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tive Arabians were Normades or shepherds. These people, becoming lords of the country, undoubtedly chose that part which was the most eligible, and their profession would lead them to the best land for pasturage; in respect of which Goshen had not its equal. For it was part of the πεδιον Αιγυπτο, the rich champaign of Egypt ; so that this circumstance among others would induce one to think that they settled here. This is confirmed by the worship which they settled in these parts; the cities they built; and the names which they bequeathed to the province. According to the Mosaic account, the land of Goshen is repeatedly said to be in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land;' and yet the LXX call it Fεooεμ τng Apaßias, which could be owing to no other reason besides its being the land of Cushan (Goshen), which was interpreted Arabian; for in Arabia it was not situated. Hence it has been concluded that the place where the children of Israel resided in Egypt was the principal Arabian nome, at the extreme and highest part of Lower Egypt, called Cushan. This was the land to which the children of Israel succeeded, after it had been abandoned by its former inhabitants; but it is uncertain at what interval. It appears to have been an unoccupied district; and, as it was the best of the land, there is no accounting for its being unoccupied but by the secession of the Cusæans, whose property it nad lately been. Accordingly Manetho expressly affirms that the second shepherds succeeded to the places which had been deserted by the former; and he moreover says, that the city Abaris, which had been built by the first shepherd king, was given to those of their body who were employed in the quarries.

Bryant suggests that the migration of the shepherds was about the time of Serug or Nahor: and this is the time when archbishop Usher supposes it to have happened, who refers it to the year A. M. 1920, according to the Hebrew computation, in the 101st year of the life of Serug, the seventh from Noah, and in the forty-second year of Terab, eighty-eight years before the birth of Abraham. Bishop Cumberland supposes that the shepherds invaded Egypt A. M. 1937, in the time of the same patriarchs, according to the Hebrew chronology. Our author has alleged several arguments to prove that the Arabian shepherds were distinct from the Israelites, and prior to them. When the Arabians came into Egypt, they are said to have been 240,000 in number, whereas the Israelites were but seventy persons. The former took possession by force; the latter were invited, and had a grant of all that they possessed. The one held the people in slavery; the others were themselves enslaved. The Arabians were driven out of the land; the Israelites were not suffered to depart. See Bryant's Observations and Enquiries, &c. Cont. 1767. SHEPPEY, an island of Kent, situated at the mouth of the Thames and Medway, separated from the main land of the county by the Swale. It is about twenty-one miles in circumference; the principal places in it are Sheerness, Queenborough, and Eastchurch, Leysdown, and Minster parishes. Its name is supposed to be derived from the number of sheep formerly bred

here. It yields good corn, but is bare of wood, and the water is but indifferent, except at Sheerness, where wells sunk below the bottom of the sea produce excellent water.

SHEPPERTON, a parish of Spelthorne hundred, Middlesex, four miles S. S. E. from Staines, on the banks of the Thames, and eighteen from London. A detached part of this parish remains in Surrey, owing to the Thames having altered its course; and that river now passes over the foundation of its ancient church. Near the bridge over the river at Walton are Cowey-stakes, supposed to be the remains of those driven into the river by the Britons, to prevent Cæsar's army from fording it; one of these is preserved in the British Museum. It is recorded that the learned Erasmus passed much of his time in the parsonage-house here with his preceptor the rector of the parish.

SHEPREVE (John), a learned English orientalist, born at Sugworth, near Abingdon, in Berkshire. He was fellow, and became Greek recorder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford; and in 1538 he was appointed professor of Hebrew in it. He had a very profound knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures. He published many poems, and died at Agmondesham, in Bucks, in 1542.

SHEPTON-MALLET, a market town and parish in Whitestone hundred, Somersetshire, five miles east of Wells, and 115 from London. The inhabitants are largely employed in knitting stockings, and various other woollen manufactures. The town is situated on several small hills, and the streets irregularly built. There is no curious or remarkable public building except the market cross, erected in 1500 on five arches, and supported by pentagonal columns.

SHERARD (William), a learned botanist, was born in 1659, and educated at Merchant Tailor's School, and St. John's College Oxford. Appointed travelling tutor to lord Howland, son of the murdered lord Russel, he formed an acquaintance with all the learned botanists of the continent, and attended three courses of Tournefort's botanical lectures, in 1686, 87, and 88, at Paris. In the summer of 1688 he describes himself as having passed some time in Holland, collecting specimens of plants from the rich gardens of that country, and getting them named by professor Herman himself, who allowed him to peruse the manuscript rudiments of his Paradisus Batavus, to examine his herbarium, and to compose a Prodromus of that work. Sherard afterwards became the editor of Herman's book itself.

In 1700 Mr. Sherard communicated to the Royal Society a paper relative to the making of Chinese or Japan varnishes, which is printed in the Philosophical Transactions, v. 22. The information which it contains was sent by the Jesuits to the grand duke of Tuscany, and probably obtained by our author at Florence. He now became one of the commissioners for sick and wounded seamen at Portsmouth, and about the year 1702, or soon after, was sent out as British consul to Smyrna. Here his botanical taste met with fresh gratification. He visited the seven churches of Asia, copied several ancient inscriptions, and communicated to the Royal

Society an account of the new volcanic island, near Santorini, which rose out of the sea May 12th, 1707. Botany, however, continued to be his leading object. He had a villa at Sedekio near Smyrna, where he began his great herbarium. Hasselquist visited this spot, with the devotion of a pilgrim, in the spring of 1750. Whatever specimens Sherard could obtain from Greece, and the neighbouring countries, he here carefully preserved; and being well aware of the insufficiency of Bauhin's Pinax, as a clue to the botanical knowledge then in the world, he is said to have here formed the project of continuing it before he returned to his native country in 1718. Soon after his return he received at Oxford the degree of LL. D. In 1721 Dr. Sherard revisited the continent. Vaillant was now in a declining state of health, and died in May 1722. Previous to his decease he concluded, through the mediation of Sherard, the sale of his manuscripts and drawings of Parisian plants, to Boerhaave, who published in 1727 the splendid

Botanicon Parisiense. This work is said to have owed much to the superintendance of Sherard, who passed a summer with Boerhaave in revising the manuscript. Our great botanist had already rendered a more important service to his favorite science by bringing with him from Germany, in August 1721, the celebrated Dillenius. By a comparison of dates, it appears that Sherard made several visits to the continent. He went from Paris to Holland in 1721, and thence with Dillenius, the same year, to England. He staid some time with Boerhaave again in 1724, or perhaps 1725. We know not precisely when it happened that he was, like Linnæus in Norway, in danger of being shot for a wolf, or a thief, by some rustic.

James Sherard, seven years younger than his brother, who had acquired opulence by medical practice in London, had a great fondness for the same pursuit, and reared at his country seat, at Eltham, a number of exotic plants. Hither the more learned subject of this article frequently resorted: and, having acquired affluence by his public appointments, he lent his aid to all who required it. He assisted Catesby with information and with money, to bring out his Natural History of Carolina, though neither that work, nor the Hortus Elthamensis of Dillenius, appeared till some time after his decease, which happened on the 12th of August, 1728, when he was sixty-nine years of age. His brother died February 12th, 1737, aged seventy-two, and is buried in Evington church, near Leicester. The most splendid service to botany, though it for a long time yielded little fruit, was rendered by the will of Dr. William Sherard, who left £3000 to found and support a botanical professorship at Oxford. He bequeathed to this establishment his choice botanical library, his ample herbarium, and the manuscript of his Pinax.

The herbarium of Sherard is considered, excepting that of Linnæus, the most ample and valuable botanical record in the world. In it may be seen original specimens from Tournefort, and all the writers of that day, named by themselves, accompanied by remarks, or by queries. He collected also copies of original drawings, from botanists whose specimens were

not to be had, such as Plumier. The most rare, and even unique, books are to be found in his library. All these collections are still in good preservation, though the noble stone building, originally constructed to receive them, was sacrificed a few years since that the adjoining street might be widened.

SHERARDIA, in botany, little field madder, a genus of the monogynia order, and tetrandria class of plants; natural order forty-seventh, stellate: CAL. small, and quadridentate: COR. monopetalous, long, and funnel-shaped: SEEDS two, naked, and crowned with the calyx. There are three species, viz. 1. arvensis; 2. fruticosa; and, 3. muralis.

SHERBET', n. s. Arab. sharbat. The juice of lemons or oranges mixed with water and sugar. They prefer our beer above all other drinks; and considering that water is with the rarest, especially in this clime, the dearest of sherbets, and plenty of barley, it would prove infinitely profitable to such as should bring in the use thereof.

Sandys.

SHERBET, OF SHERBIT, was first brought into England from Turkey and Persia, consisting of water, lemon-juice, and sugar, in which are dissolved perfumed cakes made of excellent Damascus fruit, containing an infusion of some drops of rose water. Another kind of it is made of violets, honey, juice of raisins, &c.

SHERBORNE, a market-town and parish in the hundred and division of Sherborne, Dorsetshire, seventeen miles north by west from Dorchester, and 116 W. S. W. from London; pleasantly situate on the side of a hill near the border of the White-Hart Forest, and divided into two parts, by the river Ivel, called Sherborne and Castleton; that part called Castleton had a strong castle, of which only the ruins are now to be seen. The inhabitants are employed in various trades and manufactures, principally in those of woollen cloth, linen, and silk. Anciently it was a bishopric; but, in the eleventh century, the see being removed to Salisbury, the cathedral was converted into an abbey. This was originally a noble structure; but, at the dissolution of the monasteries, it was made parochial, and is now the finest parish church in the west of England. The inside, beautifully decorated, contains many Saxon monuments of kings and nobles. Near the church is a free-school, built and endowed by Edward VI., and an alms-house for sixteen men and eight women. In the town is a market-house, a workhouse, a dissenters' chapel, and several schools and benefit societies. The general quarter-sessions are held here. The mansion called Sherborne Castle is a beautiful structure, the seat of lord Digby. Near Sherborne is White-Hart Forest. Market on Saturday. Fairs, the day before Holy Thursday, 18th and 26th of July, and the first Monday in October, O. S.

SHERBRO, a country and river of Western Africa, at the northern extremity of the Grain or Pepper coast of Guinea. The river, with a large island at its mouth, is navigable twenty leagues up for ships of burden, and vessels of seventy or eighty tons may ascend 250 miles. The channel, however, is encumbered with rushes, and subject to frequent tornadoes. The country abounds in

grain, fruits, poultry, and a species of pearl oyster.

SHERD, n. s. Sax. rceand. A fragment of broken earthenware. See SHARD.

The trivet-table of a foot was lame;
She thrusts beneath the limping leg a sherd.

Dryden. SHEREBATOF (Prince), a learned Russian nobleman, who published several works in the Russian language. Of these the principal is his History of Russia from the earliest Times; which is a faithful and well written work.

SHERIBON, or CHERIBON, a town in the island of Java, the capital of a district of the same name, and situated about 150 miles east from Batavia. The surrounding country is remarkably fertile, and produces the finest coffee raised on the island. Its other productions are timber, cotton, yaru, areca, indigo, sugar, and some pepper. The horses of this district are reckoned the best in Java, and in the contiguous woods and mountains the rhinoceros is sometimes discovered. The roadsted at Cheribon is open, and only sheltered to the west by a large sand-bank, with four and a half and five fathoms water, two leagues from the shore, at which distance ships of burden are obliged to anchor. Smaller vessels run along the bank to within three-fourths of a league from the land. In order to enter the river, country craft, drawing from four to six feet, are obliged to wait for the high tides on account of the small bank at the mouth. The appearance of this place resembles a large village more than a town. It is at present the capital of a principality, divided between two princes of the same family, each of whom takes the title of sultan, and resides in it; but the exterior of their palace exhibits little of Asiatic pomp and grandeur, being built of plank and bamboos. On the right bank of the river is a small brick fort surrounded by a ditch, over which is a bridge protected by a redoubt. This fortress is of little strength, its embrasure parapet being only eighteen inches thick, with only four small guns, kept more for the purpose of making signals than for defence. The mole and battery are in a state of the greatest decay, and the garrison only fifteen Maduran soldiers, commanded by a European serjeant and two corporals; the whole scarcely sufficient to resist the attacks of the roving Malay pirates who infest the adjacent seas. The European inhabitants of the town are the resident, secretary, book-keeper, serjeant-major, and three subalterns; the rest are natives, who compose two-thirds of the population, and Chinese, employed in the retail trade and agriculture. This state put itself under the protection of the Dutch East India Company in 1680, since which justice and injustice have been administered by the princes of the country in conjunction with the resident on the part of the company. These chiefs are under an obligation to deliver to the Dutch East India Company exclusively the produce of their respective territories at fixed prices.-Tombe, Stavo

rinus, &c.

SHERIDAN (Thomas), D. D., the intimate friend of dean Swift, is said by Shield, in Cibber's Lives of the Poets, to have been born about 1684, in the county of Cavan, where his parents lived in no very elevated state. They are de

scribed as being unable to afford their son the advantages of a liberal education; but he, being observed to give early indications of genius, attracted the notice of a friend to his family, who sent him to the college of Dublin, and contributed towards his support there. He afterwards entered into orders, and set up a school in Dublin, which long maintained a very high degree of reputation, as well for the attention bestowed on the morals of the scholars as for their proficiency in literature. So great was the estimation in which this seminary was held that it is asserted to have produced in some years the sum of £1000. It does not appear that he had any considerable preferment; but his intimacy with Swift, in 1725, procured for him a living in the south of Ireland worth about £150 a year, which he went to. take possession of, and, by an act of inadvertence, destroyed all his future expectations of rising in the church; for being at Cork on the 1st of August, the anniversary of king George's accession, he preached a sermon on this text, Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof.' On this being known he was struck out of the list of chaplains to the lord lieutenant, and forbidden the castle. This living Dr. Sheridan afterwards changed for that of Dunboyne, which, by the knavery of the farmers and power of the gentlemen in the neighbourhood, fell so low as £80 per annum. He gave it up for the free school of Cavan, where he might have lived well in so cheap a country on £80 a year salary, besides his scholars; but the air being, as he said, too moist and unwholesome, and being disgusted with some persons who lived there, he sold the school for about £400; and, having soon spent the money, he fell into bad health, and died September 10th, 1738, in his fifty-fifth year. Lord Corke has given the following character of him: Dr. Sheridan was a school master, and in many instances perfectly well adapted for that station. He was deeply versed in the Greek and Roman languages, and in their customs and antiquities. He had that kind of good nature which absence of mind, indolence of body, and carelessness of fortune, produce; and, although not over strict in his own conduct, yet he took care of the morality of his scholars, whom he sent to the university remarkably well founded in all the kinds of classical learning, and not ill instructed in the social duties of life. He was slovenly, indigent, and cheerful. He knew books much better than men; and he knew the value of money least of all. In this situation, and with this disposition, Swift fastened upon him, as upon a prey with which he intended to regale himself, whenever his appetite should prompt him.' His lordship then mentions the event of the unlucky sermon, and adds, "This ill-starred, good-natured, improvident man, returned to Dublin, unhinged from all favor at court, and even banished from the castle.

But still he remained a punster, a quibbler, a fiddler, and a wit. Not a day passed without a rebus, an anagram, or a madrigal. His pen and his fiddlestick were in continual motion.' One of the volumes of Swift's miscellanies consists almost entirely of letters between him and the dean. He published a prose translation of Persius; to which he added the best notes of former editors, with many judicious ones

of his own. This work was printed at London, 1739, in 12mo.

SHERIDAN (Thomas), A. M., son of the doctor, and an eminent actor, philologist, and lexicographer, was born at Quilca, in Ireland, in 1721. In 1734 and 1735 he studied at Westminster; and, on his return to Ireland, attended Trinity College, Dublin, where he took his degree. On his father's death, he entered on the stage. His first appearance was at Dublin in 1743 in the character of Richard III., wherein he met with unbounded applause. In 1744 he came to London, and appeared in Hamlet at Covent Garden. In 1745 he engaged at Drury Lane, and performed Siffredi, in Tancred and Sigismunda. About this time a quarrel took place between Sheridan and Garrick, which was not made up when Sheridan left London. On his return to Dublin, he undertook the management of the Dublin theatre; and, finding that Mr. Garrick was then unemployed, he very politely invited him over, upon the most liberal terms, which Mr. Garrick accepted. But, though Miss Bellamy and Mr. Barry often acted along with them, they were not able to exhibit plays oftener than twice a-week, and the receipts for the season did not exceed £3400. Mean time, in winter 1747, Mr. Sheridan's popularity was interrupted, and the peace of the theatre disturbed, by the riotous behaviour of a young gentleman, who, being the worse for liquor, raised a quarrel, and formed such a powerful party that the theatre was obliged to be shut for some time. Two trials were commenced before the court of king's bench; the manager was tried for an assault on the young gentleman, and acquitted; but, in the other trial, the rioter was found guilty, and sentenced to pay a fine of £500, and to be imprisoned three months. After being confined one week, he made concessions to Mr. Sheridan, who solicited government to remit the fine, and succeeded. He also became bail himself for the young man's enlargement, and obtained it. This affair, so disagreeable in its commencement, and so honorable to Mr. Sheridan in its conclusion, was productive of a very fortunate event. During the public controversy about the riots, Miss Frances Chamberlaine, a most accomplished young lady, wrote a pamphlet in favor of the manager, which attracted Mr. Sheridan's attention and gratitude to such a degree that he soon after obtained an introduction to his fair champion, and married her. The harmony of the theatre, after this event, met with no interruption till 1754, when politics ran high. Mr. Sheridan had instituted a club, consisting of about fifty noblemen and members of parliament, who dined weekly at his apartment in the theatre. No lady was admitted but Mrs. Woffington, who presided. The manager had no party views, but Mrs. Woffington diverted it from its original design; and, the toasts being generally in favor of the court, Mr. Sheridan himself became obnoxious. On the 25th of February, 1754, Mr. Digges, in the tragedy of Mahomet, was encored for a speech that contained some severe imprecations against venal senators and courtiers. Digges gratified the audience, repeated the speech, and received reiterated plaudits. In

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the green-room Mr. Sheridan remarked Digges's conduct as a circumstance of self degradation. The tragedy was again acted, and Digges's speech again encored. Digges expressed his readiness to comply, but urged that his compliance would injure him with the manager. The vociferation for the manager then became universal. Sheridan, afraid of personal insult, went home. Repeated messages were sent for him in vain; and, after waiting a full hour, the audience rose in a mass and destroyed the inside of the house. Mr. Sheridan published a state of his case, left the theatre for two years, and embarked for England. At London he appeared, in 1754, on the Covent Garden boards in Hamlet. He also performed Coriolanus, Cato, Edipus, Richard III., Shylock, lord Townly, Romeo, &c., but his profits fell short of his hopes. Besides, Garrick was a rival whom it was impossible for any man to rival. In 1756, the term of this theatre at Dublin being expired, he went over, in hopes that the public ferment was also expired. apology, however, was deemed necessary: the house was crowded, and never did any man, in such a situation, appear with more address, or speak to the passions with so much propriety. Tears fell from many, and pardon was sealed by the plaudits of all. Rivalship and opposition, however, arose from a new quarter. Barry and Woodward had engaged to erect a new theatre in Crow Street. Mr. Sheridan struggled to maintain his ground for three years; but gave it up on the 27th of April, 1759. Meantime, he had composed his Lectures on Elocution, and began to deliver them at London, Oxford, Cambridge, &c., with great success. In 1759 he took his degree at Cambridge. In 1760 he engaged with Mr. Garrick at Drury Lane. But the king's public approbation of Mr. Sheridan's John excited Garrick's jealousy so much that he would not permit that play to be again performed. Hence disputes arose, and they parted. In 1769 Mr. Sheridan exhibited at the Haymarket, the Attic Evening Entertainment, consisting of reading, singing, and music, and met with great success. Previous to this, in 1756, he had published British Education, or the Source of the Disorders of Great Britain; being an essay to prove that the immorality, ignorance, and false taste, which so generally prevail, are the consequences of the present defective system of education; &c. This was followed, in 1758, by a very spirited Oration on the Establishment of a Proper Mode of Education in Ireland. He had delivered it before the nobility and gentry at the Music Hall in Dublin, December 6th, 1757. In 1759 he published a discourse delivered at Oxford, introductory to his Lectures on Elocution. In 1762 appeared his Dissertation on the Causes of the Difficulties which occur in learning English: also his Course of Lectures on Elocution. In 1769 he pubblished A Plan of Education for the Young Nobility and Gentry of Great Britain. In 1775 Lectures on the Art of Reading, and in 1780 his General Dictionary of the English Language; in 2 vols. 4to. Its main object is to establish a plain and permanent standard of pronunciation. In 1784 he published a new edition of Swift's

Works, in 17 vols. 8vo. His last work was, in 1785, Elements of English; being a new method of teaching the whole art of reading; 12mo. At the accession of his majesty, in 1760, a pension was conferred on Mr. Sheridan. He also gave lectures on reading in Scotland, where he was honored with much attention, by the principal literati. About 1764 he went to France, and resided at Blois, where his wife died. On Mr. Garrick's retiring from the stage, in 1776, the purchasers of his share in Drury Lane invested Mr. Sheridan with the powers of manager; but he relinquished it in 1779. In 1786 he visited Ireland, but returned to England, and died at Margate, August 14th, 1788.

SHERIDAN (Mrs. Frances), wife to the preceding, was born in Ireland about 1724, but descended from a good English family which had removed thither. Her maiden name was Chamberlaine. Her first literary performance procured her marriage. She was a person of the most engaging manners. After lingering some years in a very weak state of health, she died at Blois, in the South of France, September 26th, 1766. Her Sidney Biddulph may be ranked with the first productions of that class in our or any other language. She also wrote a little romance in one volume called Nourjahad, in which there is a great deal of imagination, productive of an admirable moral. And she was the authoress of two comedies, the Discovery, and the Dupe. By Mr. Sheridan, she became the mother of two splendid ornaments to this family of genius: viz. Charles Francis Sheridan, esq., late secretary at war in Ireland, and author of an excellent History of the Revolution in Sweden, in 1772; and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, esq., M. P., a celebrated dramatic writer, and one of the most eminent orators, and uniformly steady patriots in the British senate.

SHERIDAN (Richard Brinsley), esq., the third and youngest son of Thomas Sheridan, was distinguished both as a statesman and a dramatist. He was born in Dorset Street, Dublin, October 30th, 1751. The early development of his talents was greatly aided by the instructions of his mother: he was afterwards placed at a grammar school in Dublin, whence, in 1759, he was removed in consequence of his parents leav. ing Ireland. They settled at Windsor, and he remained at home till 1762, when he was sent to Harrow, which seminary he left at the age of eighteen, owing to his father's embarrassments. He entered subsequently as a student of the middle temple; but the close application and industry requisite for success as a lawyer were incompatible with his disposition; and an early marriage induced him to look out for some more immediate means of support. Having very soon after his marriage dissipated the moderate property with which he set out in the world, he turned his attention to dramatic composition. His first production was the comedy of the Rivals, acted at Covent Garden in January 1775, with moderate success; but the Duenna, a musical entertainment, which followed, was received with general admiration; and his School for Scandal gained him the highest reputation as a comic writer. On the retirement of Garrick from the

management of Drury Lane Theatre, Sheridan in conjunction with Dr. Forde and Mr. Linley purchased Garrick's share of the patent. This property qualified him for a seat in parliament; and in 1780 he was chosen member for the borough of Stafford. Sheridan joined the opposition, and displayed so much ability that on the retreat of the premier, and the conclusion of the American war, he was made under secretary of state for the war department. He resigned with his principal, in consequence of a dispute with lord Shelburne, afterwards marquis of Lansdowne, who was at the head of the ministry. His intimate connexion with Fox brought him again into office on the coalition of that statesman with lord North, when Sheridan held the post of joint secretary of the treasury under the late duke of Portland. The dissolution of that ministry threw him again into the ranks of opposition, where he remained during the whole period of the ministry of Mr. Pitt. He now attained distinguished celebrity as a parliamentary orator but the grandest display of his eloquence occurred during the progress of the impeachment of Warren Hastings. In 1792 Mr. Sheridan lost his wife, who left one son; and three years afterwards married Miss Ogle, daughter of the dean of Winchester. With this lady he had a fortune, which enabled him to purchase the estate of Polesdon, in Surrey; and he held the office of receiver-general of the duchy of Cornwall, worth £1200 a year. The political changes consequent to the death of Mr. Pitt, in 1806, occasioned the exaltation of the party with which Sheridan was connected, and he obtained the lucrative post of treasurer of the navy, and the rank of a privy counsellor. This administration being weakened by the death of Mr. Fox, new alterations took place, and Sheridan was deprived of office, to which he never returned. At the election in 1806 he obtained a seat for Westminster, the great object of his ambition; but was afterwards nominated for the borough of Ilchester, which he continued to represent during the remainder of his public career. The latter part of the life of this talented individual was embittered by misfortunes, arising principally from his own indolence and mismanagement, the destruction of Drury Lane Theatre by fire, &c. When the affairs of that establishment were arranged, in 1811, Mr. Sheridan and his son were to have on various accounts £40,000 for their share of the property; but the portion of the former was not sufficient to liquidate his debts. The dissolution of parliament, and his failure in an attempt to obtain a seat for Stafford, the borough he had formerly represented, completed his ruin. In 1812 he had relinquished all thoughts of returning to the house of commons; and the remainder of his existence was spent in attempts to ward off the evils to which his improvidence had exposed him. At length the disappearance of his property was followed by arrest, and though, after a few days' detention, he was released, it was only to experience apprehension and alarm, from which he sought a temporary relief in that unrestrained indulgence which had occasioned his misfortunes. Intemperance had undermined his constitution; and, until on the

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