[Humbert I.], king of Italy, son of Victor Emmanuel, whom he succeeded in 1878; took while crown prince an active part in the movement for Italian unity, and distinguished himself by his bravery; b. 1844.
[Humboldt, Friedrich Heinrich Alex., Baron von], great traveller and naturalist, born in Berlin; devoted all his life to the study of nature in all its departments, travelling all over the Continent, and in 1800, with [Aimé Bonpland] (q. v.) for companion, visiting S. America, traversing the Orinoco, and surveying and mapping out in the course of five years Venezuela, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru, and Mexico, the results of which he published in his "Travels"; his chief work is the "Kosmos," or an account of the visible universe, in 4 vols., originally delivered as lectures in Paris in the winter of 1827-28; he was a friend of Goethe, who held him in the highest esteem (1769-1859).
[Humboldt, Karl Wilhelm von], an eminent statesman and philologist, born at Potsdam, elder brother of the preceding; represented Prussia at Rome and Vienna, but devoted himself chiefly to literary and scientific pursuits; wrote on politics and æsthetics as well as philology, and corresponded with nearly all the literary grandees of Germany (1767-1835).
[Hume, David], philosopher and historian, born in Edinburgh, the younger son of a Berwickshire laird; after trial of law and mercantile life gave himself up to study and speculation; spent much of his life in France, and fraternised with the sceptical philosophers and encyclopedists there; his chief works, "Treatise on Human Nature" (1739), "Essays" (1741-42), "Principles of Morals" (1751), and "History of England" (1754-61); his philosophy was sceptical to the last degree, but from the excess of it provoked a reaction in Germany, headed by Kant, which has yielded positive results; he found in life no connecting principle, no purpose, and had come to regard it as a restless aimless, heaving up and down, swaying to and fro on a waste ocean of blind sensations, without rational plot or counterplot, God or devil, and had arrived at an absolutely non-possumus stage, which, however, as hinted, was followed by a speedy and steady rebound, in speculation at all events; Hume's history has been characterised by Stopford Brooke as clear in narrative and pure in style, but cold and out of sympathy with his subject, as well as inaccurate; personally, he was a guileless and kindly man (1711-1776).
[Hume, Joseph], a politician, born in Montrose; studied medicine, and served as a surgeon under the East India Company in India, made his fortune, and came home; adopted the political principles of Bentham and entered Parliament, of which he continued a prominent member till his death; he was an ardent reformer, and lived to see many of the measures he advocated crowned with success (1777-1855).
[Humour], distinct from wit, and defined as "a warm, tender, fellow-feeling with all that exists," as "the sport of sensibility and, as it were, the playful, teasing fondness of a mother for a child" ... as "a sort of inverse sublimity exalting into our affections what is below us,... warm and all-embracing as the sun."
[Hundred Days], the name given to the period between Napoleon's return from Elba and his abdication, from Mar. 10 to June 28, 1815, after Waterloo.
[Hundyades John Corvinus], a Hungarian captain of the 14th century, a formidable foe of the Turks.
[Hungary] (18,556), the eastern part of Austro-Hungary, including Hungary proper, Transylvania, Croatia, and Slavonia, and, except in military and diplomatic matters and customs dues, with a considerable amount of self-government independent of Austria, differing from it, as it does, in race, language, and many other respects, to such a degree as gives rise to much dissension, and every now and then threatens disruption.
[Huns, The], a horde of barbarians of Mongolian origin who invaded Europe from the shores of the Caspian Sea in two wars, the first in the 4th century, which at length subsided, and the second in the 5th century, ultimately under Atilla, which, in the main body of them at all events, was driven back and even dispersed; they have been described as a race with broad shoulders, flat noses, small black eyes buried in the head, and without beards.