HUGHES, Thomas, English author: b. Uffington, Berkshire, 20 Oct. 1823; d. Brighton, Sussex, 22 March 1896. He was educated at Rugby and Oxford, later studied law at Lin coln's Inn, was called to the bar of the Inner Temple in 1848, and began practice at once. In 1869 he was appointed queen's counsel, in 1832 County Court judge. Throughout his long pub lic career, as advanced Liberal in Parliament (1865-74), as president of the Working Men's College in London, as a champion of the co operative movement, as founder with Canon Kingsley and Frederick Maurice of the Chris tian Socialists and as creator of Rugby, a so cialistic community in the mountains of Ten nessee (1880), he tried most earnestly to exer cise a helpful influence upon English working people. He early essayedjournalism, writing many sketches for the London Spectator, chiefly accounts of traveling experiences. These sketches served as his apprenticeship in writing, and afterward were collected in book form with the title 'Vacation Rambles) (1895).
But authorship was a secondary interest until