[Courtois, Jacques], a French painter of battle-pieces; became a Jesuit, died a monk (1621-1676).
[Courtrais] (29), a Belgian town on the Lys.
[Cousin, Victor], a French philosopher, born in Paris; founder of an eclectic school, which derived its doctrines partly from the Scottish philosophy and partly from the German, and which Dr. Chalmers in his class-room one day characterised jocularly as neither Scotch nor German, but just half seas over; he was a lucid expounder, an attractive lecturer, and exerted no small influence on public opinion in France; had a considerable following; retired from public life in 1848, and died at Cannes; he left a number of philosophic works behind him, the best known among us "Discourses on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good" (1792-1867).
[Cousin Michael], a disparaging designation of our German kindred, as slow, heavy, unpolished, and ungainly.
[Cousin-Montauban], a French general, commanded the Chinese expedition of 1860, and, after a victory over the Chinese, took possession of Pekin (1796-1878).
[Cousins, Samuel], a mezzotint engraver, born at Exeter; engraved "Bolton Abbey," "Marie Antoinette in the Temple," and a number of plates after eminent painters; left a fund to aid poor artists (1801-1880).
[Couston], the name of three eminent French sculptors: Nicolas (1658-1733); Guillaume, father (1678-1746); and Guillaume, son (1716-1777).
[Couthon, Georges], a violent revolutionary, one of a triumvirate with Robespierre and St. Just, who would expel every one from the Jacobin Club who could not give evidence of having done something to merit hanging, should a counter-revolution arrive; was paralysed in his limbs from having had to spend a night "sunk to the middle in a cold peat bog" to escape detection as a seducer; trapped for the guillotine; tried to make away with himself under a table, but could not (1756-1794).
[Coutts, Thomas], a banker, born in Edinburgh, his father having been Lord Provost of that city; joint-founder and eventually sole manager of the London banking house, Coutts & Co.; left a fortune of £900,000 (1735-1822).
[Couvade], a custom among certain races of low culture in which a father before and after childbirth takes upon himself the duties and cares of the mother.