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XI. — A Biographical Notice of Peter Clare, Esq., F.R.A.S. 

 By the Rev. H. H. Jones, F.R.A.S. 



[Read April 6<A, 1852.] 



The late Peter Clare, Esq., was born in Manchester, in the 

 early part of the year 1781, but the exact date of his birth 

 as far as we are aware is not known. While quite a youth 

 he was accustomed to assist his father, who was in the habit 

 of giving occasional lectures on electricity, and some kindred 

 subjects in natural philosophy, illustrated by experiments. 



The son, in consequence of his early habits of thought- 

 fulness and inquiry, was not unfrequently admitted to the 

 meetings of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Man- 

 chester, while he was yet ineligible for membership on 

 account of his minority. And though he had arrived at the 

 requisite age some years before, his modesty held him back 

 till 1810, in which year he was regularly proposed and elected 

 an ordinary member of the Society. 



Commending himself, by his constant attendance and uni- 

 form assiduity, to the approbation of his philosophic friends, 

 he was in the course of a few years made a member of the 

 Council, or as it was then designated, "The Committee of 

 Papers." Subsequently (I believe it was in the year 1821) 

 he became one of the Secretaries ; and during the last several 

 years of his life, he held the office of Vice-President of the 

 Society ; the duties of which office he continued to discharge 

 with unremitting attention till disabled by bis last fatal 

 illness. 



In the year 1841 he was made a Fellow of the Royal 

 Astronomical Society. And though he was constitutionally 



