RAFFJoseph Joachim (1822-1882), composer and orchestral conductor, was born near Zurich on 27th May 1822 and educated chiefly at Schwyz. Here, under the care of the Jesuit fathers, he soon became an excellent classical and mathematical scholar, but received scarcely any instruction in his favourite art, in which, nevertheless, he made extraordinary progress through sheer force of natural genius, developed by persevering study which no external obstacles could induce him to discontinue. So successful were his unaided efforts that, when in 1843 he sent some MSS. to Mendelssohn, that warm encourager of youthful talent felt justified in at once recommending him to Breitkopf & Hartel of Leipsic, who published a large selection of his early works. Soon after this he became acquainted with Liszt, who gave him much generous encouragement. He first became personally acquainted with Mendelssohn at Cologne in 1846, and gave up all his other engagements for the purpose of following him to Leipsic, but his intention was frustrated by the great composer’s death in 1847. After this cruel disappointment he remained for some time at Cologne, where his attention was alternately devoted to composition and to the ¡)reparation of critiques for the well-known periodical Cacilia. Thus far he must be regarded as, in every sense of the word, a self-taught artist; but he felt the need of systematic instruction so deeply that, retiring for a time from public life, he entered at Stuttgart upon a long course of severe and uninterrupted study, and with so great success that in 1850 he appeared before the world in the character of an accomplished and highly-cultivated musician. Raff now settled for a time in Weimar in order to be near Liszt. Hans von Biilow had already brought him into notice by ...playing his Concertstiick for pianoforte and orchestra in public, and the favour with which this fine work was everywhere received encouraged him to attempt a greater one. During his stay in Stuttgart he had begun the composition of an opera entitled K'&nig Alfred , and had good hope of securing its performance at Dresden; but the political troubles with which Germany was then overwhelmed rendered its production in the Saxon capital impossible. At Weimar he was more fortunate. In due time K'&nig Alfred was produced there under Liszt’s able direction with complete success; it is still frequently performed at the court theatre, as is also his second opera, Dame Kobold , written for the same theatre in 1870. His third opera, Samson , has not yet, we believe, been publicly represented.
Raff remained at Weimar until 1856, when he obtained a large clientèle at Wiesbaden as a teacher of the pianoforte. In 1859 he married Doris Genast, an actress of high repute, and thenceforward devoted himself with renewed energy to the work of composition, displaying an inexhaustible fertility of invention tempered by an amount of technical skill which stamped even his lightest works with the dignity to which the union of natural talent with high artistic cultivation can alone give birth. He resided chiefly at Wiesbaden till 1877, when he was appointed director of the Hoch-Conservatorium at Frankfort, an office which he retained until his death, 25th June 1882.
Raff’s compositions are almost innumerable. More than 200 have been published, including ten symphonies—undoubtedly his finest works—quartets, concertos, sonatas, songs, and examples of nearly every known variety of style; yet he never repeats himself. Notwithstanding his strong love for the-romantic school, he is never guilty of extravagance, and, if in his minor works he is sometimes a little commonplace, he never descends to vulgarity. His symphonies Lenore and Im Walde are truly wonderful examples of musical painting, and replete with poetry in every bar.
[624 words — estimated reading time: 4 minutes]
RAFFLESSir Thomas Stamford (1781-1826), the son of a captain in the West India trade, was born at sea off the coast of Jamaica on 5tli July 1781. Returning with his mother to England, he was placed in a boarding-school at Hammersmith, where he remained till the age of fourteen, when he entered the East India House as an extra clerk. While employed there he occupied his leisure hours in particularly studying languages, for which he possessed great facility. In 1805 the directors of the India House having resolved to found a new trading settlement at Penang, Raffles was appointed assistant-secretary, and on his voyage out he acquired the Malay language. Owing to the illness of the chief secretary, he soon had to undertake the entire administrative labour of the new government. In 1808 he had to visit Malacca to recruit his shattered strength; here he enjoyed large opportunity of mingling with a very varied population, and, in company with the two Orientalists Marsden and Leyden, he began his elaborate researches into the history, laws, and literature of the Hindu and Malay races. In zoology he took special interest, and on his return to England became founder and first president of the Zoological Society. While in Calcutta in 1809, Raffles suggested to Lord Minto, then governor-general of India, the desirableness of wresting Java from the French. The governor-general took up the idea with vigour; a fleet of ninety ships dropped anchor before Batavia in August 1811, and in a short time the conquest of the island was effected. Raffles was made lieutenant-general of the new territory, and resolved to give to the island a pure and upright administration. There were three sources of abuse to eradicate—the revenue system, the system of police and public justice, and the slave ...trade. In a period of only five years Raffles had almost effected his design; his popularity was secured, and the revenue was eight times larger than it had been under the Dutch. The policy of some of his measures being, however, considered doubtful by the home authorities, he was recalled in 1816, but his conduct was approved. He published a valuable and well-illustrated History of Java, in 2 vols. 4to, 1817.
Having received knighthood, Sir Stamford Raffles set out for Sumatra as lieutenant-governor of Bencoolen, arriving in March 1818, and immediately recommenced the work of reform. In 1819 he induced the marquis of Hastings to annex Singapore. He again visited Singapore, his “political child,” in 1822, and occupied himself for nearly a year in laying out the new city, and in establishing its constitution as a free port. Java had been given up to the Dutch shortly after Sir Stamford left it, and now Bencoolen was granted to them in exchange for Malacca. On setting sail for England from Sumatra in February 1824 the ship took fire and the crew and passengers were with difficulty saved. The loss to Sir Stamford was beyond all repair. The whole of his drawings, all his collections in botany and zoology, all his multitudinous papers and manuscripts, fell a prey to the flames, his pecuniary loss amounting to more than ¿£20,000. During one of his excursions into the interior of Sumatra, in company with Dr Arnold, he came upon the largest and most extraordinary of known flowers, the Rafflesia Amoldi (see Parasitism, vol. xviii. p. 265). In 1820 he sent home a large collection of preserved animals, now in the museum of the London Zoological Society, described in the Transactions of the Linnean Society. He died of apoplexy at his house near London on 5th July 1826.
[610 words — estimated reading time: 4 minutes]