“Journal” is particularly applied to the record, day by day, of the business and proceedings of a public body. The journals of the British houses of parliament contain an official record of the business transacted day by day in either house. The record does not take note of speeches, though some of the earlier volumes contain references to them. The journals are a lengthened account written from the “votes and proceedings” (in the House of Lords called “minutes of the proceedings”), made day by day by the assistant clerks, and printed on the responsibility of the clerk to the house, after submission to the “subcommittee on the journals.” In the Commons the journal is passed by the Speaker before publication. The journals of the House of Commons begin in the first year of the reign of Edward VI. (1547), and are complete, except for a short interval under Elizabeth. Those of the House of Lords date from the first year of Henry VIII. (1509). Before that date the proceedings in parliament were entered in the rolls of parliament, which extend from 1278 to 1503. The journals of the Lords are “records” in the judicial sense, those of the Commons are not (see Erskine May, Parliamentary Practice, 1906, pp. 201-202).
The term “journal” is used, in business, for a book in which an account of transactions is kept previous to a transfer to the ledger (see [Book-keeping]), and also as an equivalent to a ship’s log, as a record of the daily run, observations, weather changes, &c. In mining, a journal is a record describing the various strata passed through in sinking a shaft. A particular use of the word is that, in machinery, for the parts of a shaft which are in contact with the bearings; the origin of this meaning, which is firmly established, has not been explained.
JOURNEY (through O. Fr. jornee or journee, mod. Fr. journée, from med. Lat. diurnata, Lat. diurnus, of or belonging to dies, day), properly that which occupies a day in its performance, and so a day’s work, particularly a day’s travel, and the distance covered by such, usually reckoned in the middle ages as twenty miles. The word is now used of travel covering a certain amount of distance or lasting a certain amount of time, frequently defined by qualifying words. “Journey” is usually applied to travel by land, as opposed to “voyage,” travel by sea. The early use of “journey” for a day’s work, or the amount produced by a day’s work, is still found in glassmaking, and also at the British Mint, where a “journey” is taken as equivalent to the coinage of 15 ℔ of standard gold, 701 sovereigns, and of 60 ℔ of silver. The term “journeyman” also preserves the original significance of the word. It distinguishes a qualified workman or mechanic from an “apprentice” on the one hand and a “master” on the other, and is applied to one who is employed by another person to work at his trade or occupation at a day’s wage.
JOUVENET, JEAN (1647-1717), French painter, born at Rouen, came of a family of artists, one of whom had taught Poussin. He early showed remarkable aptitude for his profession, and, on arriving in Paris, attracted the attention of Le Brun, by whom he was employed at Versailles, and under whose auspices, in 1675, he became a member of the Académie Royale, of which he was elected professor in 1681, and one of the four perpetual rectors in 1707. The great mass of works that he executed, chiefly in Paris, many of which, including his celebrated Miraculous Draught of Fishes (engraved by Audran; also Landon, Annales, i. 42), are now in the Louvre, show his fertility in invention and execution, and also that he possessed in a high degree that general dignity of arrangement and style which distinguished the school of Le Brun. Jouvenet died on the 5th of April 1717, having been forced by paralysis during the last four years of his life to work with his left hand.
See Mém. inéd. acad. roy. de p. et de sc., 1854, and D’Argenville, Vies des peintres.
JOUY, VICTOR JOSEPH ÉTIENNE DE (1764-1846), French dramatist, was born at Jouy, near Versailles, on the 12th of September 1764. At the age of eighteen he received a commission in the army, and sailed for South America in the company of the governor of Guiana. He returned almost immediately to France to complete his studies, and re-entered the service two years later. He was sent to India, where he met with many romantic adventures which were afterwards turned to literary account. On the outbreak of the Revolution he returned to France and served with distinction in the early campaigns, attaining the rank of adjutant-general. He drew suspicion on himself, however, by refusing to honour the toast of Marat, and had to fly for his life. At the fall of the Terror he resumed his commission but again fell under suspicion, being accused of treasonable correspondence with the English envoy, James Harris, 1st earl of Malmesbury who had been sent to France to negotiate terms of peace. He was acquitted of this charge, but, weary of repeated attacks, resigned his position on the pretext of his numerous wounds. Jouy now turned his attention to literature, and produced in 1807 with immense success his opera La vestale (music by Spontini). The piece ran for a hundred nights, and was characterized by the Institute of France as the best lyric drama of the day. Other operas followed, but none obtained so great a success. He published in the Gazette de France a series of satirical sketches of Parisian life, collected under the title of L’Ermite de la Chaussée d’Antin, ou observations sur les mœurs et les usages français au commencement du xixe siècle (1812-1814, 5 vols.), which was warmly received. In 1821 his tragedy of Sylla gained a triumph due in part to the genius of Talma, who had studied the title-rôle from Napoleon. Under the Restoration Jouy consistently fought for the cause of freedom, and if his work was overrated by his contemporaries, they were probably influenced by their respect for the author himself. He died in rooms set apart for his use in the palace of St Germain-en-Laye on the 4th of September 1846.
Out of the long list of his operas, tragedies and miscellaneous writings may be mentioned, Fernand Cortez (1809), opera, in collaboration with J. E. Esménard, music by Spontini; Tippo Saïb, tragedy (1813); Bélisaire, tragedy (1818); Les Hermites en prison (1823), written in collaboration with Antoine Jay, like himself a political prisoner; Guillaume Tell (1829), with Hippolyte Bis, for the music of Rossini. Jouy was also one of the founders of the Biographie nouvelle des contemporains.