Here in 1783 he pub. The Village, which established his reputation, and about the same time he was presented by Lord Thurlow to two small livings.  He was now secured from want, made a happy marriage, and devoted himself to literary and scientific pursuits.  The Newspaper appeared in 1785, and was followed by a period of silence until 1807, when he came forward again with The Parish Register, followed by The Borough (1810), Tales in Verse (1812), and his last work, Tales of the Hall (1817-18).  In 1819 Murray the publisher gave him L3000 for the last named work and the unexpired copyright of his other poems.  In 1822 he visited Sir Walter Scott at Edinburgh.  Soon afterwards his health began to give way, and he d. in 1832.  C. has been called “the poet of the poor.”  He describes in simple, but strong and vivid, verse their struggles, sorrows, weaknesses, crimes, and pleasures, sometimes with racy humour, oftener in sombre hues.  His pathos, sparingly introduced, goes to the heart; his pictures of crime and despair not seldom rise to the terrific, and he has a marvellous power of painting natural scenery, and of bringing out in detail the beauty and picturesqueness of scenes at first sight uninteresting, or even uninviting.  He is absolutely free from affectation or sentimentality, and may be regarded as one of the greatest masters of the realistic in our literature.  With these merits he has certain faults, too great minuteness in his pictures, too frequent dwelling upon the sordid and depraved aspects of character, and some degree of harshness both in matter and manner, and not unfrequently a want of taste.

Life prefixed to ed. of works by his son (1834), Ainger (Men of Letters, 1903).  Works (Ward, 3 vols., 1906-7).

CRAIGIE, MRS. PEARL MARY TERESA (RICHARDS) (1867-1906).—­Dau. of John Morgan, R. b. in Boston, Massachusetts.  Most of her education was received in London and Paris, and from childhood she was a great reader and observer.  At 19 she m. Mr. R.W.  Craigie, but the union did not prove happy and was, on her petition, dissolved.  In 1902 she became a Roman Catholic.  She wrote, under the pseudonym of “John Oliver Hobbes,” a number of novels and dramas, distinguished by originality of subject and treatment, brightness of humour, and finish of style, among which may be mentioned Some Emotions and a Moral, The Gods, Some Mortals and Lord Wickenham (1895), The Herb Moon and The School for Saints (1897), and Robert Orange (1900), The Dream and The Business (1907).  Her dramas include The Ambassador and The Bishop’s Move.

CRAIK, GEORGE LILLIE (1798-1866).—­Writer on English literature, etc., b. at Kennoway, Fife, and ed. at St. Andrews, went to London in 1824, where he wrote largely for the “Society for the Promotion of Useful Knowledge.”  In 1849 he was appointed Prof. of English Literature and History at Belfast.  Among his books are The Pursuit of Knowledge under Difficulties (1831), History of British Commerce (1844), and History of English Literature and the English Language (1861).  He was also joint author of The Pictorial History of England, and wrote books on Spenser and Bacon.