Mary Russell, one of the most successful delineators of English rural life, was the only child of a physician, and was born at Alresford in Hampshire in December 1786. At the age of ten she was sent to a London boarding establishment. She was placed at the same time under the private tuition of Miss Rowden, a lady who was an indefatigable writer of verses, was fond of going to the play, had already educated Lady Caroline Lamb, and was yet destined to educate "L. E. L." and Fanny Kemble. Under such a governess Miss Mitford became inspired with a passion for poetry and the drama. She pored over the tragic authors of France, and doated on Shakespeare and his great contemporaries. In a short time her own fancy was quickened, and she produced within two years three volumes of juvenile poetry, which were afterwards published, and received a grave censure from the Quarterly Review. At the age of fifteen Miss Mitford left the boarding-school and returned home. Her father, a good-natured spendthrift, was now squandering the last remains of a competent fortune. The gaining of a Chancery suit soon afterwards brought him to bankruptcy, and left him a burden in the hands of his daughter. She was now forced to adopt literature as a profession, and commenced to write for the stage. Her first successful drama, the tragedy of Julian, was per- Mitford, formed at Covent Garden in 1823. About this time also, in some happy hour, she thought of describing the rural scenes and simple inhabitants in the place of her residence, the small hamlet of Three-Mile-Cross, near Reading. Her fresh and genial sketches appeared in the Lady's Magazine, under the title of "Our Village," and attracted general attention. They were published in a volume in 1824; and were afterwards continued until, in 1832, they had filled four other volumes. Meanwhile Miss Mitford had been diversifying such light and congenial occupation with the severe task of dramatic composition. Her tragedies Foscari and Rienzi were acted with success,—the former at Covent Garden in 1826, and the latter at Drury Lane in 1828. She was now in the enjoyment of a full reputation. It was the custom among young writers to try to catch the tone of her simple rustic sketches. Her cottage of Swallowfield, in the hamlet of Three-Mile-Cross, was visited by the highest and the most accomplished in the land. Yet necessity compelled her to ply her pen under much ill health and discomfort. In 1838 a pension from government alleviated her cares, but did not slacken her industry. She continued to engage in new literary enterprises, to publish corrected editions of her former works, and to treat her friends with great affection and sweetness of temper, till death closed her career in January 1855.

Miss Mitford also wrote Atherton and other Tales; Country Stories; Belford Regis; Lights and Shadows of American Life; Recollections of a Literary Life; Tales for Young Persons; Charles the First, a Tragedy, and other dramatic works.

Mitford, William, author of a History of Greece, was the eldest son of John Mitford of Exbury in Hampshire, and was born in London in 1744. He studied at Queen's College, Oxford; but he showed no taste for any branch of knowledge except Greek, and left the university without a degree. His legal studies at the Middle Temple were becoming equally unsatisfactory, when the death of his father, in 1761, transferred the family estate into his hands, and rendered it no longer necessary that he should adopt a profession. He therefore fixed his residence at his country seat, and turned his attention from the hard details of law to his favourite Greek authors. In 1769 Mitford, entering as captain into the South Hampshire Militia, became acquainted with Gibbon, who was major in the same corps. His intercourse with the future historian, whose brain was then teeming with literary projects, gave form, and perhaps origin, to his purpose of writing a history of Greece. The first volume of this great work appeared in 1784, and the four remaining volumes followed in 1790, 1797, 1808, and 1818, respectively. The increasing infirmities of age prevented the historian from carrying his narration of events beyond the death of Alexander the Great. Meanwhile he had successively represented in Parliament Newport in Cornwall, Becclesdon, and New Romney. He had also been appointed professor of ancient history in the Royal Academy. His death took place at his hereditary seat in 1827. An edition of the History of Greece, with a Life of the author by his brother, Lord Redesdale, was published in 10 vols. 8vo, London, 1829. The other works of Mitford are,—An Inquiry into the Principles of Harmony in Languages, and of the Mechanism of Verse, Modern and Ancient, 8vo, London, 1774; and A Treatise on the Military Force, and particularly the Militia of this Kingdom, 8vo.

Previous to the publication of the great historical works of Grote and Thirlwall, Mitford was reckoned the highest authority on Grecian history. More intimate with the original narratives of Thucydides, Xenophon, and Arrian, than any of his predecessors, he discovered much that was new concerning the events and political questions of ancient Greece. Some of his most manifest faults are a cumbrous style, a deficiency in reflective power, and an occasional dullness in narration. Worse than all these, however, is that obstinate prejudice which invariably leads him to advocate tyranny and to misrepresent democracy.