HEBER, REGINALD (1783-1826).--Poet, _s._ of the Rector of Malpas, a man of family and wealth, and half-brother of Richard H., the famous book-collector, was _ed._ at Oxf., where he gained the Newdigate prize for his poem, _Palestine_, and was elected in 1805 Fellow of All Souls. After travelling in Germany and Russia, he took orders in 1807, and became Rector of the family living of Hodnet. In 1822, after two refusals, he accepted the Bishopric of Calcutta, an office in which he showed great zeal and capacity. He _d._ of apoplexy in his bath at Trichinopoly in 1826. In addition to _Palestine_ he wrote _Europe_, a poem having reference specially to the Peninsular War, and left various fragments, including an Oriental romance based on the story of Bluebeard. H.'s reputation now rests mainly on his hymns, of which several, _e.g._, _From Greenland's Icy Mountains_, _Brightest and Best of the Sons of the Morning_, and _Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty_, are sung wherever the English language is known. He also wrote a _Life of Jeremy Taylor_ (1822). H. was a scholar and wit as well as a devoted Christian and Churchman. HELPS, SIR ARTHUR (1813-1875).--Essayist and historian, was _b._ at Streatham, Surrey, and _ed._ at Eton and Camb. After leaving the Univ. he was private sec. to various public men, and in 1841, his circumstances rendering him independent of employment, he retired to Bishop's Waltham, and devoted himself for 20 years to study and writing. Appointed, in 1860, Clerk to the Privy Council, he became known to, and a favourite of, Queen Victoria, who entrusted him with the task of editing the _Speeches and Addresses of the Prince Consort_ (1862), and her own book, _Leaves from the Journal of our Life in the Highlands_ (1868). Of his own publications the first was _Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd_ (1835), a series of aphorisms, and there followed, among others, _Essays written in the Intervals of Business_ (1841), _Friends in Council_, 4 series (1847-59), _Realmah_ (1869), and _Conversations on War and General Culture_ (1871). In history H. wrote _The Conquerors of the New World_ (1848-52), and _The Spanish Conquests in America_, 4 vols. (1855-61). He also wrote a _Life of Thos. Brassey_, and, as the demand for his historical works fell off, he _repub._ parts of them as individual biographies of Las Casas, Columbus, Pizarro, and Cortez. He also tried the drama, but without success. His essays are his most successful work, containing as they do the thoughts and opinions of a shrewd, experienced, and highly cultivated man, written in what Ruskin called "beautiful quiet English." They have not, however, any exceptional depth or originality.