[Ouse], the name of several English rivers, of which the chief are (1) the Yorkshire Ouse, flowing through the great Vale of York southwards to the Humber, receiving the Swale, Ure, Nidd, Wharfe, and Aire from the W. and the Derwent from the E., and having in its basin more great towns than any other river in the country; (2) the Great Ouse, rising in the S. of Northamptonshire, pursuing a winding course NE. through the plains of Buckingham, Bedford, Huntingdon, Cambridge, and Norfolk to the Wash; and (3) the Sussex Ouse.
[Outram, Sir James], British general, surnamed by Napier the "Bayard of India," born in Derbyshire, began his military career in Bombay, served in the Afghan War and the war with Persia, played an important part in the suppression of the Mutiny, marching to the relief of Lucknow, magnanimously waived his rank in favour of Havelock, and fought under him (1803-1863).
[Overbeck, Friedrich], celebrated German painter, born at Lübeck; was head of the new Romantic or Pre-Raphaelite school of German art; had devoted himself to religious subjects, abjured Lutheranism, and joined the Roman Catholic Church; is famed for his frescoes "Christ's Entry into Jerusalem" and "St. Francis" in particular, still more than his oil-paintings; spent most of his life in Rome (1789-1869).
[Overbury, Sir Thomas], English gentleman, remembered chiefly from the circumstances of his death, having been poisoned in the Tower at the instance of Rochester and his wife for dissuading the former from marrying the latter, for which crime the principals were pardoned and the instruments suffered death; he was the author of certain works published after his death, and "The Wife," a poem, his "Characters," and "Crumbs from King James's Table" (1581-1613).
[Overland Route], the route to Australia and the East across the European continent instead of round the Cape of Good Hope, was inaugurated by Lieutenant Waghorn in 1845, modified on the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, and is now viâ France, the Mont Cenis tunnel, Brindisi, the Levant, Suez Canal, Red Sea, and Indian Ocean.
[Overreach, Sir Giles], a character in Massinger's play, "A New Way to Pay Old Debts."
[Overstone, Baron], English financier, represented Hythe; was made a peer in 1850; wrote on finances; was opposed to limited liability and the introduction of the decimal system; died immensely rich (1796-1883).
[Ovid] (Publius Ovidius Naso), Roman poet of the Augustan age, born at Salmo, of equestrian rank, bred for the bar, and serving the State in the department of law for a time, threw it up for literature and a life of pleasure; was the author, among other works, of the "Amores," "Fasti," and the "Metamorphoses," the friend of Horace and Virgil, and the favourite of Augustus, but for some unknown reason fell under the displeasure of the latter, and was banished in his fiftieth year, to end his days among the swamps of Scythia, near the Black Sea (B.C. 43-18 A.D.).
[Oviedo] (44), capital of the Spanish province of Asturias, near the river Nalon; is the seat of a university, library, and cathedral; it is the centre of the chief coal-field of Spain; in the neighbourhood are a gun-factory and many iron-works.
[Owen, John], Puritan divine, born in Oxfordshire, educated at Oxford; driven from the Church, became first a Presbyterian then an Independent; Cromwell made him chaplain for a sermon he preached the day after Charles I.'s execution, and he was presented in 1651 with the deanery of Christ Church, Oxford, and next year with the Vice-Chancellorship, but on the Restoration was deprived of both, after which, from 1657, he spent his life in retirement; wrote an exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews, on the Holy Spirit, and many other works in exposition of the Puritan theology, which at one time were held in greater favour than they are now (1616-1683).