Memoir of' William Roscoe, Esq. 195 



we can trace the embryo botanist, to whose ardent enthusiasm 

 in after years, we owe our botanic garden, tJte world the new 

 arrangement of Scitaminea?, and the superb botanical pubH- 

 cation on the same beautiful order of plants. The early essays 

 in painting china-ware seem also to have first inspired him with 

 a love of the fine arts, and drew him on to cultivate his taste in 

 the arts of design, in which he not only displayed the knowledge 

 of an intelligent amateur, but such practical proficiency, as might 

 have led to eminence, had his genius not been directed to other 

 channels, as several slight but spirited etchings by his hand, 

 yet in existence, amply testify. 



The rudiments of Latin he acquired between the age of six- 

 teen and twenty, by his own unassisted efforts, though at a later 

 period he read several of the best Latin authors in company 

 with his friends the late William Clarke and Richard Lowndes, 

 two young men of Liverpool, equally intent with himself on 

 mental improvement. 



I may here mention, it was not until a comparatively later 

 period of his life, and, if I mistake not, after the publication of 

 the Life of Lorenzo had given him celebrityj that he began to 

 study Greek. In a copy of Homer in possession of his family, 

 we find the following note : — " Finished the Odyssey the day I 

 came to Allerton, 18th March 1799.— W. R.'' 



From his fifteenth to his twentieth year, he appeal's, from 

 some memoranda which he has left, to have studied very assidu- 

 ously during his leisure hours ; and he luckily found some as- 

 sociates, with congenial tastes and habits, of wliose friendship he 

 always spoke, to his latest hour, with affectionate regard. 

 Among those the most conspicuous were Mr Edward Rogers, 

 Mr WiUiam Clarke, Mr Richard Lowndes, Mr William Neil- 

 son, and Mr Francis Holden. To the latter, whose various ac- 

 quirements and extraordinary talents were in after life the fre- 

 quent theme of Roscoe"'s enthusiastic encomiums, he was dispos- 

 ed to attribute his first inclination to the study of modern lan- 

 guages ; and he had pleasure in acknowledging, that it was by 

 the advice and encouragement of this young friend, that he de- 

 voted himself assiduously to the study of Italian. In his ac- 

 quisition of the elements of French and Italian, he does not 

 seem to have had any other assistance than the advice and en- 



n2 



