Cross, Mary

ANN EVANS, better known by her penname, GEORGE ELIOT, was born at Griff House, near Nuneaton, in War wicks hire, England, Nov. 22, 1820. Her father was Robert Evans, a master carpenter, on whose death in 1849 she went abroad with friends and spent some time in Geneva, where she continued the diligent study she had carried on in her father's house. After her return to England, she contributed a few articles to the Westminster Review, among the best of which productions are: Woman in France; Madame de Sable; The Natural History of German Life, . Her translation of Feuerbach's Wesen des Christ ent hums appeared in 1853. Novel writing was not attempted by her till after her acquaintance with Mr. George Henry Lewes, a gentleman with whom she afterward lived as his wife, but without the tie of the marriage service. It was at his suggestion that she undertook the writing of fiction, her first work being Scenes of Clerical Life, which was published in Blackwood's Magazine before appearing in book form. Following this came: Adam Bede; The Mill on the Flo ; Silas Marner; Romola; Felix Holt; Middle march, generally regarded as the greatest of her works; and Daniel Devonda. The Spanish Gypsy, a poem; The Legend of Jubal, and a collection of social e ays, The Impre ions of Theophrastus Such, and the translation of Strau ' Leben Jesu, which she made in IMG:content-0498.png:[graphic][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed] 1846, complete the list of her works. George Eliot was a realist in method. Her characters are not drawn from those who live in the midst of wealth, or in high places, nor does she represent the romantic or fashionable side of life. She has depicted, for the lovers of human nature, life as it is to the ma es from the rising to the setting of each day's sun. Human life, as described by her, is seen in the present, but is also the life of the past, and will for many years to come represent the life of the future. Her characters belong to no particular period and are of little social importance, but she has vividly portrayed their life as it really is-imperfect, neither wholly good nor bad. They are the everyday men and women of all time living the ordinary life that you sands experience. This greatest of recent English novelists has shown us the joys, sorrows and poetry which exist in commonplace lives, with their actual surroundings, trials and temptations. Her marriage with Mr. Cro seemed to the world an acknowledgment that her former disregard of social conventionalities was a mistake, and the consequences of her defiance of custom and law must have caused her much suffering, hers being especially a temperament that needed the comradeship, respect and love of her kind. The sorrow with which her life must have been darkened seems shown in her works, which, despite their occasional rich sense of humor, are invariably sad in conception and handling. The shadowy side of life alone seemed to appeal to her deep, reflecting mind, while her earnest, philosophical spirit makes itself continuously felt in injected paragraphs of thoughtful deduction. These occur so frequently in some of her later works as to make them, to many persons, rather heavy reading. Died Dec. 22, 1880. Croton Aqueduct. (Hydraul. Eng.) An aqueduct for conveying water from Croton river to New York city, a distance of about 40 miles. This, built originally in 1837-41, was the first large aqueduct in the U.S. It is a masonry chamber 7 ft. 5 in. wide and 8 ft. 6 in. high, of horseshoe form. It proving insufficient, an additional aqueduct on a much larger scale was built in 1885-90. This is 33 miles long, following a direct line from the river to the city, and was constructed chiefly by tunneling. In the tunnel portions it is circular and of 12 ft. 3 in. diameter. The other sections are horseshoe shape, 13 ft. 7 in. by 13 ft. 6% in. in dimensions. The Harlem river is pa ed by an inverted siphon of masonry lined with iron, in a tunnel 150 feet below the river bed.