Way 23, 1859.] OBITUARY.— KEID, 253 



Joining tlie army of Wellington in 1810, lie was present as a 

 subaltern officer of engineers at all the great sieges and battles in 

 the Peninsula, from that date until the close of the war, when he 

 obtained his company. He was afterwards present at the bombard- 

 ment of Algiers in 1816, and commanded the Engineers under Sir 

 De Lacy Evans in Spain. 



In 1832, when employed at Bermuda, and when devising the 

 reconstruction of extensive Government buildings destroyed by a 

 hurricane, he was led to follow out that series of inquiries into the 

 causes of such storms, and collected numerous data to work out their 

 giratory character, which had been shortly before put forth by Mr. 

 Eedfield of New York. These effects resulted in ' Eeid's Laws of 

 Storms,' which work, published in 1838, has passed through several 

 editions, and has been translated into various foreign languages, 

 even into Chinese. By the law which he evolved, he taught the 

 mariner that the old method of running before the wind in such 

 storms might lead to destruction, and that true safety was to be 

 sought by veering to the one side or the other, and thus escaping 

 from the whirlwind. 



It was infinitely to the credit of my old friend Lord Glenelg, then 

 Colonial Secretary, that in consequence of the talent displayed in 

 that work, his Lordship appointed Colonel Eeid to the Government 

 of the Windward Islands ; and I mention this circumstance because 

 science is not often so appositely rewarded. 



As an administrator. Sir William Eeid was never more distinguished 

 than in methodizing and controlling the proceedings of the Great 

 National Exhibition of the Industry of all Nations, with which our 

 Vice Patron the Prince Consort has so eminently identified his 

 name ; and His Eoyal Highness never better demonstrated his right 

 appreciation of true merit than in warmly acknowledging the value 

 of the services of the Chairman of the Executive Committee of that 

 great undertaking, and in procuring for William Eeid the honour- 

 able distinction of a Knight Commandership of the Order of the 

 Bath, and the Government of Malta. 



Possessing a genuine enthusiasm under a calm and tranquil ex- 

 terior, Sir William not only thoroughly performed his arduous 

 duties at Malta during the Crimean war, but lost no opportunity 

 of improving the estate committed to his charge, by ameliorating 

 its agriculture, replenishing the old library of the knights, and by 

 founding a botanical school for the working classes. 



