenty years of
age, to a post as assistant master in a college at Rouen. He published
Vert Vert at Rouen in 1734. It is a story, in itself exceedingly
humorous, showing how a parrot, the delight of a convent,
whose talk was all of prayers and pious ejaculations, was
conveyed to another convent as a visitor to please the nuns. On
the way he falls among bad companions, forgets his convent
language, and shocks the sisters on arrival by profane swearing.
He is sent back in disgrace, punished by solitude and plain
bread, presently repents, reforms and is killed by kindness. The
story, however, is nothing. The treatment of the subject, the
atmosphere which surrounds it, the delicacy in which the little
prattling ways of the nuns, their jealousies, their tiny trifles, are
presented, takes the reader entirely by surprise. The poem stands
absolutely unrivalled, even among French contes en vers.
Gresset found himself famous. He left Rouen, went up to Paris, where he found refuge in the same garret which had sheltered him when a boy at the Collège Louis le Grand, and there wrote his second poem, La Chartreuse. It was followed by the Carême impromptu, the Lutrin vivant and Les Ombres. Then trouble came upon him; complaints were made to the fathers of the alleged licentiousness of his verses, the real cause of complaint being the ridicule which Vert Vert seemed to throw upon the whole race of nuns and the anti-clerical tendency of the other poems. An example, it was urged, must be made; Gresset was expelled the order. Men of robust mind would have been glad to get rid of such a yoke. Gresset, who had never been taught to stand alone, went forth weeping. He went to Paris in 1740 and there produced Édouard III, a tragedy (1740) and Sidnei (1745), a comedy. These were followed by Le Méchant which still keeps the stage, and is qualified by Brunetière as the best verse comedy of the French 18th century theatre, not excepting even the Métromanie of Alexis Piron. Gresset was admitted to the Academy in 1748. And then, still young, he retired to Amiens, where his relapse from the discipline of the church became the subject of the deepest remorse. He died at Amiens on the 16th of June 1777.
The best edition of his poems is A. A. Rénouard’s (1811). See Jules Wogue, J. B. L. Gresset (1894).
GRETNA GREEN, or Graitney Green, a village in the south-east
of Dumfriesshire, Scotland, about 8 m. E. of Annan, 9 m.
N.N.W. of Carlisle, and 34 m. from the river Sark, here the
dividing-line between England and Scotland, with a station on
the Glasgow & South-Western railway. The Caledonian and
North British railways have a station at Gretna on the English
side of the Border. As the nearest village on the Scottish side,
Gretna Green was notorious as the resort of eloping couples,
who had failed to obtain the consent of parents or guardians to
their union. Up till 1754, when Lord Hardwicke’s act abolishing
clandestine marriages came into force, the ceremony had commonly
been performed in the Fleet prison in London. After
that date runaway couples were compelled to seek the hospitality
of a country where it sufficed for them to declare their wish
to marry in the presence of witnesses. At Gretna Green the
ceremony was usually performed by the blacksmith, but the toll-keeper,
ferryman or in fact any person might officiate, and the
toll-house, the inn, or, after 1826, Gretna Hall was the scene of
many such weddings, the fees varying from half a guinea to a
sum as large as impudence could extort or extravagance bestow.
As many as two hundred couples were married at the toll-house
in a year. The romantic traffic was practically, though not
necessarily, put an end to in 1856, when the law required one of
the contracting parties to reside in Scotland three weeks previous
to the event.
GRÉTRY, ANDRÉ ERNEST MODESTE (1741–1813), French
composer, was born at Liége on the 8th of February 1741, his
father being a poor musician. He was a choir boy at the church
of St Denis. In 1753 he became a pupil of Leclerc and later of
Renekin and Moreau. But of greater importance was the
practical tuition he received by attending the performance of
an Italian opera company. Here he heard the operas of Galuppi,
Pergolesi and other masters; and the desire of completing his
own studies in Italy was the immediate result. To find the
necessary means he composed in 1759 a mass which he dedicated
to the canons of the Liége cathedral, and it was at the cost of
Canon Hurley that he went to Italy in the March of 1759. In
Rome he went to the Collège de Liége. Here Grétry resided for
five years, studiously employed in completing his musical
education under Casali. His proficiency in harmony and counterpoint
was, however, according to his own confession, at all times
very moderate. His first great success was achieved by La
Vendemmiatrice, an Italian intermezzo or operetta, composed for
the Aliberti theatre in Rome and received with universal
