a rising seaport and watering-place in Lancashire, at the mouth of the Wyre, and connected with Preston by a railway 22 miles in length. Fleetwood dates its rise from 1836, and takes its name from Sir P. H. Fleetwood by whom it was laid out, and who has erected various public buildings. It has a neat church, several chapels and schools, mechanics' institute, subscription news-room, market-house, lighthouse, docks, two wharfs, custom-house, and bonded warehouses. Steamers ply between it and Glasgow, Belfast, Londonderry, and Isle of Man. The number of vessels registered at the port on 31st December 1853 was 30 sailing vessels of 2804 tons, and 5 steamers of 904 tons; during that year 443 sailing vessels of 33,874 tons, and 672 steamers of 117,880, entered; and 268 sailing vessels of 19,255 tons, and 671 steamers of 118,725 tons left the port. Pop. (1851) 3048.

Charles, lord-deputy of Ireland under the Commonwealth, and son-in-law of Cromwell, was one of the most prominent of the minor figures in that troubled period of English history. Entering the ranks of the parliamentary forces, he rose in 1644 to the rank of colonel of horse, and was appointed governor of Bristol in that same year. In the course of the civil wars that afterwards distracted the kingdom he distinguished himself, particularly at the battle of Worcester, and by his conduct on that occasion gained the favour of Cromwell and the whole army. After the death of his first wife he was pitched upon by Cromwell as a fitting husband for his eldest daughter Bridget, the widow of Ireton, and was appointed commander-in-chief of the forces in Ireland. Though the Protector did not place very much confidence in Fleetwood's attachment to himself, political motives afterwards induced him to nominate him one of the fourteen major-generals to whom the internal administration of the commonwealth was intrusted. On the death of the Lord Protector, Fleetwood did his best, by means of his influence with the troops, to supplant Richard Cromwell; but in the midst of his intrigues the nation recalled the exiled Stuarts. Fleetwood's prominent position marked him out as an object of vengeance to the restored king, and it was only with very great difficulty that he escaped with his life. Not long after the Restoration he died in wretchedness and obscurity at Stoke Newington, whither he had retired.

Fleetwood, William, a learned English bishop, descended of an ancient family in Lancashire, was born in the Tower of London, Jan. 21, 1656. He received his education at Eton, and at King's College, Cambridge. About the time of the Revolution he entered into holy orders, and having soon become a distinguished preacher, was appointed chaplain to King William and Queen Mary. By the interest of Dr Godelphin, vice-provost of Eton and residentiary of St Paul's, he was appointed rector of St Austin's, London, which is in the gift of the dean and chapter of St Paul's; and soon afterwards he also obtained the lectureship of St Dunstan's in the West. In 1691 he published his Inscriptionum Antiquarum Sylloge, in two parts; one containing remarkable pagan inscriptions, the other part ancient Christian monuments. In 1692 he published a translation of Jureius's Plain Method of Christian Devotion, the twenty-seventh edition of which was printed in 1750. In 1701 appeared his Essay on Miracles, which called forth the animadversions of several writers, particularly Hoadly. In 1704 he published anonymously The Reasonable Communicant; and in 1705, Sixteen Practical Discourses on the relative duties of parents and children, husbands and wives, masters and servants, with three sermons on the case of self-murder. In the following year he was nominated to the see of St Asaph. In 1710 he published a vindication of the thirteenth chapter to the Romans, upon the authority of which the regal dignity had been so magnified by some as to make tyranny seem an ordinance of God, and to represent the most abject slavery as founded upon the principles of religion. This degrading doctrine was highly offensive to Bishop Fleetwood, who in this tract contends that, in the chapter referred to, St Paul requires of no people any more submission to the higher powers than that which is enjoined by the laws of their several countries. In 1712 he published Four Sermons, one on the death of Queen Mary in 1694, another on that of the Duke of Gloucester in 1700, a third on that of King William in 1701, and a fourth on the accession of Queen Anne; and also, the same year, an anonymous tract on Lay Baptism, according to the Church of England, a subject which then engaged a good deal of attention. The Life and Miracles of St Wenefrede, together with her Litanies, appeared in 1713, likewise without his name; the object of which was to expose the absurd superstitions by which weak minds are apt to be influenced, and, in particular, to show the delusions which had been practised under the names of pretended saints. In 1714 he was translated from the see of St Asaph to that of Ely, and continued there till his death, which took place at Tottenham, Middlesex, on the 4th of August 1723.

The remaining works of Bishop Fleetwood are these:—1. The Chancellor's Plea in the Divorce of Sir G. Downing, 1715; 2. Papists Not Excluded from the Throne on Account of Religion, 1717; 3. A Letter from Mr T. Burdett, Executed at Tyburn for the murder of Captain Falkner, to some Attorneys' clerks of his acquaintance, 1717; 4. A Letter to an Inhabitant of the Parish of St Andrews, Holborn, about New Ceremonies in the Church, 1717; and 5. A Defence of Praying Before Sermon, as directed by the fifty-fifth canon. All these tracts, however, were published without the author's name. Bishop Fleetwood's character stood deservedly high in general estimation. His virtue was without any alloy of fanaticism, and his piety wholly untinctured with superstition. He was the friend of liberty and learning, equally zealous in defending the one and in encouraging the other. He assisted Dr Hickey in his great work Linguaem veterum Septentrionalium Thesaurus; and Hearne also confesses himself to have been under many obligations to him. In a professional point of view, he was unquestionably the best preacher of his time; and his occasional sermons exhibit a felicity of adaptation to the circumstances that had called them forth, which we should perhaps seek for in vain in similar compositions of that period.