DE LAND, a town and the county-seat of Volusia county, Florida, U.S.A., 111 m. by rail S. of Jacksonville, 20 m. from the Atlantic coast and 4 m. from the St John’s river. Pop. (1900) 1449; (1910) 2812. De Land is served by the Atlantic Coast Line and by steamboats on the St John’s river. It has a fine winter climate, with an average temperature of 60° F., has sulphur springs, and is a health and winter resort. There is a starch factory here; and the surrounding country is devoted to fruit-growing. De Land is the seat of the John B. Stetson University (co-educational), an undenominational institution under Baptist control, founded in 1884, as an academy, by Henry A. De Land, a manufacturer of Fairport, New York, and in 1887 incorporated under the name of De Land University, which was changed in 1889 to the present name, in honour of John Batterson Stetson (1830-1906), a Philadelphia manufacturer of hats, who during his life gave nearly $500,000 to the institution. The university includes a college of liberal arts, a department of law, a school of technology, an academy, a normal school, a model school, a business college and a school of music. De Land was founded in 1876 by H. A. De Land, above mentioned, who built a public school here in 1877 and a high school in 1883.
DELANE, JOHN THADEUS (1817-1879), editor of The Times (London), was born on the 11th of October 1817 in London. He was the second son of Mr W. F. A. Delane, a barrister, of an old Irish family, who about 1832 was appointed by Mr Walter financial manager of The Times. While still a boy he attracted Mr Walter’s attention, and it was always intended that he should find work on the paper. He received a good general education at private schools and King’s College, London, and also at Magdalen Hall, Oxford; after taking his degree in 1840 he at once began work on the paper, though later he read for the bar, being called in 1847. In 1841 he succeeded Thomas Barnes as editor, a post which he occupied for thirty-six years. He from the first obtained the best introductions into society and the chief political circles, and had a position there such as no journalist had previously enjoyed, using his opportunities with a sure intuition for the way in which events would move. His staff included some of the most brilliant men of the day, who worked together with a common ideal. The result to the paper, which in those days had hardly any real competitor in English journalism, was an excellence of information which gave it great power. (See [Newspapers].) Delane was a man of many interests and great judgment; capable of long application and concentrated attention, with power to seize always on the main point at issue, and rapidly master the essential facts in the most complicated affair. His general policy was to keep the paper a national organ of opinion above party, but with a tendency to sympathize with the Liberal movements of the day. He admired Palmerston and respected Lord Aberdeen, and was of considerable use to both; and it was Lord Aberdeen himself who, in 1845, told him of the impending repeal of the Corn Laws, an incident round which many incorrect stories have gathered. The history, however, of the events during the thirteen administrations, between 1841 and 1877, in which The Times, and therefore Delane, played an important part cannot here be recapitulated. In 1877 his health gave way, and he retired from the editorship; and on the 22nd of November 1879 he died at Ascot.
A biography by his nephew, Arthur Irwin Dasent, was published in 1908.
DELANY, MARY GRANVILLE (1700-1788), an Englishwoman of literary tastes, was born at Coulston, Wilts, on the 14th of May 1700. She was a niece of the 1st Lord Lansdowne. In 1717 or 1718 she was unhappily married to Alexander Pendarves, a rich old Cornish landowner, who died in 1724. During a visit to Ireland she met Dean Swift and his intimate friend, the Irish divine, Patrick Delany, whose second wife she became in 1743. After his death in 1768 she passed all her summers with her bosom friend the dowager duchess of Portland—Prior’s “Peggy”—and when the latter died George III. and Queen Charlotte, whose affection for their “dearest Mrs Delany” seems to have been most genuine, gave her a small house at Windsor and a pension of £300 a year. Fanny Burney (Madame D’Arblay) was introduced to her in 1783, and frequently visited her at her London home and at Windsor, and owed to her friendship her court appointment. At this time Mrs Delany was a charming and sweet old lady, with a reputation for cutting out and making the ingenious “paper mosaiks” now in the British Museum; she had known every one worth knowing in her day, had corresponded with Swift and Young, and left an interesting picture of the polite but commonplace English society of the 18th century in her six volumes of Autobiography and Letters. Burke calls her “a real fine lady”—“the model of an accomplished woman of former times.” She died on the 15th of April 1788.
DE LA REY, JACOBUS HERCULES (1847- ), Boer soldier, was born in the Lichtenburg district, and in his youth and early manhood saw much service in savage warfare. In 1893 he entered the Volksraad of the South African Republic, and was an active supporter of the policy of General Joubert. At the outbreak of the war with Great Britain in 1899 De La Rey was made a general, and he was engaged in the western campaign against Lord Methuen and Lord Roberts. He won his first great success at Nitral’s Nek on the 11th of July 1900, where he compelled the surrender of a strong English detachment. In the second or guerrilla stage of the war De La Rey became one of the most conspicuously successful of the Boer leaders. He was assistant to General Louis Botha and a member of the government, with charge of operations in the western Transvaal. The principal actions in which he was successful (see also [Transvaal]: History) were Nooitgedacht, Vlakfontein and the defeat and capture of Lord Methuen at Klerksdorp (March 7, 1902). The British general was severely wounded in the action, and De La Rey released him at once, being unable to afford him proper medical assistance. This humanity and courtesy marked De La Rey’s conduct throughout the war, and even more than his military skill and daring earned for him the esteem of his enemies. After the conclusion of peace De La Rey, who had borne a prominent part in the negotiations, visited Europe with the other generals, with the intention of raising funds to enable the Boers to resettle their country. In December 1903 he went on a mission to India, and induced the whole of the Boer prisoners of war detained at Ahmednagar to accept the new order of things and to take the oath of allegiance. In February 1907 General De La Rey was returned unopposed as member for Ventersdorp in the legislative assembly of the first Transvaal parliament under self-government.