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    "source_title": "Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911)",
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    "chunk_id": "1911:crabbe:132a1332ac1b",
    "title": "CRABBE",
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    "verified_text": "crabbe, george (1754-1832), english poet, was born at aldeburgh in suffolk on the 24th of december 1754. his family was partly of norfolk, partly of suffolk origin, and the name was doubtless originally derived from \"crab.\" his grandfather, robert crabbe, was the first of the family to settle at aldeburgh, where he held the appointment of collector of customs. he died in 1734, leaving one son, george, who practised many occupations, including that of a schoolmaster, in the adjoining village of orford. finally the poet's father obtained a small post in the customs of aldeburgh, married mary lodwick, the widow of a publican, and had six children, of whom george was the eldest. the sea has swept away the small cottage that was george crabbe's birthplace, but one may still visit the quay at slaughden, some half-mile from the town, where the father worked and the son was at a later date to work with him. at first attending a dame's school in aldeburgh, when nine or ten years of age he was sent to a boarding-school at bungay, and at twelve to a school at stowmarket, where he remained two years. his father dreamt of the medical profession for his clever boy, and so in 1768 he went to wickham brook near newmarket as an apothecary's assistant. in 1771 we find him assisting a surgeon at woodbridge, and it was while here that he met sarah elmy. crabbe was now only eighteen years of age, but he became \"engaged\" to this lady in 1772. it was not until 1783 that the pair were married. the intervening years were made up of painful struggle, in which, however, not only the affection but the purse of his betrothed assisted him. about the time of crabbe's return from woodbridge to aldeburgh he published at ipswich his first work, a poem entitled _inebriety_ (1775). he found his father fallen on evil days. there was no money to assist him to a partnership, and surgery for the moment seemed out of the question. for a few weeks crabbe worked as a common labourer, rolling butter casks on slaughden quay. before the year was out, however, the young man bought on credit \"the shattered furniture of an apothecary's shop and the drugs that stocked it.\" this was at aldeburgh. a year later crabbe installed a deputy in the surgery and paid his first visit to london. he lodged in whitechapel, took lessons in midwifery and walked the hospitals. returning to aldeburgh after nine months--in 1777--he found his practice gone. even as a doctor for the poor he was an utter failure, poetry having probably taken too firm a hold upon his mind. at times he suffered hunger, so utterly unable was he to earn a livelihood. after three years of this, in 1780 crabbe paid his second visit to london, enabled thereto by the loan of five pounds from dudley lang, a local magnate. this visit to london, which was undertaken by sea on board the \"unity\" smack, made for crabbe a successful career. his poem _the candidate_, issued soon after his arrival, helped not at all. for a time he almost starved, and was only saved, it is clear, by gifts of money from his sweetheart sarah elmy. he importuned the great, and the publishers also. everywhere he was refused, but at length a letter which reached edmund burke in march 1781 led to the careful consideration on the part of that great man of crabbe's many manuscripts. burke advised the publication of _the library_, which appeared in 1781. he invited him to beaconsfield, and made interest in the right quarters to secure crabbe's entry into the church. he was ordained in december 1781 and was appointed curate to the rector of aldeburgh. crabbe was not happy in his new post. the aldeburgh folk could not reverence as priest a man they had known as a day labourer. crabbe again appealed to burke, who persuaded the duke of rutland to make him his chaplain (1782), and crabbe took up his residence in belvoir castle, accompanying his new patron to london, when lord chancellor thurlow (who told him he was \"as like parson adams as twelve to the dozen\") gave him the two livings of frome st quentin and evershot in dorsetshire, worth together about l200 a year. in may 1783 crabbe's poem _the village_ was published by dodsley, and in december of this year he married sarah elmy. crabbe continued his duties as ducal chaplain, being in the main a non-resident priest so far as his dorsetshire parishes were concerned. in 1785 he published _the newspaper_. shortly after this he moved with his wife from belvoir castle to the parsonage of stathern, where he took the duties of the non-resident vicar thomas parke, archdeacon of stamford. crabbe was at stathern for four years. in 1789, through the persuasion of the duchess of rutland (now a widow, the duke having died in dublin as lord-lieutenant of ireland in 1787), thurlow gave crabbe the two livings of muston in leicestershire and west allington in lincolnshire. at muston parsonage crabbe resided for twelve years, divided by a long interval. he had been four years at muston when his wife inherited certain interests in a property of her uncle's that placed her and her husband in possession of ducking hall, parham, suffolk. here he took up his residence from 1793 to 1796, leaving curates in charge of his two livings. in 1796 the loss of their son edmund led the crabbes to remove from parham to great glemham hall, suffolk, where they lived until 1801. in that year crabbe went to live at rendham, a village in the same neighbourhood. in 1805 he returned to muston. in 1807 he broke a silence of more than twenty years by the publication of _the parish register_, in 1810 of _the borough_, and in 1812 of _tales in verse_. in 1813 crabbe's wife died, and in 1814 he was given the living of trowbridge, wiltshire, by the duke of rutland, a son of his early patron, who, it is interesting to recall, wanted the living of muston for a cousin of lord byron. from 1814 to his death in 1832 crabbe resided at trowbridge. these last years were the most prosperous of his life. he was a constant visitor to london, and in friendship with all the literary celebrities of the time. \"crabbe seemed to grow young again,\" remarks his biographer, m. rene huchon. he certainly carried on a succession of mild flirtations, and one of his parishioners, charlotte ridout, would have married him. the elderly widower had proposed to her and had been accepted in 1814, but he drew out of the engagement in 1816. he proposed to yet another friend, elizabeth charter, somewhat later. in his visits to london crabbe was the guest of samuel rogers, in st james's place, and was a frequent visitor to holland house, where he met his brother poets moore and campbell. in 1817 his _tales of the hall_ were completed, and john murray offered l3000 for the copyright, crabbe's previous works being included. the offer after much negotiation was accepted, but crabbe's popularity was now on the wane. in 1822 crabbe went to edinburgh on a visit to sir walter scott. the adventure, complicated as it was by the visit of george iv. about the same time, is most amusingly described in lockhart's biography of scott, although one episode--that of the broken wine-glass--is discredited by crabbe's biographer, m. huchon. crabbe died at trowbridge on the 3rd of february 1832, and was buried in trowbridge church, where an ornate monument was placed over his tomb in august 1833. never was any poet at the same time so great and continuous a favourite with the critics, and yet so conspicuously allowed to fall into oblivion by the public. all the poets of his earlier and his later years, cowper, scott, byron, shelley in particular, have been reprinted again and again. with crabbe it was long quite otherwise. his works were collected into eight volumes, the first containing his life by his son, in 1832. the edition was intended to continue with some of his prose writings, but the reception of the eight volumes was not sufficiently encouraging. a reprint, however, in one volume was made in 1847, and it has been reproduced since in 1854, 1867 and 1901. the exhaustion of the copyright, however, did no good for crabbe's reputation, and it was not until the end of the century that sundry volumes of \"selections\" from his poems appeared; edward fitzgerald, of omar khayyam fame, always a loyal admirer, made a \"selection,\" privately printed by quaritch, in 1879. a \"selection\" by bernard holland appeared in 1899, another by c. h. herford in 1902 and a third by deane in 1903. the _complete works_ were published by the cambridge university press in three volumes, edited by a. w. ward, in 1906. crabbe's poems have been praised by many competent pens, by edward fitzgerald in his _letters_, by cardinal newman in his _apologia_, and by sir leslie stephen in his _hours in a library_, most notably. his verses comforted the last hours of charles james fox and of sir walter scott, while thomas hardy has acknowledged their influence on the realism of his novels. but his works have ceased to command a wide public interest. he just failed of being the artist in words who is able to make the same appeal in all ages. yet to-day his poems will well repay perusal. his stories are profoundly poignant and when once read are never forgotten. he is one of the great realists of english fiction, for even considered as a novelist he makes fascinating reading. he is more than this: for there is true poetry in crabbe, although his most distinctively lyric note was attained when he wrote under the influence of opium, to which he became much addicted in his later years. bibliography.--_the works of crabbe_ (8 vols., murray, 1834; 1 vol., murray, 1901), and the _works_ in the cambridge press classics, edited by a. w. ward (1906), have already been referred to. the life by crabbe's son in one volume, _the life of the rev. george crabbe, ll.b., by his son the rev. george crabbe, a.m._ (1834), has not been separately reprinted as it deserves to be. a recent biography is _george crabbe and his times, 1754-1832; a critical and biographical study_, by rene huchon, translated from the french by frederick clarke (1907). brief biographies by t. h. kebbel (\"great writers\" series) and by canon ainger (\"english men of letters\" series) also deserve attention. (c. k. s.) cracker (from \"crack,\" a common teutonic word, cf. ger. _krachen_, dutch _kraken_, meaning to break with a sharp sound), that which \"cracks\"; it is, therefore, applied (1) to a firework so constructed that it explodes with several reports and jumps at each explosion, when placed on the ground (see fireworks); (2) to a roll of coloured and ornamented paper containing sweets, small articles of cheap jewelry, paper caps and other trifles, together with a strip of card with a fulminant which explodes with a \"crack\" on being pulled; (3) to a thin crisp biscuit (q.v.); in america the general name for a biscuit. in the southern states of america, \"cracker\" is a term of contempt for the \"poor\" or \"mean whites,\" particularly of georgia and florida; the term is an old one and dates back to the revolution, and is supposed to be derived from the \"cracked corn\" which formed the staple food of the class to whom the term refers. cracow (pol. _krakov_; ger. _krakau_), a town and episcopal see of austria, in galicia, 212 m. w. by n. of lemberg by rail. pop. (1900) 91,310, of which 21,000 were jews, 5000 germans and the remainder poles. although in regard to its population it is only the second place in galicia, cracow is the most interesting town in the whole of poland. no other polish town possesses so many old and historic buildings, none of them contains so many national relics, or has been so closely associated with the development and destinies of poland as cracow. and the ancient capital is still the intellectual centre of the polish nation. cracow is situated in a fertile plain on the left bank of the vistula (which becomes navigable here) and occupies a position of great strategical importance. it consists of the old inner town and seven suburbs. the only relics of the fortifications of the old town, whose place is now occupied by shady promenades, is the florian's gate and the rondell, a circular structure, built in 1498. cracow has 39 churches--about half the number it formerly had--and 25 convents for monks and nuns. of these the most important is the stanislaus cathedral, in gothic style, consecrated in 1359, and built on the wawel, the rocky eminence to the s.w. of the old town. here the kings of poland were crowned, and this church is also the pantheon of the polish nation, the burial place of its kings and its great men. here lie the remains of john sobieski, of thaddaeus kosciuszko, of joseph poniatowski and of adam mickiewicz. here also are conserved the remains of st stanislaus, the patron saint of the poles, who, as bishop of cracow, was slain before the altar by king boleslaus in 1079. the cathedral is adorned with many valuable objects of art, paintings and sculptures, by such artists as veit stoss, guido reni, peter vischer, thorwaldsen, &c. part of the ancient polish regalia is also kept here. the gothic church of st mary, founded in 1223, rebuilt in the 14th century with several chapels added in the 15th and 16th centuries, was restored in 1889-1893, and decorated with paintings from the designs by matejko. it contains a huge high altar, the masterpiece of veit stoss, who was a native of cracow, executed in 1477-1489; a colossal stone crucifix, dating from the end of the 15th century, and several sumptuous tombs of noble families from the 16th and 17th centuries. the dominican church, a gothic building of the 13th century, but practically rebuilt after a fire in 1850; the franciscan church, also of the 13th century, also much modernized; the church of st florian of the 12th century, rebuilt in 1768, which contains the late-gothic altar by veit stoss, executed in 1518, during his last sojourn in cracow; the church of st peter, with a colossal dome, built in 1597, after the model of that of st peter at rome, and the beautiful augustinian church in the suburb of kazimierz, are all worth mentioning. of the principal secular buildings, the royal castle (_zamek krolowsk_), a huge building, begun in the 13th century, and successively enlarged by casimir the great and by sigismund i. jagiello (1510-1533), is situated on the wawel, and was until 1610 the residence of the polish kings. it suffered much from fires and other disasters, and from 1846 onward was used as a barracks and a military hospital; it has now, however, been cleared out and restored. the jagellonian university, now housed in a magnificent gothic building erected in 1881-1887, was attended in 1901 by 1255 students, and had 175 professors and lecturers. the language of instruction is polish. it is the second oldest university in europe--the oldest being that of prague--and was famous during the 15th and 16th centuries. it was founded by casimir the great in 1364, and completed by ladislaus jagiello in 1400. its rich library is now housed in the old university buildings, erected in the 15th century, in the beautiful gothic court of which a bronze statue of copernicus was placed in 1900. the polish academy of science, founded in 1872, is housed in the new university buildings. in the ring-platz, or the principal square, opposite the church of st mary, is the _tuchhaus_ (cloth-hall, pol. _sukiennice_), a building erected in 1257, several times renovated and enlarged, most recently in 1879, which contains the polish national museum of art. behind it is a gothic tower, the only relic of the old town hall, demolished in 1820. the czartoryski museum contains a large collection of objects of art, a rich library and a precious collection of manuscripts, relating to the history of poland. among the manufactures of the town are machinery, agricultural implements, chemicals, soap, tobacco, &c. but cracow is more important as a trading than as an industrial centre. its position on the vistula and at the junction of several railways makes it the natural mart for the exchange of the products of silesia, hungary and russian and austrian poland. its trade in timber, salt, textiles, cattle, wine and agricultural produce of all kinds is very considerable. in the neighbourhood of cracow there are mines of coal and zinc, and not far away lies the village of krzeszowice with sulphur baths. about 2-1/2 m. n.w. lies the kosciuszko hill, a mound of earth 100 ft. high, thrown up in 1820-1823 on the borislava hill (1093 ft.), in honour of thaddaeus kosciuszko, the hero of poland. on the opposite bank of the vistula, united to cracow by a bridge, lies the town of podgorze (pop. 18,142); near it is the krakus hill, smaller than the kosciuszko hill, and a thousand years older than it, erected in honour of krakus, the founder of cracow. about 8 m. s.e. of cracow is situated wieliczka (q.v.), with its famous salt mines. _history._--tradition assigns the foundation of cracow to the mythical krak, a polish prince who is said to have built a stronghold here about a.d. 700. its early history is, however, entirely obscure. in the latter part of the 10th century it was annexed to the bohemian principality, but was recaptured by boleslaus chrobry, who made it the seat of a bishopric, and it became the capital of one of the most important of the principalities into which poland was divided from the 12th century onwards. the city was practically ruined during the first tatar invasion in 1241, but the introduction of german colonists restored its prosperity, and in 1257 it received \"magdeburg rights,\" i.e. a civic constitution modelled on that of magdeburg. in this year the _tuchhalle_ was built. the town, however, had yet to pass through many vicissitudes. it suffered again from tatar invasions; in 1290 it was captured by wenceslaus ii. of bohemia and was held by the bohemians until, in 1305, the polish king ladislaus lokietek recovered it from wenceslaus iii. ladislaus made it his capital, and from this time until 1764 it remained the coronation and burial place of the polish kings, even after the royal residence had been removed by siegmund iii. (1587-1632) to warsaw. on the third partition of poland in 1795 austria took possession of cracow; but in 1809 napoleon wrested it from that power, and incorporated it with the duchy of warsaw, which was placed under the rule of the king of saxony. in the campaign of 1812 the emperor alexander made himself master of this and the other territory which formed the duchy of warsaw. at the general settlement of the affairs of europe by the great powers in 1815, it was agreed that cracow and the adjoining territory should be formed into a free state; and, by the final act of the congress signed at vienna in 1815, \"the town of cracow, with its territory, is declared to be for ever a free, independent and strictly neutral city, under the protection of russia, austria and prussia.\" in february 1846, however, an insurrection broke out in cracow, apparently a ramification of a widely spread conspiracy throughout poland. the senate and the other authorities of cracow were unable to subdue the rebels or to maintain order, and, at their request, the city was occupied by a corps of austrian troops for the protection of the inhabitants. the three powers, russia, austria and prussia, made this a pretext for extinguishing this independent state; and as the outcome of a conference at vienna (november 1846) the three courts, contrary to the assurance previously given, and in opposition to the expressed views of the british and french governments, decided to extinguish the state of cracow and to incorporate it with the dominions of austria.",
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