COWLEY, HENRY WELLESLEY, EARL, an eminent diplomatist, brother of the Duke of Wellington; served as a diplomatist in Vienna, Constantinople, and Switzerland, and was ambassador to France from 1852 to 1867 (1804-1884).

COWPER, WILLIAM, a popular English poet, born at Great Berkhampstead, Hertford, of noble lineage; lost his mother at six, and cherished the memory of her all his days; of a timid, sensitive nature, suffered acutely from harsh usage at school; read extensively in the classics; trained for and called to the bar; was appointed at 32 a clerk to the House of Lords; qualifying for the duties of the appointment proved too much for him, and he became insane; when he recovered, he retired from the world to Huntingdon beside a brother, where he formed an intimacy with a family of the name of Unwin, a clergyman in the place; on Mr. Unwin’s death he removed with the family to Olney, in Buckinghamshire, where he lived as a recluse and associated with the Rev. John Newton and Mrs. Unwin; shortly after he fell insane again, and continued so for two years; on his recovery he took to gardening and composing poems, his first the “Olney Hymns,” the melancholy being charmed away by the conversation of a Lady Austin, who came to live in the neighbourhood; it was she who suggested his greatest poem, the “Task”; then followed other works, change of scene and associates, the death of Mrs. Unwin, and the gathering of a darker and darker cloud, till he passed away peacefully; it is interesting to note that it is to this period his “Lines to Mary Unwin” and his “Mother’s Picture” belong (1731-1800).

COX, DAVID, an eminent landscape painter, rated by some next to Turner, born at Birmingham; began his art as a scene-painter; painted as a landscapist first in water-colour, then in oil; many of his best works are scenes in N. Wales; his works have risen in esteem and value; an ambition of his was to get L100 for a picture, and one he got only L20 for brought L3602 (1793-1830).

COX, SIR GEORGE, an English mythologist, specially distinguished for resolving the several myths of Greece and the world into idealisations of solar phenomena; he has written on other subjects, all of interest, and is engaged with W. T. Brande on a “Dictionary of Science, Literature, and Art”; b. 1827.

COXCIE, MICHAEL, a celebrated Flemish painter, born at Mechlin (1497-1592).

COXE, HENRY OCTAVIUS, librarian, became assistant-librarian of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, in 1838, and ultimately head-librarian in 1860; under his direction the catalogue, consisting of 720 folio volumes, was completed; held this post till his death; has edited several works of value; is one of Dean Burgon’s “Twelve Good Men” (1811-1881).

COXE, WILLIAM, a historical writer, heavy but painstaking, born in London; wrote “History of the House of Austria” and the “Memoirs of Marlborough,” and on “Sir Robert Walpole and the Pelham Administrations” (1747-1828).