GRACCHUS, CAIUS SEMPRONIUS, Roman tribune and reformer, brother of the succeeding, nine years his junior; devoted himself and his oratory on his brother’s death to carry out his measures; was chosen tribune in 123 B.C., and re-elected in 122; his measures of reform were opposed and undone by the Senate, and being declared a public enemy he was driven to bay, his friends rallying round him in arms, when a combat took place in which 3000 fell, upon which Gracchus made his slave put him to death; “overthrown by the Patricians,” he is said, “when struck with the fatal stab, to have flung dust toward heaven, and called on the avenging deities; and from this dust,” says one, “there was born Marius—­not so illustrious for exterminating the Cimbri as for overturning in Rome the tyranny of the nobles.”

GRACCHUS, TIBERIUS SEMPRONIUS, Roman tribune and reformer, eldest son of Cornelia, and brought up by her; proposed, among others, a measure for the more equal distribution of the public land, which he had to battle for against heavy odds three successive times, but carried it the third time; was killed with others of his followers afterwards in a riot, and his body thrown into the Tiber and refused burial, 138 B.C., aged 40.

GRACE, the term in Scripture for that which is the free gift of God, unmerited by man and of eternal benefit to him.

GRACE, DR. W. G., the celebrated cricketer, born near Bristol; distinguished as a batsman, fielder, and bowler; earned the title of champion, which was spontaneously and by universal consent conferred on him; has written on cricket; b. 1848.

GRACE CUP, a silver bowl with two handles passed round the table after grace at all banquets in London City.

GRACES, THE, reckoned at one time two in number, but originally they appear to have been regarded as being, what at bottom they are, one.  At last they are spoken of as three, and called Aglaia, Euphrosyne, and Thalia:  Thalia, the blooming one, or life in full bloom; Euphrosyne, the cheerful one, or life in the exuberance of joy and sympathy; and Aglaia, the shining one, or life in its effulgence of sunny splendour and glory.  But these three are one, involved each in the other, and made perfect in one.  There is not Thalia by herself, or Aglaia, but where one truly is, there, in the same being also, the other two are.  They are three sisters, as such always inseparable, and in their inseparability alone are Graces.  Their secret is not learned from one, but from all three; and they give grace only with fulness, buoyancy, and radiancy of soul, or life, united all in one.  They are in essence the soul in its fulness of life and sympathy, pouring itself rhythmically through every obstruction, before which the most solid becomes fluid, transparent, and radiant of itself.

GRACIOSA, a princess in a fairy tale, persecuted by her stepmother, and protected by Prince Percinet, her lover.