198 Memoir of Williatn Roscoe, Esq. 



tion of circumstances that brought him into public notice, hut 

 had grown up with his expanding faculties, and became confirmed 

 by the reflections of his maturer years. 



While Roscoe was thus improving his literary taste in the 

 moments snatched from the fatigues of his profession, he devo- 

 ted no inconsiderable portion of his attention to the study and 

 promotion of the fine arts in his native town. He was the chief 

 instigator, and most active member, of a small society formed 

 here in 1772, "Jbr the encouragement of designing, drawing, 

 and painting r and he read before that association, at one of 

 its first meetings, an ode, addressed to the institution, which was 

 afterwards published with the poem of Mount Pleasant, in 

 1777. 



Soon after the termination of his articles of clerkship, Mr 

 Roscoe entered into partnership as an attorney with Mr Aspi- 

 nall ; and in this profession he continued, first with that gentle- 

 man, and afterwards with Mr Joshua Lace, until the year 1796. 

 It is proper to remark, that Mr Roscoe, though eminent as a 

 practitioner, never relished his profession, and had always ex- 

 pressed his determination to retire from practice as an attorney, 

 whenever the possession of a moderate competence should enable 

 him to devote his attention to literary pursuits. He continued, 

 however, for several years to attend sedulously to his business ; 

 but it was not until the year 1781 that the profits of his exer- 

 tions enabled him to marry ; when he was united to Jane, the 

 second daughter of Mr William Griffies, a respectable trades- 

 man of Liverpool. 



This union was productive of the utmost domestic happiness 

 to the subject of this memoir, and made him the happy father 

 of seven sons and three daughters ; all of whom, except a son 

 and a daughter, survive him. 



For several years after his marriage, at intervals of leisure, 

 he contrived to increase those rich treasures of literary informa- 

 tion, and to cultivate that taste for the fine arts, which gave a 

 peculiar charm to his conversation, and paved the way to his fu- 

 ture celebrity. 



In the year 1787, the agitation of the abolition of the slave- 

 trade drew Mr Roscoe into the field of political controversy ; 

 and he became the author of two anonymous pamphlets on that 



