LAPRADE

laprade, french poet and critic, was born on the 13th of january 1812 at montbrison, in the department of the loire. he came of a modest provincial family. after completing his studies at lyons, he produced in 1839 a small volume of religious verse, _les parfums de madeleine_. this was followed in 1840 by _la colere de jesus_, in 1841 by the religious fantasy of _psyche_, and in 1844 by _odes et poemes_. in 1845 laprade visited italy on a mission of literary research, and in 1847 he was appointed professor of french literature at lyons. the french academy, by a single vote, preferred emile augier at the election in 1857, but in the following year laprade was chosen to fill the chair of alfred de musset. in 1861 he was removed from his post at lyons owing to the publication of a political satire in verse (_les muses d'etat_), and in 1871 took his seat in the national assembly on the benches of the right. he died on the 13th of december 1883. a statue has been raised by his fellow-townsmen at montbrison. besides those named above, laprade's poetical works include _poemes evangeliques_ (1852), _idylles heroiques_ (1858), _les voix de silence_ (1864), _pernette_ (1868), _poemes civiles_ (1873), _le livre d'un pere_ (1877), _varia_ and _livre des adieux_ (1878-1879). in prose he published, in 1840, _des habitudes intellectuelles de l'avocat_. _questions d'art et de morale_ appeared in 1861, succeeded by _le sentiment de la nature, avant le christianisme_ in 1866, and _chez les modernes_ in 1868, _education liberale_ in 1873. the material for these books had in some cases been printed earlier, after delivery as a lecture. he also contributed articles to the _revue des deux mondes_ and the _revue de paris_. no writer represents more perfectly than laprade the admirable genius of french provincial life, its homely simplicity, its culture, its piety and its sober patriotism. as a poet he belongs to the school of chateaubriand and lamartine. devoted to the best classical models, inspired by a sense of the ideal, and by worship of nature as revealing the divine--gifted, too, with a full faculty of expression--he lacked only fire and passion in the equipment of a romantic poet. but the want of these, and the pressure of a certain chilly facility and of a too conscious philosophizing have prevented him from reaching the first rank, or from even attaining the popularity due to his high place in the second. only in his patriotic verse did he shake himself clear from these trammels. speaking generally, he possessed some of the qualities, and many of the defects, of the english lake school. laprade's prose criticisms must be ranked high. apart from his classical and metaphysical studies, he was widely read in the literatures of europe, and built upon the groundwork of a naturally correct taste. his dislike of irony and scepticism probably led him to underrate the product of the 18th century, and there are signs of a too fastidious dread of philistinism. but a constant love of the best, a joy in nature and a lofty patriotism are not less evident than in his poetry. few writers of any nation have fixed their minds so steadily on whatsoever things are pure, and lovely and of good report. see also edmond bire, _victor de laprade, sa vie et ses oeuvres_. (c.) lapse (lat. _lapsus_, a slip or departure), in law, a term used in several senses. (1) in ecclesiastical law, when a patron has neglected to present to a void benefice within six months next after the avoidance, the right of presentation is said to lapse. in such case the patronage or right of presentation devolves from the neglectful patron to the bishop as ordinary, to the metropolitan as superior and to the sovereign as patron paramount. (2) the failure of a testamentary disposition in favour of any person, by reason of the decease of its object in the testator's lifetime, is termed a lapse. see legacy, will. lapwing (o.eng. _hleapewince_ = "one who turns about in running or flight"),[1] a bird, the _tringa vanellus_ of linnaeus and the _vanellus vulgaris_ or _v. cristatus_ of modern ornithologists. in the temperate parts of the old world this species is perhaps the most abundant of the plovers, _charadriidae_, breeding in almost every suitable place from ireland to japan--the majority migrating towards winter to southern countries, as the punjab, egypt and barbary--though in the british islands some are always found at that season. as a straggler it has occurred within the arctic circle (as on the varanger fjord in norway), as well as in iceland and even greenland; while it not unfrequently appears in madeira and the azores. conspicuous as the strongly contrasted colours of its plumage and its very peculiar flight make it, it is remarkable that it maintains its ground when so many of its allies have been almost exterminated, for the lapwing is the object perhaps of greater persecution than any other european bird that is not a plunderer. its eggs are the well-known "plovers' eggs" of commerce,[2] and the bird, wary and wild at other times of the year, in the breeding-season becomes easily approachable, and is shot to be sold in the markets for "golden plover." its growing scarcity in great britain was very perceptible until the various acts for the protection of wild birds were passed. it is now abundant and is of service both for the market and to agriculture. what seems to be the secret of the lapwing holding its position is the adaptability of its nature to various kinds of localities. it will find sustenance equally on the driest of soils as on the fattest pastures; upland and fen, arable and moorland, are alike to it, provided only the ground be open enough. the wailing cry[3] and the frantic gestures of the cock bird in the breeding-season will tell any passer-by that a nest or brood is near; but, unless he knows how to look for it, nothing save mere chance will enable him to find it. the nest is a slight hollow in the ground, wonderfully inconspicuous even when deepened, as is usually the case, by incubation, and the black-spotted olive eggs (four in number) are almost invisible to the careless or untrained eye. the young when first hatched are clothed with mottled down, so as closely to resemble a stone, and to be overlooked as they squat motionless on the approach of danger. at a distance the plumage of the adult appears to be white and black in about equal proportions, the latter predominating above; but on closer examination nearly all the seeming black is found to be a bottle-green gleaming with purple and copper; the tail-coverts, both above and below, are of a bright bay colour, seldom visible in flight. the crest consists of six or eight narrow and elongated feathers, turned slightly upwards at the end, and is usually carried in a horizontal position, extending in the cock beyond the middle of the back; but it is capable of being erected so as to become nearly vertical. frequenting parts of the open country so very divergent in character, and as remarkable for the peculiarity of its flight as for that of its cry, the lapwing is far more often observed in nearly all parts of the british islands than any other of the group limicolae. the peculiarity of its flight seems due to the wide and rounded wings it possesses, the steady and ordinarily somewhat slow flapping of which impels the body at each stroke with a manifest though easy jerk. yet on occasion, as when performing its migrations, or even its almost daily transits from one feeding-ground to another, and still more when being pursued by a falcon, the speed with which it moves through the air is very considerable. on the ground this bird runs nimbly, and is nearly always engaged in searching for its food, which is wholly animal. allied to the lapwing are several forms that have been placed by ornithologists in the genera _hoplopterus_, _chettusia_, _lobivanellus_, _defilippia_. in some of them the hind toe, which has already ceased to have any function in the lapwing, is wholly wanting. in others the wings are armed with a tubercle or even a sharp spur on the carpus. few have any occipital crest, but several have the face ornamented by the outgrowth of a fleshy lobe or lobes. with the exception of north america, they are found in most parts of the world, but perhaps the greater number in africa. europe has three species--_hoplopterus spinosus_, the spur-winged plover, and _chettusia gregaria_ and _c. leucura_; but the first and last are only stragglers from africa and asia. (a. n.) footnotes: [1] skeat, _etym_. dict. (1898), _s.v_. caxton in 1481 has "lapwynches" (_reynard the fox_, cap. 27). the first part of the word is from _hleapan_, to leap; the second part is "wink" (o.h.g. _winchan_, ger. _wanken_, to waver). popular etymology has given the word its present form, as if it meant "wing-flapper," from "lap," a fold or flap of a garment. [2] there is a prevalent belief that many of the eggs sold as "plovers'" are those of rooks, but no notion can be more absurd, since the appearance of the two is wholly unlike. those of the redshank, of the golden plover (to a small extent), and enormous numbers of those of the black-headed gull, and in certain places of some of the terns are, however, sold as lapwings', having a certain similarity of shell to the latter, and a difference of flavour only to be detected by a fine palate. [3] this sounds like _pee-weet_, with some variety of intonation. hence the names peewit, peaseweep and teuchit, commonly applied in some parts of britain to this bird--though the first is that by which one of the smaller gulls, _larus ridibundus_ (see gull), is known in the districts it frequents. in sweden _vipa_, in germany _kiebitz_, in holland _kiewiet_, and in france _dixhuit_, are names of the lapwing, given to it from its usual cry. other english names are green plover and hornpie--the latter from its long hornlike crest and pied plumage. the lapwing's conspicuous crest seems to have been the cause of a common blunder among english writers of the middle ages, who translated the latin word _upupa_, property hoopoe, by lapwing, as being the crested bird with which they were best acquainted. in like manner other writers of the same or an earlier period latinized lapwing by _egrettides_ (plural), and rendered that again into english as egrets--the tuft of feathers misleading them also. the word _vanellus_ is from _vannus_, the fan used for winnowing corn, and refers to the audible beating of the bird's wings.