1869, aged eighty, and lies buried in San Bernardo, the church wherein he worshipped.
There are biographies by J. Beavington Atkinson (1882) and Howitt (1886). (J. B. A.)
OVERBURY, SIR THOMAS (1581–1613), English poet and
essayist, and the victim of one of the most sensational crimes
in English history, was the son of Nicholas Overbury, of Bourton-on-the-Hill,
and was born in 1581 at Compton Scorpion, near
Ilmington, in Warwickshire. In the autumn of 1595 he became
a gentleman commoner of Queen’s College, Oxford, took his
degree of B.A. in 1598 and came to London to study law in the
Middle Temple. He found favour with Sir Robert Cecil, travelled
on the Continent and began to enjoy a reputation for an accomplished
mind and free manners. About the year 1601, being in
Edinburgh on a holiday, he met Robert Carr, then an obscure
page to the earl of Dunbar; and so great a friendship was struck
up between the two youths that they came up to London
together. The early history of Carr remains obscure, and it
is probable that Overbury secured an introduction to Court
before his young associate contrived to do so. At all events,
when Carr attracted the attention of James I., in 1606, by breaking
his leg in the tilt-yard, Overbury had for some time been
servitor-in-ordinary to the king. He was knighted in June
1608, and in 1609 he travelled in France and the Low Countries.
He seems to have followed the fortunes of Carr very closely,
and “such was the warmth of the friendship, that they were
inseparable, . . . nor could Overbury enjoy any felicity but
in the company of him he loved [Carr].” When the latter was
made Lord Rochester in 1610, the intimacy seems to have been
sustained. But it was now destroyed by a new element. Early
in 1611 the Court became aware of the mutual attraction between
Rochester and the infamous and youthful countess of Essex,
who seemed to have bewitched the handsome Scots adventurer.
To this intrigue Overbury was from the first violently opposed,
pointing out to Rochester that an indulgence in it would be
hurtful to his preferment, and that the woman, even at this
early stage in her career, was already “noted for her injury
and immodesty.” He went so far as to use, in describing her,
a word which was not more just than scandalous. But Rochester
was now infatuated, and he repeated to the countess what
Overbury had said. It was at this time, too, that Overbury
wrote, and circulated widely in MS., the poem called “His
Wife,” which was a picture of the virtues which a young man
should demand in a woman before he has the rashness to marry
her. It was represented to Lady Essex that Overbury’s object
in writing this poem was to open the eyes of Rochester to her
defects. The situation now resolved itself into a deadly duel
for the person of Rochester between the mistress and the friend.
The countess contrived to lead Overbury into such a trap as
to make him seem disrespectful to the king, and she succeeded
so completely that he was thrown into the Tower on the 22nd
of April 1613. It was not known at the time, and it is not certain
now, how far Rochester participated in this first crime, or whether
he was ignorant of it. But the queen, by a foolish phrase, had
sown discord between the friends; she had called Overbury
Rochester’s “governor.” It is, indeed, apparent that Overbury
had become arrogant with success, and was no longer a favourite
at Court. Lady Essex, however, was not satisfied with having
had him shut up; she was determined that “he should return no
more to this stage.” She had Sir William Wade, the honest
Governor of the Tower, removed to make way for a creature of
her own, Sir Gervaise Elvis (or Helwys); and a gaoler, of whom
it was ominously said that he was “a man well acquainted with
the power of drugs,” was set to attend on Overbury. This
fellow, afterwards aided by Mrs Turner, the widow of a physician,
and by an apothecary called Franklin, plied the miserable poet
with sulphuric acid in the form of copper vitriol. But his constitution
long withstood the timid doses they gave him, and he
lingered in exquisite sufferings until the 15th of September
1613, when more violent measures put an end to his existence.
Two months later Rochester, now earl of Somerset, married the
chief murderess, Lady Essex. More than a year passed before
suspicion was roused, and when it was, the king showed a hateful
disinclination to bring the offenders to justice. In the celebrated
trial which followed, however, the wicked plot was all discovered.
The four accomplices were hanged; the countess of Somerset
pleaded guilty but was spared, and Somerset himself was disgraced.
Meanwhile, Overbury’s poem, The Wife, was published
in 1614, and ran through six editions within a year, the scandal
connected with the murder of the author greatly aiding its success.
It was abundantly reprinted within the next sixty years, and
it continued to be one of the most widely popular books of the
17th century. Combined with later editions of The Wife, and
gradually adding to its bulk, were “Characters” (first printed
in the second of the 1614 editions), “The Remedy of Love”
(1620), and “Observations in Foreign Travels” (1626). Later,
much that must be spurious was added to the gathering snowball
of Overbury’s Works. Posterity has found the praise of
his contemporaries for the sententious and graceful moral verse of
Overbury extravagantly expressed. The Wife is smooth and
elegant, but uninspired. There is no question that the horrible
death of the writer, and the extraordinary way in which his
murderers were brought to justice, gave an extraneous charm
to his writings. Nor can we be quite sure that Overbury was
in fact such a “glorious constellation” of all the religious
virtues as the 17th century believed. He certainly kept very
bad company, and positive evidence of his goodness is wanting.
But no one was ever more transcendently canonized by becoming
the victim of conspirators whose crimes were equally detestable
and unpopular. (E. G.)
OVERDOOR, the name given to any ornamental moulding
placed over a door. The overdoor is usually architectural
in form, but is sometimes little more than a moulded shelf
for the reception of china or curiosities.
OVERMANTEL, the name given to decorative cabinet work,
or joinery, applied to the upper part of a fireplace. The overmantel
is derived from the carved panelling formerly applied
to chimney-pieces of importance, but the word is now generally
restricted to a movable fitment, often consisting of a series of
shelves and niches for the reception of ornaments.
OVERSOUL (Ger. Überseele), the name adopted by Emerson to describe his conception of that transcendent unity which embraces subject and object, mind and matter, and in which all the differences in virtue of which particular things exist are absorbed. The idea is analogous to the various doctrines of the absolute, and to the ἰδέα of Plato.
OVERSTONE, SAMUEL JONES LOYD, 1st Baron (1796–1883),
English banker, the only son of the Rev. Lewis Loyd,
a Welsh dissenting minister, was born on the 25th of September
1796. He was educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge.
His father, who had married a daughter of John Jones, a banker
of Manchester, had given up the ministry to take a partnership
in his father-in-law’s bank, and had afterwards founded the
London branch of Jones, Loyd & Co., afterwards incorporated in
the London and Westminster Bank. Loyd, who had joined his
father in the banking business, succeeded to it on the latter’s
retirement in 1844. He conducted the business so successfully
that on his death he left personal property of over £2,000,000.
He sat in parliament as liberal member for Hythe from 1819
to 1826, and unsuccessfully contested Manchester in 1832. As
early as 1832 he was recognized as one of the foremost authorities
on banking, and he enjoyed much influence with successive
ministries and chancellors of the exchequer. He was created
Baron Overstone in 1850. He died in London on the 17th of
November 1883, leaving one daughter, who married Robert
James Loyd-Lindsay, afterwards Lord Wantage.
OVERT ACT (O. Fr. overt, from ouvrir, to open), in law, an open
act, one that can be clearly proved by evidence, and from
which criminal intent can be inferred, as opposed to a mere
intention in the mind to commit a crime (see Intent). The
term is more particularly employed in cases of treason (q.v.), which
must be demonstrated by some overt or open act.
OVERTURE (Fr. ouverture, opening), in music, the instrumental introduction to a dramatic or choral composition. The
