together with Ludlow's Memoirs, and Sydney's Discourse on Government. In 1758, he employed much of his time in collecting books for the public library at Berne, to which he presented a great number of very valuable works, which were acknowledged by a Latin address of thanks to him, and his name was inserted in the records of the donators, beneath the plate of a medal typical of his gift.

About this time, he corresponded very frequently with an American clergyman, Dr. Mayhew, for whom he had conceived so great a regard, on reading one of his sermons, that he sent him, anonymously, a large box of books; which, being lost, he supplied by a second chest, and shortly afterwards forwarded him a third, with his name subscribed; upon which, an epistolary communication took place between them, and continued till the time of Dr. Mayhew's death. Mr. Hollis also corresponded, at different times, with almost all the literati of France, Italy, and Germany, and presented several of the letters he had received to the Antiquarian, and other societies. He also made several valuable donations, of medals and manuscripts, to both universities; to the library of St. Mark, at Venice; and to several individuals, public as well as private; particularly, among the former, to the Duke of Devonshire, whose death he notes in his diary, with much regret, having, as he said "just before he died, obtained his confidence to so absolute a degree, as to be able to employ it to many noble purposes."

Up to the year 1770, he kept a diary of all his transactions, which consisted in a continued distribution of gifts, both in money and books, to an immense amount, as unostentatiously recorded, as they were charitably and liberally bestowed. In the August of the lastmentioned year, he retired to his seat at Corscombe, in Devonshire, still continuing to employ himself in whatever he conceived might be beneficial to his country; and occasionally sending out, to the libraries of foreign countries, such books as he thought rare or valuable to them. Among others, was the Polyglott Bible of Walton, two volumes of Castel's Lexicon, and the works of Lightfoot, which are thus alluded to

in a letter of thanks from the Prince of Torremuzza, to whom he had sent them as a present:-"I am astonished at your excessive goodness. These works are hardly ever seen in the best public libraries. I am at a loss to find words to express the obligations with which your goodness is continually loading me."

A few years before his death, he became alarmed at what he considered the decline of the public hostility towards popery, and was much annoyed, in 1764, at the conduct of ministers, then opposed to Mr. Pitt, whom he greatly admired, and whose promotion to the secretaryship of state, he thus prophecies, to a friend :-" Not for the sake of any noble pursuit in which the ministry wish to employ Mr. Pitt, but solely in hopes thereby to still all popular clamour; and they may, till the next general war, when wo to Britain! which, by its leaders in the close of the last, has seemed to renounce the very providence of the Almighty:" and, in one of his subsequent letters, he speaks of his exertions against "popery, intolerant popery," with a virulence that, notwithstanding his universal benevolence, argues a little against the spirit of toleration in himself. On the 1st of January, 1774, whilst walking out in his grounds at Corscombe, in the morning of which day he had thus concluded a letter to one of his servants, "I have to thank God for continuing me in health," he suddenly dropped down in a fit, and expired.

A more charitable and eccentric character has seldom existed than Mr. Hollis; all the public journals of the day accompanied the mention of his decease with laudatory remarks, rarely applied to the memory of a private individual. His diary, in addition to its interest for the singularity of its records, contains an account of books and persons, both ancient and modern, from which a biographical and bibliographical work might almost be compiled. His independence was equal to his munificence; "though," said he, in answer to an application to become a candidate for a borough, "I would almost give my right hand to be chosen into parliament, yet I would not give a single crown for it by way of bribe;

no! let me pass the remainder of my life only in innocence and in decorum, if it be possible, and in quietness and retirement." His collection of medals, besides those he himself designed and struck, was immense; and their beneficial tendency, and the judgment with which they were chosen, were as remarkable as their quantity, which he found, on calculation, sufficient to make fortyfour octavo volumes. The value he set on them, particularly those bearing the likenesses of the heads of antiquity, is forcibly shown by the following observation, on his refusing a present of one, by way of remuneration:-" Petty favours and obligations," said he, "I accept-great ones, never; and I would sooner myself have stricken flat the sacred effigies of Brutus, than have acquired it by donation, or in any degree by finesse and bounty."

Towards the latter part of his life, his aversion to popery continued to increase; and his fears of the catholics were expressed and shown in such a manner, as to subject him to the charge of mental imbecility. He went so far as to fancy that the pope had despatched emissaries from Rome, to watch for an opportunity of taking his life; and that his bookbinder, who was of the Romish persuasion, intended to set fire to his house, for the purpose of burning_his books in favour of protestantism. But, however sincere he might have been in these apprehensions, it is doubtful whether many of his eccentricities were not affected; and this supposition is justified by a passage in one of his letters to a friend, about three years previously to his death:-"That of which I am most chary is my time; and people are cautious enough in general not to break in upon, and consume it. The idea of singularity, by way of shield, I try, by all means, to hold out." He kept, till the day of his death, a resolution he had made, to avoid all public distinctive characters; accordingly, though member of several literary and scientific societies, he refused all solicitation to become chairman or president of one of them. He scarcely passed a single year, after his coming of age, in which he distributed, in public and private charity, less than

£400. "To sum up his character in a few words," says the St. James's Chronicle," in his death, Liberty lost her champion, Humanity her treasurer, and Charity her steward."

His person combined an excellent shape, with a strength and appearance almost Herculean; and the simple, honest straight-forwardness of his mind was on a par with the extreme affability and amenity of his manners. He rose early; was very abstemious in his diet, never drinking wine or beer, nor using salt, spices, butter, milk, or sugar; he walked many miles daily; was passionately fond of fencing, and played well on the flute, with which, when tired with reading, he amused himself in the evening. Averse to the formal compliments of society, he entertained very little company at his house, and refused to allow himself any of those luxuries which his ample fortune would have enabled him to procure; and on being told that people wondered he kept so few servants and no carriage, and that a certain person had said some hard things of him, relative to his secluded and unsociable way of life, he replied:-"These speeches mortify me sensibly; though, on strict examination of my conduct, I cannot think that person hath any reason to talk in such a kind of manner of me. But I will endeavour to act up steadily to what shall appear to me to be right and decent; and, for the rest, be disturbed as little as may be by what the world shall think or say of me." He had ordered, that whenever his death took place, his corpse should be deposited in a grave ten feet deep, in the middle of one of his fields, and that the spot should be immediately ploughed over, that no trace of his burial-place might be visible. In addition to the works before mentioned, he published, or procured the publication of, the following:-Wallis's Grammar of the English Language; Locke on Toleration; Government, a work by the same author; Sidney on Government; Needham's Excellence of a Free State; Neville's Plato Redivivus; and several tracts and pamphlets, particularly those by Dr. Mayhew respecting America.

JOHN BYRON, second son of William, fourth Lord Byron, was born on the 8th of November, 1723; and, in 1740, proceeded, on board the Wager, to the South Seas, under Commodore Anson. The vessel being shipwrecked in its passage, Byron, with a few of his companions who survived, endured innumerable hardships; and were conducted, by a party of Indians, to Chiloe, where they were received by the natives with the greatest hospitality. They were afterwards removed to the convent of the Jesuits, at Castro; and, while there, proposals were made to Byron of a marriage with the niece of an old priest, the richest man in the island, who endeavoured to persuade him into the match, by a promise to make him the heir to his property. Byron, however, declined the offer, and was, soon after, conveyed, with his companions, to Chaco, where they were all immediately consigned to a dungeon, by the Spanish governor. Here he remained, for some time, in confinement, treated with the utmost severity; which was, however, mitigated by the kindness of a common soldier, with six children; whom he, two years afterwards, was able to reward. He was, in a short time, ordered, with Mr. Campbell, to St. Jago, whither he was conveyed, under the direction of an old muleteer, who kindly advised Byron to continue with him, and not to remain in the city, where, he said, there was nothing but vice, folly, and extravagance. He was, however, as well as Mr. Campbell, treated, on his arrival, with every respect: they were invited to meet Admiral Pizarro at the table of the president; and, having no clothes in which they could appear, accepted a loan of six hundred dollars from a Spanish lieutenant, who had generously offered them two thousand, though there appeared no prospect of the debt ever being liquidated. After remaining two years at St. Jago, they embarked, in December, 1744, for Europe; and arrived, at the close of the following year, at Dover. Byron tra

velled to London, on a borrowed horse, having no money for refreshments, and being compelled, by hard riding, to defraud the turnpikes. He proceeded to the house of his sister, Lady Carlisle, in John Square, and from the shabbiness of his appearance, was, at first, refused admittance.

Soon after his arrival, he was made commander of a sloop-of-war; and, on the 30th of December, 1746, was appointed captain of the Syren frigate. He afterwards went, in the St. Albans, under Commodore Buckle, to the coast of Guinea; and, in 1753, was promoted to the Augusta, a guard-ship, at Plymouth. In 1757, his ship, the America, of sixty guns, formed one of the fleet engaged under Sir Edward Hawke, at the successful expedition against Rochefort; and, in 1758, he commanded three vessels of the line, one of which, the Brilliant, sank the Intrepide, a French privateer, by her first broadside. Early in 1763, Captain Byron proceeded, in the Fame, to destroy the fortifications at Louisburg; and, in Chaleur Bay, with his own and two other vessels, destroyed a large force, consisting of three frigates, twenty schooners, and a number of privateers, belonging to the enemy.

On the accession of George the Third, Captain Byron was appointed to the command of the Dolphin, and, in company with the Tamar, sailed from Plymouth, on the 3rd of July, 1764, for the South Seas, on a voyage of discovery. On the 13th of September, he anchored in the great road of Rio de Janeiro, where he lost five of his men by the artifices of the Portuguese, who, he says in his journal," make it their business to attend every time a boat comes on shore, and use every art in their power to entice away the crew." On the 22nd of October, he again put to sea, and made for Port Desire, and, about three weeks afterwards, experienced a tremendous storm; on the subsiding of which, he says, "the sea became red as blood, being covered with a small shell-fish of that colour." He landed at Port Desire on the 21st of November,

and, after passing some days in examining the country, where he shot several hares of the size of a fawn, and in taking soundings of the bay, he weighed anchor, and steered out E.N.E. with a fresh gale at N. N. W. Whilst

at anchor near Cape Virgin Mary, perceiving several hundred people on foot and horseback waving him to land, he approached the shore in a boat, where he was met by a chief whom he describes as "of a gigantic stature, and painted so as to make the most hideous appearance he ever beheld." After making a few presents to the inhabitants, of whom he speaks as a race of giants, he passed up the Straits of Magellan to Port Famine, when he turned his course back to some land to which he gave the name of Falkland's Islands. Whilst staying here, he lost several of his crew on shore, from the attack of sea-lions, a ferocious species of animal, of the size of a mastiff, and one of whom, he says, "it afforded a dozen of us an hour's work to despatch." Leaving these islands in January, 1765, he proceeded through the Straits of Magellan, as far as Cape Monday, where he arrived on the 9th of February, and was detained by contrary winds until the 23rd, when "soon after he made sail, opened the South Sea." He quitted the Straits of Magellan on the 9th of April, and notwithstanding the many difficulties and dangers he encountered in his passage, recommends it in preference to going round Cape Horn, in a western course from Europe, into the South Seas. "I think," he says, "that at a proper season of the year, not only a single vessel, but a large squadron, might pass the straits in less than three weeks; and I think, to take the proper season, they should be at the eastern entrance some time in the month of December."

He now pursued his course to the westward, till the 26th of April, when he bore away for the island of Masafuero, and, on the 7th of June, he came in sight of a small island, to which he gave the name of Disappointment, in consequence of his being

unable to land, or to procure from the hostile natives any of the cocoa-nuts visible on several trees; the milk of that nut being the best cure for the scurvy, with which most of his men were afflicted. About three days afterwards, he discovered, and, after a skirmish with the natives, landed at, two islands, which he named after King George; and he subsequently discovered, and named, Prince of Wales's, Duke of York's, and Byron's Islands; the latter of which lies in latitude 1 deg. 18 min. S., longitude 173 deg. 46 min. E.; and where he states the variation of the compass to have been "one point E." After passing some time in the island of Tinian, in describing which, as the most unhealthy, and hottest place in the world, he somewhat differs from the account given by Lord Anson, he proceeded to Pulo Timoan, and thence to Batavia, where he arrived on the 29th of November. In December, he sailed by way of the Cape of Good Hope, for England, and landed at Deal, on the 9th of May, 1766. In 1769, his lordship was made governor of Newfoundland; and, after having commanded in the West Indies during the American war, was ultimately promoted to be vice-admiral of the white. He died on the 16th of April, 1786, leaving two sons and seven daughters by his wife, who was a daughter of John Trevainon, Esq., of Carhays, in the county of Cornwall.

The unparalleled trials and hardships that befel Admiral Byron when he entered the service, and at a period when he was not more than seventeen years of age, had the effect of producing a patient fortitude, which he exhibited, in after life, on a variety of occasions. The series of stormy adventures which attended him in the discharge of his professional duties, procured for him the title of "Foul-weather Jack;" an epithet applied to Sir John Norris for similar reasons. An account of the admiral's voyage to the South Sea is to be found in Hawkesworth's collection, but will be read with little interest after the journals of Cook, Franklin, and Parry,