FRANCIS

francis, sir philip (1740-1818), english politician and pamphleteer, the supposed author of the _letters of junius_, and the chief antagonist of warren hastings, was born in dublin on the 22nd of october 1740. he was the only son of dr philip francis (c. 1708-1773), a man of some literary celebrity in his time, known by his translations of horace, aeschines and demosthenes. he received the rudiments of an excellent education at a free school in dublin, and afterwards spent a year or two (1751-1752) under his father's roof at skeyton rectory, norfolk, and elsewhere, and for a short time he had gibbon as a fellow-pupil. in march 1753 he entered st paul's school, london, where he remained for three years and a half, becoming a proficient classical scholar. in 1756, immediately on his leaving school, he was appointed to a junior clerkship in the secretary of state's office by henry fox (afterwards lord holland), with whose family dr francis was at that time on intimate terms; and this post he retained under the succeeding administration. in 1758 he was employed as secretary to general bligh in the expedition against cherbourg; and in the same capacity he accompanied the earl of kinnoul on his special embassy to the court of portugal in 1760. in 1761 he became personally known to pitt, who, recognizing his ability and discretion, once and again made use of his services as private amanuensis. in 1762 he was appointed to a principal clerkship in the war office, where he formed an intimate friendship with christopher d'oyly, the secretary of state's deputy, whose dismissal from office in 1772 was hotly resented by "junius"; and in the same year he married miss macrabie, the daughter of a retired london merchant. his official duties brought him into direct relations with many who were well versed in the politics of the time. in 1763 the great constitutional questions arising out of the arrest of wilkes began to be sharply canvassed. it was natural that francis, who from a very early age had been in the habit of writing occasionally to the newspapers, should be eager to take an active part in the discussion, though his position as a government official made it necessary that his intervention should be carefully disguised. he is known to have written to the _public ledger_ and _public advertiser_, as an advocate of the popular cause, on many occasions about and after the year 1763; he frequently attended debates in both houses of parliament, especially when american questions were being discussed; and between 1769 and 1771 he is also known to have been favourable to the scheme for the overthrow of the grafton government and afterwards of that of lord north, and for persuading or forcing lord chatham into power. in january 1769 the first of the _letters of junius_ appeared, and the series was continued till january 21, 1772. they had been preceded by others under various signatures such as, "candor," "father of candor," "anti-sejanus," "lucius," "nemesis," which have all been attributed, some of them certainly in error, to one and the same hand. the authorship of the _letters of junius_ has been assigned to francis on a variety of grounds (see junius). in march 1772 francis finally left the war office, and in july of the same year he left england for a tour through france, germany and italy, which lasted until the following december. on his return he was contemplating emigration to new england, when in june 1773 lord north, on the recommendation of lord barrington, appointed him a member of the newly constituted supreme council of bengal at a salary of l10,000 per annum. along with his colleagues monson and clavering he reached calcutta in october 1774, and a long struggle with warren hastings, the governor-general, immediately began. these three, actuated probably by petty personal motives, combined to form a majority of the council in harassing opposition to the governor-general's policy; and they even accused him of corruption, mainly on the evidence of nuncomar. the death of monson in 1776, and of clavering in the following year, made hastings again supreme in the council. but a dispute with francis, more than usually embittered, led in august 1780 to a minute being delivered to the council board by hastings, in which he stated that "he judged of the public conduct of mr francis by his experience of his private, which he had found to be void of truth and honour." a duel was the consequence, in which francis received a dangerous wound (see hastings, warren). though his recovery was rapid and complete, he did not choose to prolong his stay abroad. he arrived in england in october 1781, and was received with little favour. little is known of the nature of his occupations during the next two years, except that he was untiring in his efforts to procure first the recall, and afterwards the impeachment of his hitherto triumphant adversary. in 1783 fox produced his india bill, which led to the overthrow of the coalition government. in 1784 francis was returned by the borough of yarmouth, isle of wight; and although he took an opportunity to disclaim every feeling of personal animosity towards hastings, this did not prevent him, on the return of the latter in 1785, from doing all in his power to bring forward and support the charges which ultimately led to the impeachment resolutions of 1787. although excluded by a majority of the house from the list of the managers of that impeachment, francis was none the less its most energetic promoter, supplying his friends burke and sheridan with all the materials for their eloquent orations and burning invectives. at the general election of 1790 he was returned member for bletchingley. he sympathized warmly and actively with the french revolutionary doctrines, expostulating with burke on his vehement denunciation of the same. in 1793 he supported grey's motion for a return to the old constitutional system of representation, and so earned the title to be regarded as one of the earliest promoters of the cause of parliamentary reform; and he was one of the founders of the "society of the friends of the people." the acquittal of hastings in april 1795 disappointed francis of the governor-generalship, and in 1798 he had to submit to the additional mortification of a defeat in the general election. he was once more successful, however, in 1802, when he sat for appleby, and it seemed as if the great ambitions of his life were about to be realized when the whig party came into power in 1806. his disappointment was great when the governor-generalship was, owing to party exigencies, conferred on sir gilbert elliot (lord minto); he declined, it is said, soon afterwards the government of the cape, but accepted a k.c.b. though re-elected for appleby in 1806, he failed to secure a seat in the following year; and the remainder of his life was spent in comparative privacy. among the later productions of his pen were, besides the _plan of a reform in the election of the house of commons_, pamphlets entitled _proceedings in the house of commons on the slave trade_ (1796), _reflections on the abundance of paper in circulation and the scarcity of specie_ (1810), _historical questions exhibited_ (1818), and a _letter to earl grey on the policy of great britain and the allies towards norway_ (1814). his first wife, by whom he had six children, died in 1806, and in 1814 he married his second wife, emma watkins, who long survived him, and who left voluminous manuscripts relating to his biography. francis died on the 23rd of december 1818. in his domestic relations he was exemplary, and he lived on terms of mutual affection with a wide circle of friends. he was, however, full of vindictiveness, dissimulation and treachery, and there can be little doubt that in his historic conflict with warren hastings unworthy personal motives played a leading part. bibliography.--for the evidence identifying francis with junius see the article junius, and the authorities there cited. see also _memoirs of sir philip francis, with correspondence and journals_, by joseph parkes and herman merivale (2 vols., london, 1867); _the francis letters_, edited by beata francis and eliza keary (2 vols., london, 1901); sir j.f. stephen, _the story of nuncomar and the impeachment of sir e. impey_ (2 vols., london, 1885); lord macaulay's _essay_ on "warren hastings"; g.b. malleson, _life of warren hastings_ (london, 1894); g.w. forrest, _the administration of warren hastings, 1772-1785_ (calcutta, 1892); sir leslie stephen's article on francis in _dict. of nat. biog._ vol. xx. francis joseph i. (1830- ), emperor of austria, king of bohemia, and apostolic king of hungary, was the eldest son of the archduke francis charles, second son of the reigning emperor francis i., being born on the 18th of august 1830. his mother, the archduchess sophia, was daughter of maximilian i., king of bavaria. she was a woman of great ability and strong character, and during the years which followed the death of the emperor francis was probably the most influential personage at the austrian court; for the emperor ferdinand, who succeeded in 1835, was physically and mentally incapable of performing the duties of his office; as he was childless, francis joseph was in the direct line of succession. during the disturbances of 1848, francis joseph spent some time in italy, where, under radetzky, at the battle of st lucia, he had his first experience of warfare. at the end of that year, after the rising of vienna and capture of the city by windischgraetz, it was clearly desirable that there should be a more vigorous ruler at the head of the empire, and ferdinand, now that the young archduke was of age, was able to carry out the abdication which he and his wife had long desired. all the preparations were made with the utmost secrecy; on the 2nd of december 1848, in the archiepiscopal palace at olmuetz, whither the court had fled from vienna, the emperor abdicated. his brother resigned his rights of succession to his son, and francis joseph was proclaimed emperor. ferdinand retired to prague, where he died in 1875. the history of the dual monarchy during his reign is told under the heading of austria-hungary, and here it is only necessary to deal with its personal aspects. the young emperor was during the first years of his reign completely in the hands of prince felix schwarzenberg, to whom, with windischgraetz and radetzky, he owed it that austria had emerged from the revolution apparently stronger than it had been before. the first task was to reduce hungary to obedience, for the magyars refused to acknowledge the validity of the abdication in so far as it concerned hungary, on the ground that such an act would only be valid with the consent of the hungarian parliament. a further motive for their attitude was that francis joseph, unlike his predecessor, had not taken the oath to observe the hungarian constitution, which it was the avowed object of schwarzenberg to overthrow. in the war which followed the emperor himself took part, but it was not brought to a successful conclusion till the help of the russians had been called in. hungary, deprived of her ancient constitution, became an integral part of the austrian empire. the new reign began, therefore, under sinister omens, with the suppression of liberty in italy, hungary and germany. in 1853 a hungarian named lebenyi attempted to assassinate the emperor, and succeeded in inflicting a serious wound with a knife. with the death of schwarzenberg in 1852 the personal government of the emperor really began, and with it that long series of experiments of which austria has been the subject. generally it may be said that throughout his long reign francis joseph remained the real ruler of his dominions; he not only kept in his hands the appointment and dismissal of his ministers, but himself directed their policy, and owing to the great knowledge of affairs, the unremitting diligence and clearness of apprehension, to which all who transacted business with him have borne testimony, he was able to keep a very real control even of the details of government. the recognition of the separate status of hungary, and the restoration of the magyar constitution in 1866, necessarily made some change in his position, and so far as concerns hungary he fully accepted the doctrine that ministers are responsible to parliament. in the other half of the monarchy (the so-called cisleithan) this was not possible, and the authority and influence of the emperor were even increased by the contrast with the weaknesses and failures of the parliamentary system. the most noticeable features in his reign were the repeated and sudden changes of policy, which, while they arose from the extreme difficulty of finding any system by which the habsburg monarchy could be governed, were due also to the personal idiosyncrasies of the emperor. first we have the attempt at the autocratic centralization of the whole monarchy under bach; the personal influence of the emperor is seen in the conclusion of the concordat with rome, by which in 1855 the work of joseph ii. was undone and the power of the papacy for a while restored. the foreign policy of this period brought about the complete isolation of austria, and the "ingratitude" towards russia, as shown during the period of the crimean war, which has become proverbial, caused a permanent estrangement between the two great eastern empires and the imperial families. the system led inevitably to bankruptcy and ruin; the war of 1859, by bringing it to an end, saved the monarchy. after the first defeat francis joseph hastened to italy; he commanded in person at solferino, and by a meeting with napoleon arranged the terms of the peace of villafranca. the next six years, both in home and foreign policy, were marked by great vacillation. in order to meet the universal discontent and the financial difficulties constitutional government was introduced; a parliament was established in which all races of the empire were represented, and in place of centralized despotism was established liberal centralization under schmerling and the german liberals. but the magyars refused to send representatives to the central parliament; the slavs, resenting the germanizing policy of the government, withdrew; and the emperor had really withdrawn his confidence from schmerling long before the constitution was suspended in 1865 as a first step to a reconciliation with hungary. in the complicated german affairs the emperor in vain sought for a minister on whose knowledge and advice he could depend. he was guided in turn by the inconsistent advice of schmerling, rechberg, mensdorff, not to mention more obscure counsellors, and it is not surprising that austria was repeatedly outmatched and outwitted by prussia. in 1863, at the _fuerstentag_ in frankfort, the emperor made an attempt by his personal influence to solve the german question. he invited all the german sovereigns to meet him in conference, and laid before them a plan for the reconstruction of the confederation. the momentary effect was immense; for some of the halo of the holy empire still clung round the head of the house of habsburg, and francis joseph was welcomed to the ancient free city with enthusiasm. in spite of this, however, and of the skill with which he presided over the debates, the conference came to nothing owing to the refusal of the king of prussia to attend. the german question was settled definitively by the battle of koeniggraetz in 1866; and the emperor francis joseph, with characteristic habsburg opportunism, was quick to accommodate himself to the new circumstances. above all, he recognized the necessity for reconciling the magyars to the monarchy; for it was their discontent that had mainly contributed to the collapse of the austrian power. he had already, in 1859, as the result of a visit to budapest, made certain modifications in the bach system by way of concession to magyar sentiment, and in 1861 he had had an interview with deak, during which, though unconvinced by that statesman's arguments, he had at least assured himself of his loyalty. he now made beust, bismarck's saxon antagonist, the head of his government, as the result of whose negotiations with deak the austro-hungarian compromise of 1867 was agreed upon. a law was passed by the hungarian diet regularizing the abdication of ferdinand; at the beginning of june francis joseph signed the inaugural diploma and took the oath in magyar to observe the constitution; on the 8th he was solemnly crowned king of hungary. the traditional coronation gift of 100,000 florins he assigned to the widows and orphans of those who had fallen in the war against austria in 1849. once having accepted the principle of constitutional government, the emperor-king adhered to it loyally, in spite of the discouragement caused by party struggles embittered by racial antagonisms. if in the cisleithan half of the monarchy parliamentary government broke down, this was through no fault of the emperor, who worked hard to find a _modus vivendi_ between the factions, and did not shrink from introducing manhood suffrage in the attempt to establish a stable parliamentary system. this expedient, indeed, probably also conveyed a veiled threat to the magyar chauvinists, who, discontented with the restrictions placed upon hungarian independence under the compromise, were agitating for the complete separation of austria and hungary under a personal union only; for universal suffrage in hungary would mean the subordination of the magyar minority to the hitherto subject races. for nearly forty years after the acceptance of the compromise the attitude of the emperor-king towards the magyar constitution had been scrupulously correct. the agitation for the completely separate organization of the hungarian army, and for the substitution of magyar for german in words of command in hungarian regiments, broke down the patience of the emperor, tenacious of his prerogative as supreme "war lord" of the common army. a hungarian deputation which came to vienna in september 1905 to urge the magyar claims was received ungraciously by the emperor, who did not offer his hand to the members, addressed them in german, and referred them brusquely to the chancellor, count goluchowski. this incident caused a considerable sensation, and was the prelude to a long crisis in hungarian affairs, during which the emperor-king, while quick to repair the unfortunate impression produced by his momentary pique, held inflexibly to his resolve in the matter of the common army. in his relations with the slavs the emperor displayed the same conciliatory disposition as in the case of the magyars; but though he more than once held out hopes that he would be crowned at prague as king of bohemia, the project was always abandoned. in this, indeed, as in other cases, it may be said that the emperor was guided less by any abstract principles than by a common-sense appreciation of the needs and possibilities of the moment. whatever his natural prejudices or natural resentments, he never allowed these to influence his policy. the german empire and the italian kingdom had been built up out of the ruins of immemorial habsburg ambitions; yet he refused to be drawn into an alliance with france in 1869 and 1870, and became the mainstay of the triple alliance of austria-hungary, germany and italy. his reputation as a consistent moderating influence in european policy and one of the chief guarantors of european peace was indeed rudely shaken in october 1908, the year in which he celebrated his sixty years' jubilee as emperor, by the issue of the imperial recript annexing bosnia and herzegovina to the habsburg dominions, in violation of the terms of the treaty of berlin. but his opportunism was again justified by the result. europe lost an ideal; but austria gained two provinces. in his private life the emperor was the victim of terrible catastrophes--his wife, his brother and his only son having been destroyed by sudden and violent deaths. he married in 1854 elizabeth, daughter of maximilian joseph, duke of bavaria, who belonged to the younger and non-royal branch of the house of wittelsbach. the empress, who shared the remarkable beauty common to all her family, took little part in the public life of austria. after the first years of married life she was seldom seen in vienna, and spent much of her time in travelling. she built a castle of great beauty and magnificence, called the achilleion, in the island of corfu, where she often o resided. in 1867 she accompanied the emperor to budapest, and took much interest in the reconciliation with the magyars. she became a good hungarian scholar, and spent much time in hungary. an admirable horsewoman, in later years she repeatedly visited england and irland for the hunting season. in 1897 she was assassinated at geneva by an italian anarchist; previous attempts had been made on her and on her husband during a visit to trieste. there was one son of the marriage, the crown prince rudolph (1857-1889). a man of much ability and promise, he was a good linguist, and showed great interest in natural history. he published two works, _fifteen days on the danube_ and _a journey in the east_, and also promoted illustrated work giving a full description of the whole austro-hungarian monarchy; he personally shared the labours of the editorial work. in 1881 he merried stephanie, daughter of the king of the belgians. on 30th january 1889 he commited suicide at mayerling, a country house near vienna. he left one daughter, elizabeth, who was betrothed to count alfred windischgraetz in 1901. in 1900 his widow, the crown princess stephanie, married count lonyay; by this she sacrificed her rank and position within the austrian monarchy. besides the crown prince the empress gave birth to three daughters, of whom two survive: gisela (born 1857), who married a son of the prince regent of bavaria; and marie valerie (born 1868), who married the archduke franz salvator of tuscany. see j. emmer. _kaisser franz joseph_ (2 vols., vienna, 1898); j. schnitzer, _franz joseph i. und seine zeit_ (2 vols., _ib._, 1899); _viribis unitis. das buch vom kaiser_, with introduction by j.a. v. halfert, ed. m. herzig (_ib._, 1898); r. rostok, _die regierungszeit des k. u. k. franz joseph i._ (3rd ed. _ib._, 1903).