FASTI EBORACENSES. LIVES OF THE ARCHBISHOPS OF YORK. BY THE REV. W. H. DIXON, M.A., CANON RESIDENTIARY OF YORK, ETC. EDITED AND ENLARGED BY THE REV. JAMES RAINE, M.A., SECRETARY OF THE SURTEES SOCIETY. VOLUME I. LONDON: LONGMAN, GREEN, LONGMAN, AND ROBERTS. PREFACE. WHEN a work like the present emerges from the press, a work long-promised and long-delayed, on which the toil of many years has been lavished, the reader may naturally wish to know somewhat of its origin and progress, and it is only right, in this instance, that his curiosity should be gratified. These explanations may be appropriately prefaced by a short account of the beginner of these biographical annals, to whose industry and judgment the present volume is intended to be a memorial. William Henry Dixon was the son of Henry Dixon, vicar of Wadworth, in the deanery of Doncaster, and was born at that place in the month of November, 1783. His mother was the half-sister of the poet Mason, who basked for many years in the favour of the family of Darcy at the neighbouring rectory of Aston, which he has immortalized in his verse. The estates of that well-known writer came into Mr. Dixon's possession, together with some literary treasures of much interest and value, including several volumes in the beautiful handwriting of Gray. These have now found a resting-place in the minsterlibrary at York. Mr. Dixon received his education at the grammar-schools at Worsbrough and Houghton-le-Spring. In 1801 he was matriculated at Pembroke college, Cambridge, and in January, 1805, he graduated in arts. In 1807 he entered into orders, and with the curacy of the pleasant village of Tickhill he began his clerical career in the diocese of York, with which he was con 373901 |