CALVERLEY, CHARLES STUART Eng lish poet and wit, and the literary father of what may be called the university school of humour, was born at Martley in Worcester shire on Dec. 22, 1831, and died on Feb. 17, 1884. His father, the Rev. Henry Blayds, resumed in 1852 the old family name of Calverley which his grandfather had exchanged for Blayds in 1807. Charles Blayds went up to Balliol from Harrow in 185o. At Oxford he was a universal favourite, a delightful companion, a brilliant scholar and the playful enemy of all "dons." In 1851 he won the Chancellor's prize for Latin verse but a year later he took his name off the books, to avoid the consequences of a college escapade, and migrated to Christ's college, Cambridge. Here he was again successful in Latin verse. In 1856 he took second place in the first class in the Classical Tripos. He was elected fellow of Christ's (1858), published Verses and Translations in 1862, and was called to the bar in 1865. Owing to an accident while skating he was prevented from following up a professional career, and during the last years of his life he was an invalid. His Translations into English and Latin appeared in 1866; his Theocritus translated into English Verse in 1869; Fly Leaves in 1872; and Literary Re mains in 1885. His sparkling, dancing verses, which have had many clever imitators, are still without a rival in their own line.
His Complete Works, with a biographical notice by Sir W. J. Sendall, appeared in 1901.