merchants have villas here, and it is the headquarters of several of the leading rowing clubs on the Scheldt. Pop. (1904) 12,816.
HOBOKEN, a city of Hudson county, New Jersey, U.S.A., on the Hudson river, adjoining Jersey City on the S. and W. and opposite New York city, with which it is connected by ferries and by two subway lines through tunnels under the river. Pop. (1890) 43,648; (1900) 59,364, of whom 21,380 were foreign-born, 10,843 being natives of Germany; (1910 census) 70,324. Of the total population in 1900, 48,349 had either one or both parents foreign-born, German being the principal racial element. The city is served by the West Shore, and the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western railways, being the eastern terminus of the latter, and is connected by electric railway with the neighbouring cities of north-eastern New Jersey. In Hoboken are the piers of the North German Lloyd, the Hamburg American, the Netherlands American, the Scandinavian and the Phoenix steamship lines. Hoboken occupies a little more than 1 sq. m. and lies near the foot of the New Jersey Palisades, which rise both on the W. and N. to a height of nearly 200 ft. Much of its surface has had to be filled in to raise it above high tide, but Castle Point, in the N.E., rises from the generally low level about 100 ft. On this Point are the residence and private estate of the founder of the city, John Stevens (1749–1838), Hudson Park, and facing it the Stevens Institute of Technology, an excellent school of mechanical engineering endowed by Edwin A. Stevens (1795–1868), son of John Stevens, opened in 1871, and having in 1909–1910 34 instructors and 390 students. The institute owes much to its first president, Henry Morton (1836–1902), a distinguished scientist, whose aim was “to offer a course of instruction in which theory and practice were carefully balanced and thoroughly combined,” and who gave to the institute sums aggregating $175,000 (see Morton Memorial, History of Stevens Institute, ed. by Furman, 1905). In connexion with the institute there is a preparatory department, the Stevens School (1870). The city maintains a teachers’ training school. Among the city’s prominent buildings are the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western station, the Hoboken Academy (1860), founded by German Americans, and the public library. The city has an extensive coal trade and numerous manufactures, among which are lead pencils, leather goods, silk goods, wall-paper and caskets. The value of the manufactured product increased from $7,151,391 in 1890 to $12,092,872 in 1900, or 69.1%. The factory product in 1905 was valued at $14,077,305, an increase of 34.3% over that for 1900. The site of Hoboken (originally “Hobocanhackingh,” the place of the tobacco pipe) was occupied about 1640 as a Dutch farm, but in 1643 the stock and all the buildings except a brew-house were destroyed by the Indians. In 1711 title to the place was acquired by Samuel Bayard, a New York merchant, who built on Castle Point his summer residence. During the War of Independence his descendant, William Bayard, was a loyalist, and his home was burned and his estate confiscated. In 1784 the property was purchased by John Stevens, the inventor, who in 1804 laid it out as a town. For the next thirty-five years its “Elysian Fields” were a famous pleasure resort of New York City. Hoboken was incorporated as a town in 1849 and as a city in 1855. On the 30th of June 1900 the wharves of the North German Lloyd Steamship Company and three of its ocean liners were almost completely destroyed by a fire, which caused a loss of more than 200 lives and over $5,000,000.
HOBSON’S CHOICE, i.e. “this or nothing,” an expression that arose from the fact that the Cambridge-London carrier, Thomas Hobson (1544–1630), refused, when letting his horses on hire, to allow any animal to leave the stable out of its turn. Among other bequests made by Hobson, and commemorated by Milton, was a conduit for the Cambridge market-place, for which he provided the perpetual maintenance. See Spectator, No. 509 (14th of October 1712).
HOBY, SIR THOMAS (1530–1566), English diplomatist and translator, son of William Hoby of Leominster, was born in 1530. He entered St John’s College, Cambridge, in 1545, but in 1547 he went to Strassburg, where he was the guest of Martin Bucer, whose Gratulation ... unto the Church of Englande for the restitution of Christes Religion he translated into English. He then proceeded to Italy, visiting Padua and Venice, Florence and Siena, and in May 1550 he had settled at Rome, when he was summoned by his half-brother, Sir Philip Hoby (1505–1558), then ambassador at the emperor’s court, to Augsburg. The brothers returned to England at the end of the year, and Thomas attached himself to the service of the marquis of Northampton, whom he accompanied to France on an embassy to arrange a marriage between Edward VI. and the princess Elizabeth. Shortly after he returned to England he started once more for Paris, and in 1552 he was engaged on his translation of The Courtyer of Count Baldessar Castilio. His work was probably completed in 1554, and the freedom of the allusions to the Roman church probably accounts for the fact that it was withheld from publication until 1561. The Cortegiano of Baldassare Castiglione, which Dr Johnson called “the best book that ever was written upon good breeding,” is a book as entirely typical of the Italian Renaissance as Machiavelli’s Prince in another direction. It exercised an immense influence on the standards of chivalry throughout Europe, and was long the recognized authority for the education of a nobleman. The accession of Mary made it desirable for the Hobys to remain abroad, and they were in Italy until the end of 1555. Thomas Hoby married in 1558 Elizabeth, the learned daughter of Sir Anthony Cook, who wrote a Latin epitaph on her husband. He was knighted in 1566 by Elizabeth, and was sent to France as English ambassador. He died on the 13th of July in the same year in Paris, and was buried in Bisham Church.
His son, Sir Edward Hoby (1560–1617), enjoyed Elizabeth’s favour, and he was employed on various confidential missions. He was constable of Queenborough Castle, Kent, where he died on the 1st of March 1617. He took part in the religious controversies of the time, publishing many pamphlets against Theophilus Higgons and John Fludd or Floyd. He translated, from the French of Mathieu Coignet, Politique Discourses on Trueth and Lying (1586).
The authority for Thomas Hoby’s biography is a MS. “Booke of the Travaile and lief of me Thomas Hoby, with diverse things worth the noting.” This was edited for the Royal Historical Society by Edgar Powell in 1902. Hoby’s translation of The Courtyer was edited (1900) by Professor Walter Raleigh for the “Tudor Translations” series.
HOCHE, LAZARE (1768–1797), French general, was born of poor parents near Versailles on the 24th of June 1768. At sixteen years of age he enlisted as a private soldier in the Gardes françaises. He spent his entire leisure in earning extra pay by civil work, his object being to provide himself with books, and this love of study, which was combined with a strong sense of duty and personal courage, soon led to his promotion. When the Gardes françaises were broken up in 1789 he was a corporal, and thereafter he served in various line regiments up to the time of his receiving a commission in 1792. In the defence of Thionville in that year Hoche earned further promotion, and he served with credit in the operations of 1792–1793 on the northern frontier of France. At the battle of Neerwinden he was aide-de-camp to General le Veneur, and when Dumouriez deserted to the Austrians, Hoche, along with le Veneur and others, fell under suspicion of treason; but after being kept under arrest and unemployed for some months he took part in the defence of Dunkirk, and in the same year (1793) he was promoted successively chef de brigade, general of brigade, and general of division. In October 1793 he was provisionally appointed to command the Army of the Moselle, and within a few weeks he was in the field at the head of his army in Lorraine. His first battle was that of Kaiserslautern (28th-30th of November) against Prussians. The French were defeated, but even in the midst of the Terror the Committee of Public Safety continued Hoche in his command. Pertinacity and fiery energy in their eyes outweighed everything else, and Hoche soon showed that he possessed these qualities. On the 22nd of December he stormed the lines of Fröschweiler, and the representatives of the Convention with his army at once added the Army of the Rhine to his sphere of command. On the 26th of December the French
