rican patriot, signing resolutions of independence with the one hand, and with the other brandishing a whip over his affrighted slaves." In the same year he wrote " A Dialogue between a Justice of Peace and a Farmer," the principal topics of which were the necessity of a more equal representation, and the rights of juries in matter of libel. His last political production, in 1788, was "A Letter to Arthur Young, Esq. on the Wool Bill," which supported that writer in his attack upon the proposed regulations to prevent the exportation of

that article.

Another kind of writing by which Mr. Day displayed his zeal for the good of mankind, was the composition of books for children. His "Sandford and Merton," of which the first volume appeared in 1783, and the third in 1789, proved to be one of the most popular works in that class. It powerfully inculcates all the manly virtues of courage, activity, temperance, independence, and generosity, and contains many useful instructions in the principles of science. Perhaps it may partake of the fault of Rousseau's Emile, in proposing a mode of education too little accommodated to the actual state of manners, and which shews that both of them were rather speculators in this point than practitioners. Mr. Day never had children of his own. Another piece, entitled "The History of Little Jack," is an entertaining story to a similar purpose, but adapted for

lower life.

In the midst of these endeavours to promote the best interests of his fellow-creatures, he was cut off by an unfortunate accident. As he was riding from his own house to his mother's, on September 28, 1789, he was killed by a fall from his horse, in the forty-second year of his age. Biog. Britan.-A.

DEBORAH, a prophetess, and judge of Israel, nearly 1300 years B.C. resided between Ramah and Bethel, in the confines of the tribes of Benjamin and Ephraim, whither the children of Israel resorted to her for advice, and the decision of differences. About that time Jabin king of Canaan had been permitted to punish the Israelites for their vices, by conquering their country, and oppressing them with grievous exactions for twenty years. At the expiration of that period, Deborah called Barak, the son of Abinoam, who lived in a city of some note belonging to the tribe of Naphtali, and encouraged him to draw together a body of 10,000 men towards Mount Tabor, assuring him that God would enable him with such a force to emancipate his country, and ruin the power of its oppressor. When Sisera, the

commander in chief of Jabin, heard of Barak movement, he assembled a very formidable army, with which he proceeded to crush the Israelitish insurgents. But Barak's small body utterly defeated his numerous host; and Sisera himself fell by the hand of Jael, the wife of Heber, to whose tent he had fled for concealment, who, when he was overpowered with fatigue and sleep, dispatched him by driving a tent pin through his temples. On the occasion of this victory, Deborah composed an inimitable ode, abounding in sublime sentiments,. lofty images, and all the choicest flowers of poetry. Book of Judges, chaps. iv. v.-M.

DÉCEBALUS, king of the Dacians, one of the barbarian kings who contended with most success against the power of the Roman empire, was raised to the throne by his military talents on the voluntary resignation of Duras the former king, about the reign of the em peror Domitian. He had the character of be-ing equally wise in council, and prompt in: action, skilful in all the arts of war, and possessed of vigour to improve a victory, and constancy to repair a defeat. He took up arms against the Romans, crossed the Danube, entered Mosia, defeated and killed Oppius Sabi-nus the commander in that province, and made himself master of many, of its fortresses and castles. The commencement of this war is dated A.D. 86. Domitian marched in person into Moesia, but committed the care of the war to his lieutenants. Of these, Cornelius Fuscus, prætorian prefect, sustained a total defeat, in which he perished with most of his troops; but Julianus revenged the disaster by as signal a defeat of the Dacians. Decebalus is said to have deterred the Romans from advancing to his capital by the stratagem of felling trees, and covering the trunks with armour, so as to. appear like a line of soldiers. Some time after, Domitian found it advisable to propose a treaty with the Dacians, which Decebalus prudently accepted. It was agreed that he should restore. his prisoners, receive a diadem at the emperor's hand, and a yearly tribute under the title of a. pension; and after this inglorious agreement,, Domitian was left to indulge his vanity with a triumph over the conquered Dacians. The pension was paid during the reign of Domitian and his successor Nerva; but the martial Trajan, alleging that he had not been conquered by Decebalus, refused to submit to an ignominious tribute. The war was renewed. Tra jan entered Dacia with a powerful army, and: gained a bloody victory over Decebalus. By further successes he compelled the Dacian to submit to hard conditions of peace, by which

he agreed to restore the territories he had usurped from his neighbours, to deliver up his arms and warlike engines, and to dismantle all his fortresses. Decebalus in person appeared before Trajan, and paid him homage as his conqueror. It was not likely, however, that such a submission should last longer than the present danger. After the departure of the emperor, Decebalus renewed hostilities against his neighbours the lazyges, repaired his fortifications, and defied the Romans, who again declared him a public enemy. Trajan marched against him, and refused to grant him peace but upon the terms of his surrendering at discretion. The barbarian then attempted to take off by treachery a foe whom he was afraid to meet, but the assassins whom he sent were discovered and put to death. He then by perfidy got into his power Longinus, a favourite officer of Trajan's, and endeavoured to make use of his capture as a means of obtaining favourable terms. Longinus bravely freed his master from the difficulty by taking poison. Trajan then built his famous bridge over the Danube, pushed into Dacia, and took possession of its capital and almost the whole country. Decebalus in despair put an end to his own life, A.D. 105, and with him terminated the inde pendence of Dacia, which thenceforth became à Roman province. His gold and other treasures, which he had concealed in a pit dug beneath the bed of a river, the course of which he had diverted for the purpose, were discovered to Trajan by one of his confidents, and paid the expence of the war. Univers. Hist. Cre

vier.-A.

DECEMBRIO, PIETRO CANDIDO, a learned Italian, born at Pavia in 1399, was the son of Uberto Decembrio, also a man of erudition, who died potesta of Triviglio. Pietro at an early age was made secretary to Philip-Maria Visconti, duke of Milan, and continued in his service till the duke's death, in 1447. In the tumultuous scenes which followed, he approved himself one of the most strenuous defenders of the liberty of the Milanese; insomuch, that when they determined to submit to the arms of Francis Sforza, he refused to accept the office of surrendering the city to the conqueror. He went about this period as embassador to France in order to obtain succours; but finding the cause of liberty extinguished at Milan, he accepted an offer from pope Nicholas V. of becoming apostolic secretary, and removed to Rome. He was also, during some part of his life, secretary to Alphonso of Arragon, king of Naples. He at length returned to Milan,

where he died in 1477, and was buried in the cathedral of St. Ambrose. Decembrio was a voluminous writer. Among his printed works are the "Lives of Philip-Maria Visconti, and Francis Sforza, dukes of Milan," written in imitation of the style and manner of Suetonius; also a Latin translation of "Appian's History,' which has been much censured for want of fidelity; but he has been excused on account of the faulty copies of the original which he used. He likewise translated "Quintus Curtius" into Italian; and, into the same language, the ten first books of "Livy," by command of king Alphonso. He translated the twelve first books of the "Iliad" into Latin prose; the history of "Diodorus Siculus ;" and various other works of the ancients. He composed a variety of miscellaneous pieces, prose and verse, Latin and Italian. A large number of his letters remain in manuscript. This author has been spoken of with great contempt by Philelphus, who treats many others in the same manner, but Valla calls him a very exact critic. Tiraboschi. Baillet.-A.

DECIO, PHILIP, one of the most eminent jurists of his age, son of Tristan Decio, was born at Milan in 1453. It is affirmed that he was illegitimate, but this seems a matter of doubt. While engaged in the study of polite literature at home, the plague in Milan forced him at the age of seventeen to retire to Pavia, where his elder brother, Lancelot, was a professor of law. At his brother's instigation he commenced the same study, and soon made such a progress in it, that he excited his jealousy. Lancelot being invited to Pisa, Philip followed him, and at that university soon excited the attention of all the celebrated professors by his great readiness and acuteness in disputation. He obtained a doctor's degree in 1476, and was immediately appointed to read on the Institutions. He was next made lecturer-extraordinary in the civil law, in which capacity he accompanied the university on its removal to Pistoia in 1479. There are few examples in literary history of more pertinacious disputations than were carried on between Decio and his rival Soccini and his scholars. Decio at length became so formidable, that none of the professors chose to be his competitors or opponents; and Sandeo, professor of canon law, left the university abruptly, rather than answer a challenge which he had accepted from him. These squabbles were at length the cause of his removal to Sienna, but he remained there a short time before he was invited to Rome, where Innocent

nites, without any loss, and Decius returned safe to the camp, where he was received by the general and soldiers as their deliverer. He had a crown of gold, and a present of one hundred oxen, and a white buil, from the consul; and, what he probably more valued, an obsidional crown of grass from the army, and a civic crown of oak from his own detachment. He offered the bull as a sacrifice, distributed the oxen among his brave comrades, and only reserved to himself the honourable crowns. Two years after, he was created consul along with Manlius Torquatus. Rome was then engaged in a dangerous war with the Latins, and both consuls marched against the enemy with a joint command. It was agreed between them, that he whose army should give way in battle should devote himself to death for his country; the superstition of the time encouraging an opinion, that the party whose general, after a solemn desecration of himself to the infernal gods, should be slain by the enemy, would gain the victory. This emergence took place in the succeeding combat. The troops of Decius were hard pressed by the Latins; when, calling upon the chief pontiff, the consul required him to perform the proper ceremony of devotion. He was ordered to quit the military habit, and invest himself in his senatorial robe; his head was then covered with a veil, and a form of words, by which he devoted himself, together with the army of the enemy, to the infernal gods and the goddess of the earth, was dictated to him as he stood with both feet upon his javelin. Decius then, tucking up his robe, mounted his horse, and plunged into the thickest of the hostile array. The Latins were at first thunderstruck with the uncommon spectacle; but, when he had penetrated to the second line, they threw their javelins at him from all sides, and he fell dead to the ground. The Romans rallied in the confidence of success; but victory was still dubious, till Manlius, by a skilful movement, decided the day, which ended in a terrible slaughter of the Latins. The body of Decius was found the next day buried under the enemy's weapons, and was honourably interred by his colleague. Livii Hist. lib. vit. viii.-A. DÉCIUS MUs, P. (the second), son of the preceding, was consul the first time B.C. 312, and the second time B.C. 308. During this consulate he commanded with success in Etruria. He was censor_along with Q. Fabius Maximus B.C. 303. In the next year he supported, against Appius Claudius, the claim of the plebeians to partake in the pontifical office;

and he was himself chosen into the college of pontiffs. When the Etrurians and Samnites were making great preparations for war against Rome, B.C. 297, he was chosen a third time consul, as colleague to Fabius Maximus, at the particular desire of the latter. He obtained various successes against the Samnites and their allies during that year and the succeeding, in which he was continued with, a proconsular command. A greater danger attended the republic from a confederacy of Etrurians, Umbrians, and Samnites, aided by the Gauls; when he was a fourth time made consul, B.C. 295, together with Fabius, who would not serve without him. Some contention arose between the patrician and plebeian parties on the allotment of the consular commands; but, at length, Fabius was, by common consent, appointed to that in Etruria. The danger, however, appeared so great from that quarter, that Decius was, at his request, joined with him. The confederates divided their forces, and the Gauls and Samnites came to action with the consuls. Decius commanded the left wing, which was opposed to the Gauls. By means of their armed chariots they broke the Roman cavalry, and put the first line of infantry into disorder. Decius, unable to rally his dispirited troops, determined upon imitating his father by a voluntary devotion. He caused the pontiff M. Livius to pronounce the solemn words, to which he added the prayer," that he might carry before him terror and flight, blood and slaughter, the wrath of the celestial and infernal deities; that he might contaminate with funereal rites the standards, the weapons, the armour of the enemy; and that the same spot might witness his own destruction and that of the Gauls and Samnites." He then rushed into the midst of the foe, and was slain. The Romans, by the force of superstition, were excited to new efforts, and the Gauls are said, by Livy, to have been struck with a kind of stupefaction; though it is not probable that they should understand the import of this ceremonial. In fact, it does not appear that the fate of the battle was decided, until a reinforcement to that wing arrived under Scipio and Martius. In the final event the enemy was defeated with great slaughter.

A third P. DECIUS MUS, son to the last, was killed, when consul, in a battle with Pyrrhus, B.C. 279.

Juvenal, in his eighth satire, alludes in some spirited lines to the family of the Decii, as noted examples of plebeian worth :

Virgil, Lucan, and other poets, have commemorated the self-devoted Decii among the names most honourable to Rome. Livii Hist. lib. ix. x. Univers. Hist.-A.

DECIUS, Roman emperor, was born at Bubalia in Pannonia. His family name appears to have been Messius; and there is little reason to suppose that he was descended from the ancient Roman Decii. He had risen by merit to the rank of consul, and was accounted one of the ablest senators, when he was sent, as is alleged much against his will, by the reigning emperor Philip, to command the legions in Moesia and Pannonia, which had some time before been guilty of a revolt. On his arrival, the disaffected troops insisted with menaces upon his assuming the purple. Whether the resistance of Decius was feigned or sincere cannot be known; he was, however, proclaimed emperor, and made preparations to defend himself against Philip, who marched against him. They met near Verona, and a battle ensued, in which Philip was defeated; and he was either killed in the field, or put to death afterwards at Verona. This event took place A.D. 249. Decius was in the forty-seventh year of his age when he ascended the throne. He had four sons, the eldest of whom he raised to the rank of Cesar. One of the first measures of his reign was a persecution of the Christians, which is represented as being more violent and cruel, during the short period of its continuance, than almost any with which the church was afflicted. Its peculiar character seems to have been that of endeavouring, by rigorous imprisonment, and protracted severities, to induce the Christians to abjure their religion; and also to deprive them of their pastors, that their faith might the more easily be shaken. The bishops of the most considerable cities were either banished or put to death; and the clergy of Rome were prevented, during sixteen months, from supplying the vacancy of that see. As Decius is allowed to have been in other respects a good prince, it is supposed that he was incited to this persecution by a desire of restoring the ancient religion in its purity, as he seems to have

been with regard to the ancient manners, by his revival of the office of censor. An invasion of the Goths, however, called him from domestic regulation to the defence of the frontiers. That barbarous people, under their king Cniva, had passed the Danube, and were laying waste the province of Mocsia. Young Decius first marched against them; and, after some success, was dafeated by a sudden attack, and obliged to fly in disorder. The Goths then took Philippopolis, where they massacred all the inhabitants. The emperor in person then advanced, and, by his vigilance and activity, restored the Roman affairs, and brought the Goths into such a situation, that they offered to liberate their captives and quit their booty, provided they might be permitted to return unmolested. But Decius, resolving to terminate the war at a blow, sent a detachment to cut off their retreat, and pursued them with all the rest of his forces. He overtook them at a place called Forum Terebronii, where the Goths drew up with a morass in their front. The Romans attacked; and, in the beginning of the action, young Decius, fighting valiantly, was slain by an arrow. His father, who saw him fall, cried to his soldiers, "Be not discouraged; the loss is but that of one man!" and then rushed forwards to revenge his death. He was, however, with great part of his troops, soon entangled in the morass, where, being surrounded by the enemy, he perished under a shower of darts. Neither his body nor, that of his son was ever found. He fell in the fiftieth year of his age, A.D. 251. after a reign of little more than two years. Univers. Hist. Crevier. Gibbon.-A.

DECKER, or DECKHER, JOHN, a Jesuit of great erudition, and an able chronologist, was born at Hazebruck in Flanders, about the year 1559. He commenced his studies at Douay, where he went through his philosophical course; whence he removed to Rome, in which city he entered into the order of Jesuits. From Rome he was sent to Naples, to complete his noviciate, and to perfect himself in the study of theology. On his return to Rome he was admitted into orders, and was sent thence into his native country, to teach philosophy and scholastic theology. These offices he discharged at Douay and at Louvain. Afterwards he was sent on the business of the society into Styria, where he was made chancellor of the university of Gratz; in which situation he died, in the year 1619. The principal work which he published is entitled "Velificatio, seu Theoremata de Anno Ortus ac Mortis Domini, de que universa Jesu Christi in Carne Economia,