sioners, will cause his name to be long and gratefully remembered in that noble asylum. Having thus performed his various duties throughout a career of active usefulness, both in public and in private life, he died from the effects of a paralytic stroke, on the 5th of April, 1834, most deeply and sincerely lamented.

Sir Richard was a sincere Christian in his belief and practice, and both were characterised by an enlarged benevolence. He was a personable, smart, and strict officer; but, at the same time, a kind, intelligent, moral, and generous man, with a shrewd and penetrating discrimination. That he was a distinguished officer has been shown: but it may be questioned whether the great nautical talents he possessed were ever called into full play; for we have no scruple in placing him at the very head of our naval phalanx, having proved himself second to none in gallantry, genius, or talent.

It was at first intended that the funeral of this great man should be private, but in compliance with the express wishes of his Majesty, it was performed with all the honours of martial observance. The ceremony took place on Saturday, the 12th of April, the anniversary of Rodney's great victory, and was attended by the Lords of the Admiralty, the naval officers of the King's household, and numerous admirals, captains, and lieutenants in full uniform. At a little before three P. M., the procession, headed by the band of the Royal Marines, formed in the great quadrangle opposite to the Governor's house. On the coffin being brought out, borne by eight pensioners who had served in the Superb, a party of artillery stationed with field pieces on One Tree Hill discharged minute guns until the body was deposited in the Royal Chapel, where the Rev. Dr. Cole, formerly Chaplain to the Foudroyant, read prayers over it. The firing, during this part of the ceremony, ceased, but was resumed on the reforming of the procession, and continued until the body reached the mausoleum in the burying ground of the establishment. The great square was lined with pensioners; and the upper quadrangle, in addition to lines of pensioners, was

skirted by 100 nurses and 200 girls, while the whole course of the procession was marked by a battalion of Marines in single files, with reversed arms. Since the funeral, his Majesty has announced his intention of giving 500l. towards the erection of a monument, to be placed in the Painted Hall, in Greenwich Hospital, in memory of the lamented Admiral.

For the foregoing Memoir we are indebted to the "United Service Journal.”

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53

No. III.

WILLIAM SOTHEBY, Esq. F.R.S. F.A.S. &c. &c.

MR. SOTHEBY was one of the most estimable men of our time; and his memory must be dear to all who love literature, and who appreciate great talent the more highly when they find it united with genuine goodness of heart, and with every kind disposition and social quality which ennobles human nature.

He was truly what is comprehended under the term a gentleman, in its best and widest sense: amiable, courteous, well-informed, of liberal sentiments, humane, and generous. Shortly after his decease, a small volume appeared, entitled, "Lines suggested by the Third Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Cambridge in June, 1833; by the late William Sotheby, Esq. F.R.S. &c. &c." To that volume is prefixed an interesting memoir, the writer of which justly observes, that Mr. Sotheby was "one, who, though his life was far from eventful in the ordinary sense of the word, was too much beloved by his friends, and too much distinguished in the general world of letters, to be allowed to sink into the grave without some slight tribute of respect to his memory." A similar feeling will, we trust, be a sufficient apology for transferring this memoir to the pages of the Annual Biography and Obituary.

Mr. Sotheby of Sewardstone, in the county of Essex, was descended from the younger branch of an ancient family of the same name, formerly settled at Pocklington, and Birdsall

in Yorkshire. He was the eldest son of Colonel Sotheby of the Guards, and Elizabeth, daughter of William Sloane, Esq. of Stoneham, in Hampshire, and was born in London on the 9th of November, 1757. By the death of his father, when only seven years old, he was left under the guardianship of the Honourable Charles Yorke, afterwards Lord Chancellor, and of his maternal uncle, Hans Sloane, Esq. By them he was placed at Harrow, where he remained till the age of seventeen, when that active disposition which accompanied him through life induced him to enter the army, instead of completing his education at either of the Universities. He purchased a commission in the Tenth Dragoons, from which he immediately obtained leave of absence, and passed several months at the Military Academy at Angers, for the purpose of more fully studying the principles of his profession. This was the course usually adopted by young men of family and fortune, England not then possessing any institution of a similar nature.

On quitting Angers, Mr. Sotheby spent the following winter and spring in the brilliant societies of Vienna and Berlin, and, returning through the South of France to England, rejoined his regiment towards the close of 1777.

The love of literature, which at first displayed itself at Harrow, seems now to have taken a permanent hold on his mind. At Knaresborough, where the Tenth Dragoons were then quartered, he employed himself in the diligent and critical perusal of Shakspeare, and the other great masters of English poetry, and committed their finest passages to memory, thus early acquiring that command of poetical language, and facility of versification, which at a later period were so fully exhibited in his works. This did not, however, prevent him from paying strict attention to his military duties, or from maintaining a steady friendship with the officers of his regiment, a friendship, in most instances, ter minated only by their deaths. He often reverted with much pleasure to this part of his life, and to the more actively employed portion of it in Scotland, when the Tenth Dragoons

were occupied in protecting a considerable line of coast, against the predatory incursions of Paul Jones. His first attempts in poetical ccmposition appear to have been written at this period, when under the roof of his friends Lord and Lady Elcho, in whose elegant and cheerful society he passed much of his leisure time, while quartered in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.

In the autumn of 1779, the regiment being removed to Northamptonshire, Mr. Sotheby renewed an early acquaintance with his relation Ambrose Isted, Esq. of Ecton in that county, to whose youngest daughter, Mary, he formed a permanent attachment. The ensuing lines, addressed to her shortly before their marriage, are a pleasing testimony, not only to his early poetical talent, but to that affection, which he placed, so fortunately for his own happiness, on one to whom, for the remainder of his long life, he was chiefly indebted for its cheerfulness and tranquillity.