are his principal publications; and he became widely recognized as one of the great jurists of his day.
Bibliography.—Holmes’s Complete Works, in 13 volumes, were published at Boston in 1891. See J. T. Morse, Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes (London, 1896); G. B. Ives, Bibliography (Boston, 1907); and the bibliography in P. K. Foley’s American Authors (Boston, 1897). An essay by Sir Leslie Stephen is prefixed to the “Golden Treasury” edition (1903) of The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table. See also monographs by William Sloane Kennedy (Boston, 1882); Emma E. Brown (Boston, 1884). (J. T. Mo.)
HOLMFIRTH, an urban district in the Holmfirth parliamentary
division of the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, on
and Holme and the Ribble, 6 m. S. of Huddersfield, and on the
Lancashire and Yorkshire railway. Pop. (1901) 8977. The
valley, walled by bold hills, is very picturesque. In 1852 great
destruction was wrought in the town by the bursting of a reservoir
in the vicinity. The large industrial population is employed in
woollen manufactories, and in the neighbouring stone quarries.
HOLOCAUST (Gr. ὁλόκαυστον, or ὁλόκαυτον, wholly burnt),
strictly a sacrifice wholly destroyed by fire, such as the sacrifices
of the Jews, described in the Pentateuch as “whole burnt
offerings” (see Sacrifice). The term is now often applied to a
catastrophe on a large scale, whether by fire or not, or to a
massacre or slaughter.
HOLOCENE (from Gr. ὅλος, whole, καινός, recent), in geology,
the time division which embraces the youngest of all the formations;
it is equivalent to the “Recent” of some authors. The
name was proposed in 1860 by P. Gervais. The oldest deposits
that may be included are those containing neolithic implements;
deposits of historic times should also be grouped here; presumably
the youngest are those to be chronicled by the last man.
The Holocene formations obviously include all the varieties of
deposits which are accumulating at the present day: the gravels
and alluvia of rivers; boulder clays, moraines and fluvio-glacial
deposits; estuarine, coastal and abyssal deposits of the seas,
and their equivalents in lakes; screes, taluses, wind-borne dust
and sand and desert formations; chemical deposits from saline
waters; peat, diatomite, marls, foraminiferal and other oozes;
coral, algal and shell banks, and other organic deposits; mud,
lava and dust deposits of volcanic origin and extrusions of asphalt
and pitch; to all these must be added the works of man.
HOLROYD, SIR CHARLES (1861– ), British artist, was
born in Leeds on the 9th of April 1861. He received his art
education under Professor Legros at the Slade School, University
College, London, where he had a distinguished career. After
passing six months at Newlyn, where he painted his first picture
exhibited in the Royal Academy, “Fishermen Mending a Sail”
(1885), he obtained a travelling scholarship and studied for two
years in Italy, a sojourn which greatly influenced his art. At his
return, on the invitation of Legros, he became for two years
assistant-master at the Slade School, and there devoted himself
to painting and etching. Among his pictures may be mentioned
“The Death of Torrigiano” (1886), “The Satyr King” (1889),
“The Supper at Emmaus,” and, perhaps his best picture, “Pan
and Peasants” (1893). For the church of Aveley, Essex, he
painted a triptych altarpiece, “The Adoration of the Shepherds,”
with wings representing “St Michael” and “St Gabriel,” and
designed as well the window, “The Resurrection.” His portraits,
such as that of “G. F. Watts, R.A.,” in the Legros manner, show
much dignity and distinction. Sir Charles Holroyd has made his
chief reputation as an etcher of exceptional ability, combining
strength with delicacy, and a profound technical knowledge of
the art. Among the best known are the “Monte Oliveto”
series, the “Icarus” series, the “Monte Subasio” series, and
the “Eve” series, together with the plates, “The Flight into
Egypt,” “The Prodigal Son,” “A Barn on Tadworth Common”
(etched in the open air), and “The Storm.” His etched
heads of “Professor Legros,” “Lord Courtney” and “Night,”
are admirable alike in knowledge and in likeness. His principal
dry-point is “The Bather.” In all his work Holroyd displays
an impressive sincerity, with a fine sense of composition, and of
style, allied to independent and modern feeling. He was
appointed the first keeper of the National Gallery of British Art
(Tate Gallery), and on the retirement of Sir Edward Poynter
in 1906 he received the directorship of the National Gallery.
He was knighted in 1903. His Michael Angelo Buonarotti
(London, Duckworth, 1903) is a scholarly work of real value.
HOLSTEIN, FRIEDRICH VON (1837–1909), German statesman,
for more than thirty years head of the political department
of the German Foreign Office. Holstein’s importance began
with the dismissal of Bismarck in 1890. The new chancellor,
Caprivi, was ignorant of foreign affairs; and Holstein, as the
repository of the Bismarckian tradition, became indispensable.
This reluctance to emerge into publicity has been ascribed to the
part he had played under Bismarck in the Arnim affair, which
had made him powerful enemies; it was, however, possibly due
to a shrinking from the responsibility of office. Yet the weakness
of his position lay just in the fact that he was not ultimately
responsible. He protested against the despatch of the “Kruger
telegram,” but protested in vain. On the other hand, where
his ideas were acceptable, he was generally able to realize them.
Thus it was almost entirely due to him that Germany acquired
Kiao-chau and asserted her interests in China, and the acquisition
of Samoa was also largely his work. If the skill and pertinacity
with which Holstein carried through his plans in these matters
was learned in the school of Bismarck, he had not acquired
Bismarck’s faculty for foreseeing their ulterior consequences.
This is true of his Chinese policy, and true also of his part in the
Morocco crisis. The emperor William II.’s journey to Tangier
was undertaken on his advice, as a protest against the supposed
attempt at the isolation of Germany; but of the later developments
of German policy in the Morocco question he did not
approve, on the ground that the result would merely be to
strengthen the Anglo-French entente; and from the 12th of
March 1906 onwards he took no active part in the matter. To
the last he believed that the position of Germany would remain
unsafe until an understanding had been arrived at with Great
Britain, and it was this belief that determined his attitude
towards the question of the fleet, “beside which,” he wrote in
February 1909, “all other questions are of lesser account.”
His views on this question were summarized in a memorandum
of December 1907, of which Herr von Rath gives a résumé.
He objected to the programme of the German Navy League on
three main grounds: (1) the ill-feeling likely to be aroused in
South Germany, (2) the inevitable dislocation of the finances
through the huge additional charges involved, (3) the suspicion
of Germany’s motives in foreign countries, which would bind
Great Britain still closer to France. As for the idea that
Germany’s power would be increased, this—he wrote in reply
to a letter from Admiral Galster—was “a simple question of
arithmetic”; for how would the sea-power of Germany be relatively
increased if for every new German ship Great Britain built
two? Herr von Holstein retired on the resignation of Prince
Bülow, and died on the 8th of May 1909.
See Hermann von Rath, “Erinnerungen an Herrn von Holstein” in the Deutsche Revue for October 1909. He is also frequently mentioned passim in Prince Chlodwig Hohenlohe’s Memoirs.
HOLSTEIN, formerly a duchy of Germany. Until about 1110
the county of Holstein formed part of the duchy of Saxony, and
it was made a duchy in 1472. From 1460 to 1864 it was ruled
by members of the house of Oldenburg, some of whom were also
kings of Denmark. It is now the southern part of the Prussian
province of Schleswig-Holstein. (See Schleswig-Holstein, and
for history Schleswig-Holstein Question.)
HOLSTEN, KARL CHRISTIAN JOHANN (1825–1897), German
theologian, was born at Güstrow, Mecklenburg, on the 31st of
March 1825, and educated at Leipzig, Berlin and Rostock,
where in 1852 he became a teacher of religion in the Gymnasium.
In 1870 he went to Bern as professor of New Testament studies,
passing thence in 1876 to Heidelberg, where he remained until
his death on the 26th of January 1897. Holsten was an adherent
of the Tübingen school, and held to Baur’s views on the alleged
antagonism between Petrinism and Paulinism.
Among his writings are Zum Evangelium d. Paulus und d. Petrus (1867); Das Evangelium des Paulus dargestellt (1880); Die synoptischen Evangelien nach der Form ihres Inhalts (1886).
