See Mancel,Alain Chartier, étude bibliographique et littéraire, 8vo (Paris, 1849); D. Delaunay’sÉtude sur Alain Chartier(1876), with considerable extracts from his writings. His works were edited by A. Duchesne (Paris, 1617). On Jean Chartier see Vallet de Viriville, “Essais critiques sur les historiens originaux du règne de Charles VIII,” in theBibl. de l’École des Chartes(July-August 1857).
See Mancel,Alain Chartier, étude bibliographique et littéraire, 8vo (Paris, 1849); D. Delaunay’sÉtude sur Alain Chartier(1876), with considerable extracts from his writings. His works were edited by A. Duchesne (Paris, 1617). On Jean Chartier see Vallet de Viriville, “Essais critiques sur les historiens originaux du règne de Charles VIII,” in theBibl. de l’École des Chartes(July-August 1857).
CHARTISM,the name given to a movement for political reform in England, from the so-called “People’s Charter” or “National Charter,” the document in which in 1838 the scheme of reforms was embodied. The movement itself may be traced to the latter years of the 18th century. Checked for a while by the reaction due to the excesses of the French Revolution, it received a fresh impetus from the awful misery that followed the Napoleonic wars and the economic changes due to the introduction of machinery. The Six Acts of 1819 were directed, not only against agrarian and industrial rioting, but against the political movement of which Sir Francis Burdett was the spokesman in the House of Commons, which demanded manhood suffrage, the ballot, annual parliaments, the abolition of the property qualification for members of parliament and their payment. The movement was checked for a while by the Reform Bill of 1832; but it was soon discovered that, though the middle classes had been enfranchised, the economic and political grievances of the labouring population remained unredressed. Two separate movements now developed: one socialistic, associated with the name of Robert Owen; the other radical, aiming at the enfranchisement of the “masses” as the first step to the amelioration of their condition. The latter was represented in the Working Men’s Association, by which in 1838 the “People’s Charter” was drawn up. It embodied exactly the same programme as that of the radical reformers mentioned above, with the addition of a demand for equal electoral districts.
In support of this programme a vigorous agitation began, the principal leader of which was Feargus O’Connor, whose irresponsible and erratic oratory produced a vast effect. Monster meetings were held, at which seditious language was occasionally used, and slight collisions with the military took place. Petitions of enormous size, signed in great part with fictitious names, were presented to parliament; and a great many newspapers were started, of which theNorthern Star, conducted by Feargus O’Connor, had a circulation of 50,000. In November 1839 a Chartist mob consisting of miners and others made an attack on Newport, Mon. The rising was a total failure; the leaders, John Frost and two others, were seized, were found guilty of high treason, and were condemned to death. The sentence, however, was changed to one of transportation, and Frost spent over fourteen years in Van Diemen’s Land. In 1854 he was pardoned, and from 1856 until his death on the 29th of July 1877 he lived in England. In 1840 the Chartist movement was still further organized by the inauguration at Manchester of the NationalCharter Association, which rapidly became powerful, being the head of about 400 sister societies, which are said to have numbered 40,000 members. Some time after, efforts were made towards a coalition with the more moderate radicals, but these failed; and a land scheme was started by O’Connor, which prospered for a few years. In 1844 the uncompromising spirit of some of the leaders was well illustrated by their hostile attitude towards the Anti-Corn-Law League. O’Connor, especially, entered into a public controversy with Cobden and Bright, in which he was worsted. But it was not till 1848, during a season of great suffering among the working classes, and under the influence of the revolution at Paris, that the real strength of the Chartist movement was discovered and the prevalent discontent became known. Early in March disturbances occurred in Glasgow which required the intervention of the military, while in the manufacturing districts all over the west of Scotland the operatives were ready to rise in the event of the main movement succeeding. Some agitation, too, took place in Edinburgh and in Manchester, but of a milder nature; in fact, while there was a real and widespread discontent, men were indisposed to resort to decided measures.
The principal scene of intended Chartist demonstration was London. An enormous gathering of half a million was announced for the 10th of April on Kennington Common, from which they were to march to the Houses of Parliament to present a petition signed by nearly six million names, in order by this imposing display of numbers to secure the enactment of the six points. Probably some of the more violent members of the party thought to imitate the Parisian mob by taking power entirely into their own hands. The announcement of the procession excited great alarm, and the most decided measures were taken by the authorities to prevent a rising. The procession was forbidden. The military were called out under the command of the duke of Wellington, and by him concealed near the bridges and other points where the procession might attempt to force its way. Even the Bank of England and other public buildings were put in a state of defence, and special constables, to the number, it is said, of 170,000, were enrolled, one of whom was destined shortly after to be the emperor of the French. After all these gigantic preparations on both sides the Chartist demonstration proved to be a very insignificant affair. Instead of half a million, only about 50,000 assembled on Kennington Common, and their leaders, Feargus O’Connor and Ernest Charles Jones, shrank from the responsibility of braving the authorities by conducting the procession to the Houses of Parliament. The monster petition was duly presented, and scrutinized, with the result that the number of signatures was found to have been grossly exaggerated, and that the most unheard-of falsification of names had been resorted to. Thereafter the movement specially called Chartism soon died out. It became merged, so far as its political programme is concerned, with the advancing radicalism of the general democratic movement.
CHARTRES,a city of north-western France, capital of the department of Eure-et-Loir, 55 m. S.W. of Paris on the railway to Le Mans. Pop. (1906) 19,433. Chartres is built on the left bank of the Eure, on a hill crowned by its famous cathedral, the spires of which are a landmark in the surrounding country. To the south-east stretches the fruitful plain of Beauce, “the granary of France,” of which the town is the commercial centre. The Eure, which at this point divides into three branches, is crossed by several bridges, some of them ancient, and is fringed in places by remains of the old fortifications, of which the Porte Guillaume (14th century), a gateway flanked by towers, is the most complete specimen. The steep, narrow streets of the old town contrast with the wide, shady boulevards which encircle it and divide it from the suburbs. The Clos St Jean, a pleasant park, lies to the north-west, and squares and open spaces are numerous. The cathedral of Notre-Dame (seeArchitecture:Romanesque and Gothic Architecture in France; andCathedral), one of the finest Gothic churches in France, was founded in the 11th century by Bishop Fulbert on the site of an earlier church destroyed by fire. In 1194 another conflagration laid waste the new building then hardly completed; but clergy and people set zealously to work, and the main part of the present structure was finished by 1240. Though there have been numerous minor additions and alterations since that time, the general character of the cathedral is unimpaired. The upper woodwork was consumed by fire in 1836, but the rest of the building was saved. The statuary of the lateral portals, the stained glass of the 13th century, and the choir-screen of the Renaissance are all unique from the artistic standpoint. The cathedral is also renowned for the beauty and perfect proportions of its western towers. That to the south, the Clocher Vieux (351 ft. high), dates from the 13th century; its upper portion is lower and less rich in design than that of the Clocher Neuf (377 ft.), which was not completed till the 16th century. In length the cathedral measures 440 ft., its choir measures 150 ft. across, and the height of the vaulting is 121 ft. The abbey church of St Pierre, dating chiefly from the 13th century, contains, besides some fine stained glass, twelve representations of the apostles in enamel, executed about 1547 by Léonard Limosin. Of the other churches of Chartres the chief are St Aignan (13th, 16th and 17th centuries) and St Martin-au-Val (12th century). The hôtel de ville, a building of the 17th century, containing a museum and library, an older hôtel de ville of the 13th century, and several medieval and Renaissance houses, are of interest. There is a statue of General F.S. Marceau-Desgraviers (b. 1769), a native of the town.
The town is the seat of a bishop, a prefecture, a court of assizes, and has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a chamber of commerce, training colleges, a lycée for boys, a communal college for girls, and a branch of the Bank of France. Its trade is carried on chiefly on market-days, when the peasants of the Beauce bring their crops and live-stock to be sold and make their purchases. The game-pies and other delicacies of Chartres are well known, and the industries also include flour-milling, brewing, distilling, iron-founding, leather manufacture, dyeing, and the manufacture of stained glass, billiard requisites, hosiery, &c.
Chartres was one of the principal towns of the Carnutes, and by the Romans was calledAutricum, from the riverAutura(Eure), and afterwardscivitas Carnutum. It was burnt by the Normans in 858, and unsuccessfully besieged by them in 911. In 1417 it fell into the hands of the English, from whom it was recovered in 1432. It was attacked unsuccessfully by the Protestants in 1568, and was taken in 1591 by Henry IV., who was crowned there three years afterwards. In the Franco-German War it was seized by the Germans on the 21st of October 1870, and continued during the rest of the campaign an important centre of operations. During the middle ages it was the chief town of the district of Beauce, and gave its name to a countship which was held by the counts of Blois and Champagne and afterwards by the house of Châtillon, a member of which in 1286 sold it to the crown. It was raised to the rank of a duchy in 1528 by Francis I. After the time of Louis XIV. the title of duke of Chartres was hereditary in the family of Orleans.
See M.T. Bulteau,Monographie de la cathédrale de Chartres(1887); A. Pierval,Chartres, sa cathédrale, ses monuments(1896); H.J.L.J. Massé,Chartres: its Cathedral and Churches(1900).
See M.T. Bulteau,Monographie de la cathédrale de Chartres(1887); A. Pierval,Chartres, sa cathédrale, ses monuments(1896); H.J.L.J. Massé,Chartres: its Cathedral and Churches(1900).
CHARTREUSE,a liqueur, so called from having been made at the famous Carthusian monastery, La Grande Chartreuse, at Grenoble (see below). In consequence of the Associations Law, the Chartreux monks left France in 1904, and now continue the manufacture of this liqueur in Spain. There are two main varieties of Chartreuse, the green and the yellow. The green contains about 57, the yellow about 43% of alcohol. There are other differences due to the varying nature and quantity of the flavouring matters employed, but the secrets of manufacture are jealously guarded. The genuine liqueur is undoubtedly produced by means of a distillation process.
CHARTREUSE, LA GRANDE,the mother house of the very severe order of Carthusian monks (seeCarthusians). It is situated in the French department of the Isère, about 12½ m. N. of Grenoble, at a height of 3205 ft. above the sea, in the heart of a group of limestone mountains, and not far from the sourceof the Guiers Mort. The original settlement here was founded by St Bruno about 1084, and derived its name from the small village to the S.E., formerly known as Cartusia, and now as St Pierre de Chartreuse. The first convent on the present site was built between 1132 and 1137, but the actual buildings date only from about 1676, the older ones having been often burnt. The convent stands in a very picturesque position in a large meadow, sloping to the S.W., and watered by a tiny tributary of the Guiers Mort. On the north, fine forests extend to the Col de la Ruchère, and on the west rise well-wooded heights, while on the east tower white limestone ridges, culminating in the Grand Som (6670 ft.). One of the most famous of the early Carthusian monks was St Hugh of Lincoln, who lived here from 1160 to 1181, when he went to England to found the first Carthusian house at Witham in Somerset; in 1186 he became bishop of Lincoln, and before his death in 1200 had built the angel choir and other portions of the wonderful cathedral there.
The principal approach to the convent is from St Laurent du Pont, a village situated on the Guiers Mort, and largely built by the monks—it is connected by steam tramways with Voiron (for Grenoble) and St Béron (for Chambéry). Among the other routes may be mentioned those from Grenoble by Le Sappey, or by the Col de la Charmette, or from Chambéry by the Col de Couz and the village of Les Échelles. St Laurent is about 5½ m. from the convent. The road mounts along the Guiers Mort and soon reaches the hamlet of Fourvoirie, so called fromforata via, as about 1510 the road was first pierced hence towards the convent. Here are iron forges, and here was formerly the chief centre of the manufacture of the famed Chartreuse liqueur. Beyond, the road enters the “Désert” and passes through most delightful scenery. Some way farther the Guiers Mort is crossed by the modern bridge of St Bruno, the older bridge of Parant being still visible higher up the stream. Here begins the splendid carriage road, constructed by M.E. Viaud between 1854 and 1856. It soon passes beneath the bold pinnacle of the Oeillette or Aiguillette, beyond which formerly women were not allowed to penetrate. After passing through four tunnels the road bends north (leaving the Guiers Mort which flows past St Pierre de Chartreuse), and the valley soon opens to form the upland hollow in which are the buildings of the convent. These are not very striking, the high roofs of dark slate, the cross-surmounted turrets and the lofty clock-tower being the chief features. But the situation is one of ideal peace and repose. Women were formerly lodged in the old infirmary, close to the main gate, which is now a hôtel. Within the conventual buildings are four halls formerly used for the reception of the priors of the various branch houses in France, Italy, Burgundy and Germany. The very plain and unadorned chapel dates from the 15th century, but the cloisters, around which cluster the thirty-six small houses for the fully professed monks, are of later date. The library contained before the Revolution a very fine collection of books and MSS., now mostly in the town library at Grenoble.
The monks were expelled in 1793, but allowed to return in 1816, but then they had to pay rent for the use of the buildings and the forests around, though both one and the other were due to the industry of their predecessors. They were again expelled in 1904, and are dispersed in various houses in England, at Pinerolo (Italy) and at Tarragona (Spain). It is at the last-named spot that the various pharmaceutical preparations are now manufactured for which they are famous (though sold only since about 1840)—theElixir, theBoule d’acier(a mineral paste or salve), and the celebratedliqueur. The magnificent revenues derived from the profits of this manufacture were devoted by the monks to various purposes of benevolence, especially in the neighbouring villages, which owe to this source their churches, schools, hospitals, &c., &c., built and maintained at the expense of the monks.
SeeLa Grande Chartreuse par un Chartreux(Grenoble, 1898); H. Ferrand,Guide à la Grande Chartreuse(1889); andLes Montagnes de la Chartreuse(1899)
SeeLa Grande Chartreuse par un Chartreux(Grenoble, 1898); H. Ferrand,Guide à la Grande Chartreuse(1889); andLes Montagnes de la Chartreuse(1899)
(W. A. B. C.)
CHARWOMAN,one who is hired to do occasional household work. “Char” or “chare,” which forms the first part of the word, is common, in many forms, to Teutonic languages, meaning a “turn,” and, in this original sense, is seen in “ajar,” properly “on char,” of a door “on the turn” in the act of closing. It is thus applied to a “turn of work,” an odd job, and is so used, in the form “chore,” in America, and in dialects of the south-west of England.
CHASE, SALMON PORTLAND(1808-1873), American statesman and jurist, was born in Cornish township, New Hampshire, on the 13th of January 1808. His father died in 1817, and the son passed several years (1820-1824) in Ohio with his uncle, Bishop Philander Chase (1775-1852), the foremost pioneer of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the West, the first bishop of Ohio (1819-1831), and after 1835 bishop of Illinois. He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1826, and after studying law under William Wirt, attorney-general of the United States, in Washington, D.C., was admitted to the bar in 1829, and removed to Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1830. Here he soon gained a position of prominence at the bar, and published an annotated edition, which long remained standard, of the laws of Ohio. At a time when public opinion in Cincinnati was largely dominated by Southern business connexions, Chase, influenced probably by James G. Birney, associated himself after about 1836 with the anti-slavery movement, and became recognized as the leader of the political reformers as opposed to the Garrisonian abolitionists. To the cause he freely gave his services as a lawyer, and was particularly conspicuous as counsel for fugitive slaves seized in Ohio for rendition to slavery under the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793—indeed, he came to be known as the “attorney-general of fugitive slaves.” His argument (1847) in the famous Van Zandt case before the United States Supreme Court attracted particular attention, though in this as in other cases of the kind the judgment was against him. In brief he contended that slavery was “local, not national,” that it could exist only by virtue of positive State Law, that the Federal government was not empowered by the Constitution to create slavery anywhere, and that “when a slave leaves the jurisdiction of a state he ceases to be a slave, because he continues to be a man and leaves behind him the law which made him a slave.” In 1841 he abandoned the Whig party, with which he had previously been affiliated, and for seven years was the undisputed leader of the Liberty party in Ohio; he was remarkably skilful in drafting platforms and addresses, and it was he who prepared the national Liberty platform of 1843 and the Liberty address of 1845. Realizing in time that a third party movement could not succeed, he took the lead during the campaign of 1848 in combining the Liberty party with the Barnburners or Van Buren Democrats of New York to form the Free-Soilers. He drafted the famous Free-Soil platform, and it was largely through his influence that Van Buren was nominated for the presidency. His object, however, was not to establish a permanent new party organization, but to bring pressure to bear upon Northern Democrats to force them to adopt a policy opposed to the further extension of slavery.
In 1849 he was elected to the United States Senate as the result of a coalition between the Democrats and a small group of Free-Soilers in the state legislature; and for some years thereafter, except in 1852, when he rejoined the Free-Soilers, he classed himself as an Independent Democrat, though he was out of harmony with the leaders of the Democratic party. During his service in the Senate (1849-1855) he was pre-eminently the champion of anti-slavery in that body, and no one spoke more ably than he did against the Compromise Measures of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Bill of 1854. The Kansas-Nebraska legislation, and the subsequent troubles in Kansas, having convinced him of the futility of trying to influence the Democrats, he assumed the leadership in the North-west of the movement to form a new party to oppose the extension of slavery. The “Appeal of the Independent Democrats in Congress to the People of the United States,” written by Chase and Giddings, and published in the New YorkTimesof the 24th of January 1854, may be regarded as the earliest draft of the Republican party creed. He was the first Republican governor of Ohio,serving from 1855 to 1859. Although, with the exception of Seward, he was the most prominent Republican in the country, and had done more against slavery than any other Republican, he failed to secure the nomination for the presidency in 1860, partly because his views on the question of protection were not orthodox from a Republican point of view, and partly because the old line Whig element could not forgive his coalition with the Democrats in the senatorial campaign of 1849; his uncompromising and conspicuous anti-slavery record, too, was against him from the point of view of “availability.” As secretary of the treasury in President Lincoln’s cabinet in 1861-1864, during the first three years of the Civil War, he rendered services of the greatest value. That period of crisis witnessed two great changes in American financial policy, the establishment of a national banking system and the issue of a legal tender paper currency. The former was Chase’s own particular measure. He suggested the idea, worked out all of the important principles and many of the details, and induced Congress to accept them. The success of that system alone warrants his being placed in the first rank of American financiers. It not only secured an immediate market for government bonds, but it also provided a permanent uniform national currency, which, though inelastic, is absolutely stable. The issue of legal tenders, the greatest financial blunder of the war, was made contrary to his wishes, although he did not, as he perhaps ought to have done, push his opposition to the point of resigning.
Perhaps Chase’s chief defect as a statesman was an insatiable desire for supreme office. It was partly this ambition, and also temperamental differences from the president, which led him to retire from the cabinet in June 1864. A few months later (December 6, 1864) he was appointed chief justice of the United States Supreme Court to succeed Judge Taney, a position which he held until his death in 1873. Among his most important decisions wereTexas v. White(7 Wallace, 700), 1869, in which he asserted that the Constitution provided for an “indestructible union composed of indestructible states,”Veazie Bankv.Fenno(8 Wallace, 533), 1869, in defence of that part of the banking legislation of the Civil War which imposed a tax of 10% on state bank-notes, andHepburnv.Griswold(8 Wallace, 603), 1869, which declared certain parts of the legal tender acts to be unconstitutional. When the legal tender decision was reversed after the appointment of new judges, 1871-1872 (Legal Tender Cases, 12 Wallace, 457), Chase prepared a very able dissenting opinion. Toward the end of his life he gradually drifted back toward his old Democratic position, and made an unsuccessful effort to secure the nomination of the Democratic party for the presidency in 1872. He died in New York city on the 7th of May 1873. Chase was one of the ablest political leaders of the Civil War period, and deserves to be placed in the front rank of American statesmen.
The standard biography is A.B. Hart’sSalmon Portland Chasein the “American Statesmen Series” (1899). Less philosophical, but containing a greater wealth of detail, is J.W. Shuckers’Life and Public Services of Salmon Portland Chase(New York, 1874). R.B. Warden’sAccount of the Private Life and Public Services of Salmon Portland Chase(Cincinnati, 1874) deals more fully with Chase’s private life.
The standard biography is A.B. Hart’sSalmon Portland Chasein the “American Statesmen Series” (1899). Less philosophical, but containing a greater wealth of detail, is J.W. Shuckers’Life and Public Services of Salmon Portland Chase(New York, 1874). R.B. Warden’sAccount of the Private Life and Public Services of Salmon Portland Chase(Cincinnati, 1874) deals more fully with Chase’s private life.
CHASE, SAMUEL(1741-1811), American jurist, was born in Somerset county, Maryland, on the 17th of April 1741. He was admitted to the bar at Annapolis in 1761, and for more than twenty years was a member of the Maryland legislature. He took an active part in the resistance to the Stamp Act, and from 1774 to 1778 and 1784 to 1785 was a member of the Continental Congress. With Benjamin Franklin and Charles Carroll he was sent by Congress in 1776 to win over the Canadians to the side of the revolting colonies, and after his return did much to persuade Maryland to advocate a formal separation of the thirteen colonies from Great Britain, he himself being one of those who signed the Declaration of Independence on the 2nd of August 1776. In this year he was also a member of the convention which framed the first constitution for the state of Maryland. After serving in the Maryland convention which ratified for that state the Federal Constitution, and there vigorously opposing ratification, though afterwards he was an ardent Federalist, he became in 1791 chief judge of the Maryland general court, which position he resigned in 1796 for that of an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. His radical Federalism, however, led him to continue active in politics, and he took advantage of every opportunity, on the bench and off, to promote the cause of his party. His overbearing conduct while presiding at the trials of John Fries for treason, and of James Thompson Callender (d. 1813) for seditious libel in 1800, drove the lawyers for the defence from the court, and evoked the wrath of the Republicans, who were stirred to action by a political harangue on the evil tendencies of democracy which he delivered as a charge to a grand jury at Baltimore in 1803. The House of Representatives adopted a resolution of impeachment in March 1804, and on the 7th of December 1804 the House managers, chief among whom were John Randolph, Joseph H. Nicholson (1770-1817), and Caesar A. Rodney (1772-1824), laid their articles of impeachment before the Senate. The trial, with frequent interruptions and delays, lasted from the 2nd of January to the 1st of March 1805. Judge Chase was defended by the ablest lawyers in the country, including Luther Martin, Robert Goodloe Harper (1765-1825), Philip Barton Key (1757-1815), Charles Lee (1758-1815), and Joseph Hopkinson (1770-1842). The indictment, in eight articles, dealt with his conduct in the Fries and Callender trials, with his treatment of a Delaware grand jury, and (in article viii.) with his making “highly indecent, extra-judicial” reflections upon the national administration, probably the greatest offence in Republican eyes. On only three articles was there a majority against Judge Chase, the largest, on article viii., being four short of the necessary two-thirds to convict. “The case,” says Henry Adams, “proved impeachment to be an impracticable thing for partisan purposes, and it decided the permanence of those lines of constitutional development which were a reflection of the common law.” Judge Chase resumed his seat on the bench, and occupied it until his death on the 19th of June 1811.
SeeThe Trial of Samuel Chase(2 vols., Washington, 1805), reported by Samuel H. Smith and Thomas Lloyd; an article inThe American Law Review, vol. xxxiii. (St Louis, Mo., 1899); and Henry Adams’sHistory of the United States, vol. ii. (New York, 1889).
SeeThe Trial of Samuel Chase(2 vols., Washington, 1805), reported by Samuel H. Smith and Thomas Lloyd; an article inThe American Law Review, vol. xxxiii. (St Louis, Mo., 1899); and Henry Adams’sHistory of the United States, vol. ii. (New York, 1889).
CHASE, WILLIAM MERRITT(1849- ), American painter, was born at Franklin, Indiana, on the 1st of November 1849. He was a pupil of B.F. Hays at Indianapolis, of J.O. Eaton in New York, and subsequently of A. Wagner and Piloty in Munich. In New York he established a school of his own, after teaching with success for some years at the Art Students’ League. A worker in all mediums—oils, water-colour, pastel and etching—painting with distinction the figure, landscape and still-life, he is perhaps best known by his portraits, his sitters numbering some of the most important men and women of his time. Mr Chase won many honours at home and abroad, became a member of the National Academy of Design, New York, and for ten years was president of the Society of American Artists. Among his important canvases are “Ready for the Ride” (Union League Club, N.Y.), “The Apprentice,” “Court Jester,” and portraits of the painters Whistler and Duveneck; of General Webb and of Peter Cooper.
CHASE.(1) (Fr.chasse, from Lat.captare, frequentative ofcapere, to take), the pursuit of wild animals for food or sport (seeHunting). The word is used of the pursuit of anything, and also of the thing pursued, as, in naval warfare, of a ship. A transferred meaning is that of park land reserved for the breeding and hunting of wild animals, in which sense it appears in various place-names in England, as Cannock Chase. It is also a term for a stroke in tennis (q.v.). (2) (Fr.châsse, Lat.capsa, a box, cf.caisse, and “chest”), an enclosure, such as the muzzle-end of a gun in front of the trunnions, a groove cut to hold a pipe, and, in typography, the frame enclosing the “forme.”
CHASING,orEnchasing, the art of producing figures and ornamental patterns, either raised or indented, on metallic surfaces by means of steel tools or punches. It is practisedextensively for the ornamentation of goldsmith and silversmith work, electro-plate and similar objects, being employed to produce bold flutings and bosses, and in another manner utilized for imitating engraved surfaces. Minute work can be produced by this method, perfect examples of which may be seen in the watch-cases chased by G.M. Moser, R.A. (1704-1783). The chaser first outlines the pattern on the surface he is to ornament, after which, if the work involves bold or high embossments, these are blocked out by a process termed “snarling.” The snarling iron is a long iron tool turned up at the end, and made so that when securely fastened in a vise the upturned end can reach and press against any portion of the interior of the vase or other object to be chased. The part to be raised being held firmly against the upturned point of the snarling iron, the workman gives the shoulder or opposite end of the iron a sharp blow, which causes the point applied to the work to give it a percussive stroke, and thus throw up the surface of the metal held against the tool. When the blocking out from the interior is finished, or when no such embossing is required, the object to be chased is filled with molten pitch, which is allowed to harden. It is then fastened to a sandbag, and with hammer and a multitude of small punches of different outline the whole details of the pattern, lined, smooth or “matt,” are worked out. Embossing and stamping from steel dies and rolled ornaments have long since taken the place of chased ornamentations in the cheaper kinds of plated works. (SeeEmbossing.)
CHASLES, VICTOR EUPHÉMIEN PHILARÈTE(1798-1873), French critic and man of letters, was born at Mainvilliers (Eure et Loir) on the 8th of October 1798. His father, Pierre Jacques Michel Chasles (1754-1826), was a member of the Convention, and was one of those who voted the death of Louis XVI. He brought up his son according to the principles of Rousseau’sÉmile, and the boy, after a régime of outdoor life, followed by some years’ classical study, was apprenticed to a printer, so that he might make acquaintance with manual labour. His master was involved in one of the plots of 1815, and Philarète suffered two months’ imprisonment. On his release he was sent to London, where he worked for the printer Valpy on editions of classical authors. He wrote articles for the English reviews, and on his return to France did much to popularize the study of English authors. He was also one of the earliest to draw attention in France to Scandinavian and Russian literature. He contributed to theRevue des deux mondes, until he had a violent quarrel, terminating in a lawsuit, with François Buloz, who won his case. He became librarian of the Bibliothèque Mazarine, and from 1841 was professor of comparative literature at the Collège de France. During his active life he produced some fifty volumes of literary history and criticism, and of social history, much of which is extremely valuable. He died at Venice on the 18th of July 1873. His son, Émile Chasles (b. 1827), was a philologist of some reputation.
Among his best critical works isDix-huitième Siècle en Angleterre... (1846), one of a series of 20 vols. ofÉtudes de littérature comparée(1846-1875), which he called laterTrente ans de critique. An account of his strenuous boyhood is given in hisMaison de mon père. HisMémoires(1876-1877) did not fulfil the expectations based on his brilliant talk.
Among his best critical works isDix-huitième Siècle en Angleterre... (1846), one of a series of 20 vols. ofÉtudes de littérature comparée(1846-1875), which he called laterTrente ans de critique. An account of his strenuous boyhood is given in hisMaison de mon père. HisMémoires(1876-1877) did not fulfil the expectations based on his brilliant talk.
CHASSE(from the Fr., in fullchasse-café, or “coffee-chaser”), a draught of spirit or liqueur, taken with or after coffee, &c.
CHASSÉ(Fr. for “chased”), a gliding step in dancing, so called since one foot is brought up behind or chases the other. Thechassé croiséis a double variety of the step.
CHASSELOUP-LAUBAT, FRANÇOIS,Marquis de(1754-1833), French general and military engineer, was born at St Sernin (Lower Charente) on the 18th of August 1754, of a noble family, and entered the French engineers in 1774. He was still a subaltern at the outbreak of the Revolution, becoming captain in 1791. His ability as a military engineer was recognized in the campaigns of 1792 and 1793. In the following year he won distinction in various actions and was promoted successivelychef de bataillonand colonel. He was chief of engineers at the siege of Mainz in 1796, after which he was sent to Italy. He there conducted the first siege of Mantua, and reconnoitred the positions and lines of advance of the army of Bonaparte. He was promoted general of brigade before the close of the campaign, and was subsequently employed in fortifying the new Rhine frontier of France. His work as chief of engineers in the army of Italy (1799) was conspicuously successful, and after the battle of Novi he was made general of division. When Napoleon took the field in 1800 to retrieve the disasters of 1799, he again selected Chasseloup as his engineer general. During the peace of 1801-1805 he was chiefly employed in reconstructing the defences of northern Italy, and in particular the afterwards famous Quadrilateral. Hischef-d’oeuvrewas the great fortress of Alessandria on the Tanaro. In 1805 he remained in Italy with Masséna, but at the end of 1806 Napoleon, then engaged in the Polish campaign, called him to theGrande Armée, with which he served in the campaign of 1806-07, directing the sieges of Colberg, Danzig and Stralsund. During the Napoleonic domination in Germany, Chasseloup reconstructed many fortresses, in particular Magdeburg. In the campaign of 1809 he again served in Italy. In 1810 Napoleon made him a councillor of state. His last campaign was that of 1812 in Russia. He retired from active service soon afterwards, though in 1814 he was occasionally engaged in the inspection and construction of fortifications. Louis XVIII. made him a peer of France and a knight of St Louis. He refused to join Napoleon in the Hundred Days, but after the second Restoration he voted in the chamber of peers against the condemnation of Marshal Ney. In politics he belonged to the constitutional party. The king created him a marquis. Chasseloup’s later years were employed chiefly in putting in order his manuscripts, a task which he had to abandon owing to the failure of his sight. His only published work wasCorrespondence d’un général français, &c. sur divers sujets(Paris, 1801, republished Milan, 1805 and 1811, under the titleCorrespondance de deux générals, &c., essais sur quelques parties d’artillerie et de fortification). The most important of his papers are in manuscript in the Depôt of Fortifications, Paris.
As an engineer Chasseloup was an adherent, though of advanced views, of the old bastioned system. He followed in many respects the engineer Bousmard, whose work was published in 1797 and who fell, as a Prussian officer, in the defence of Danzig in 1807 against Chasseloup’s own attack. His front was applied to Alessandria, as has been stated, and contains many elaborations of the bastion trace, with, in particular, masked flanks in the tenaille, which served as extra flanks of the bastions. The bastion itself was carefully and minutely retrenched. The ordinary ravelin he replaced by a heavy casemated caponier after the example of Montalembert, and, like Bousmard’s, his own ravelin was a large and powerful work pushed out beyond the glacis.
CHASSEPOT,officially “fusil modèle 1866,” a military breech-loading rifle, famous as the arm of the French forces in the Franco-German War of 1870-71. It was so called after its inventor, Antoine Alphonse Chassepot (1833-1905), who, from 1857 onwards, had constructed various experimental forms of breech-loader, and it became the French service weapon in 1866. In the following year it made its first appearance on the battle-field at Mentana (November 3rd, 1867), where it inflicted severe losses upon Garibaldi’s troops. In the war of 1870 it proved very greatly superior to the German needle-gun. The breech was closed by a bolt very similar to those of more modern rifles, and amongst the technical features of interest were the method of obturation, which was similar in principle to the de Bange obturator for heavy guns (seeOrdnance), and the retention of the paper cartridge. The principal details of the chassepot are:—weight of rifle, 9 ℔ 5 oz.; length with bayonet, 6 ft. 2 in.; calibre, .433 in.; weight of bullet (lead), 386 grains; weight of charge (black powder), 86.4 grains; muzzle velocity, 1328 f.s.; sighted to 1312 yds. (1200 m.). The chassepot was replaced in 1874 by the Gras rifle, which had a metal cartridge, and all rifles of the older model remaining in store were converted to take the same ammunition (fusil modèle 1866/74).
CHASSÉSRIAU, THÉODORE(1819-1856), French painter, was born in the Antilles, and studied under Ingres at Paris andat Rome, subsequently falling under the influence of Paul Delaroche. He was a well-known painter of portraits and historical pieces, his “Tepidarium at Pompeii” (1853) being now in the Louvre.
CHASSIS(Fr.châssis, a frame, from the Late. Lat.capsum, an enclosed space), properly a window-frame, from which is derived the word “sash”; also the movable traversing frame of a gun, and more particularly that part of a motor vehicle consisting of the wheels, frame and machinery, on which the body or carriage part rests.
CHASTELARD, PIERRE DE BOCSOZEL DE(1540-1563), French poet, was born in Dauphiné, a scion of the house of Bayard. His name is inseparably connected with Mary, queen of Scots. From the service of the Constable Montmorency, Chastelard, then a page, passed to the household of Marshal Damville, whom he accompanied in his journey to Scotland in escort of Mary (1561). He returned to Paris in the marshal’s train, but left for Scotland again shortly afterward, bearing letters of recommendation to Mary from his old protector, Montmorency, and theRegretsaddressed to the ex-queen of France by Pierre Ronsard, his master in the art of song. He undertook to transmit to the poet the service of plate with which Mary rewarded him. But he had fallen in love with the queen, who is said to have encouraged his passion. Copies of verse passed between them; she lost no occasion of showing herself partial to his person and conversation. The young man hid himself under her bed, where he was discovered by her maids of honour. Mary pardoned the offence, and the old familiar terms between them were resumed. Chastelard was so rash as again to violate her privacy. He was discovered a second time, seized, sentenced and hanged the next morning. He met his fate valiantly and consistently, reading, on his way to the scaffold, his master’s nobleHymne de la mort, and turning at the instant of doom towards the palace of Holyrood, to address to his unseen mistress the famous farewell—“Adieu, toi si belle et si cruelle, qui me tues et que je ne puis cesser d’aimer.” This at least is the version of theMémoiresof Brantôme, who is, however, notoriously untrustworthy. But for his madness of love, it is possible that Chastelard would have left no shadow or shred of himself behind. As it is, his life and death are of interest as illustrating the wild days in which his lot was cast.
CHASTELLAIN, GEORGES(d. 1475), Burgundian chronicler, was a native of Alost in Flanders. He derived his surname from the fact that his ancestors were burgraves or châtelains of the town; his parents, who belonged to illustrious Flemish families, were probably the Jean Chastellain and his wife Marie de Masmines mentioned in the town records in 1425 and 1432. A copy of an epitaph originally at Valenciennes states that he died on the 20th of March 1474-5 aged seventy. But since he states that he was so young a child in 1430 that he could not recollect the details of events in that year, and since he was “écolier” at Louvain in 1430, his birth may probably be placed nearer 1415 than 1405. He saw active service in the Anglo-French wars and probably elsewhere, winning the surname ofL’adventureux. In 1434 he received a gift from Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, for his military services, but on the conclusion of the peace of Arras in the next year he abandoned soldiering for diplomacy. The next ten years were spent in France, where he was connected with Georges de la Trémoille, and afterwards entered the household of Pierre de Brézé, at that time seneschal of Poitou, by whom he was employed on missions to the duke of Burgundy, in an attempt to establish better relations between Charles VII. and the duke. During these years Chastellain had ample opportunity of obtaining an intimate knowledge of French affairs, but on the further breach between the two princes, Chastellain left the French service to enter Philip’s household. He was at first pantler, then carver, titles which are misleading as to the nature of his services, which were those of a diplomatist; and in 1457 he became a member of the ducal council. He was continually employed on diplomatic errands until 1455, when, owing apparently to ill-health, he received apartments in the palace of the counts of Hainaut at Salle-le-Comte, Valenciennes, with a considerable pension, on condition that the recipient should put in writing “choses nouvelles et morales,” and a chronicle of notable events. That is to say, he was appointed Burgundian historiographer with a recommendation to write also on other subjects not strictly within the scope of a chronicler. From this time he worked hard at hisChronique, with occasional interruptions in his retreat to fulfil missions in France, or to visit the Burgundian court. He was assisted, from about 1463 onwards, by his disciple and continuator, Jean Molinet, whose rhetorical and redundant style may be fairly traced in some passages of theChronique. Charles the Bold maintained the traditions of his house as a patron of literature, and showed special favour to Chastellain, who, after being constitutedindiciaireor chronicler of the order of the Golden Fleece, was himself made a knight of the order on the 2nd of May 1473. He died at Valenciennes on the 13th of February (according to the treasury accounts), or on the 20th of March (according to his epitaph) 1475. He left an illegitimate son, to whom was paid in 1524 one hundred and twenty livres for a copy of theChroniqueintended for Charles V.’s sister Mary, queen of Hungary. Only about one-third of the whole work, which extended from 1410 to 1474, is known to be in existence, but MSS. carried by the Habsburgs to Vienna or Madrid may possibly yet be discovered.
Among his contemporaries Chastellain acquired a great reputation by his poems and occasional pieces now little considered. The unfinished state of hisChroniqueat the time of his death, coupled with political considerations, may possibly account for the fact that it remained unprinted during the century that followed his death, and his historical work was only disinterred from the libraries of Arras, Paris and Brussels by the painstaking researches of M. Buchon in 1825. Chastellain was constantly engaged during the earlier part of his career in negotiations between the French and Burgundian courts, and thus had personal knowledge of the persons and events dealt with in his history. A partisan element in writing of French affairs was inevitable in a Burgundian chronicle. This defect appears most strongly in his treatment of Joan of Arc; and the attack on Agnes Sorel seems to have been dictated by the dauphin (afterwards Louis XI.), then a refugee in Burgundy, of whom he was afterwards to become a severe critic. He was not, however, misled, as his more picturesque predecessor Froissart had been, by feudal and chivalric tradition into misconception of the radical injustice of the English cause in France; and except in isolated instances where Burgundian interests were at stake, he did full justice to the patriotism of Frenchmen. Among his most sympathetic portraits are those of his friend Pierre de Brézé and of Jacques Cœur. His French style, based partly on his Latin reading, has, together with its undeniable vigour and picturesqueness, the characteristic redundance and rhetorical quality of the Burgundian school. Chastellain was no mere annalist, but proposed to fuse and shape his vast material to his own conclusions, in accordance with his political experience. The most interesting feature of his work is the skill with which he pictures the leading figures of his time. His “characters” are the fruit of acute and experienced observation, and abound in satirical traits, although the 42nd chapter of his second book, devoted expressly to portraiture, is headed “Comment Georges escrit et mentionne les louanges vertueuses des princes de son temps.”