13 8 Linnean Society. [May 24, 



but of the Roman Catholic religion, to purposes connected with 

 which he is said to have contributed during the last few years of his 

 life sums amounting to £100,000. He served the office of Sheriff 

 of London and Middlesex in the year 1834, was in the following 

 year returned to Parliament for the County of Carlow, but was un- 

 seated on petition, and sat for St. Albans from 1847 till the time of 

 his death. He became a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1835, 

 and died at his house in Great Stanhope Street, May Fair, on the 

 17th of November last, at the age of seventy-four. 



George Thackeray, D.D., and Provost of King's College, Cam- 

 bridge, was the son of Dr. Thackeray of Windsor, a favourite phy- 

 sician of King George III., and grandson of the Rev. Thomas 

 Thackeray, D.D., head-master of Harrow School. He was born at 

 Harrow, passed his school days at Eton, and proceeded thence to 

 King's College, where he took his degree of B.A. in 1802, and of 

 M.A. in 1805, and became a Fellow of his College in the same year. 

 He was soon after appointed to be one of the Assistant-Masters at 

 Eton, and became one of the chaplains in ordinary to King George 

 IJL, an office which he continued to hold under that sovereign's 

 successors. In 1814 he was appointed Provost of King's College, 

 and in the same year Vice- Chancellor of the University. Dr. 

 Thackeray was a most erudite classical scholar, and especially di- 

 stinguished by his critical knowledge of Latin. He was a great 

 lover of old books, and had also paid much attention to natural 

 history, in which department his library, in all respects a very 

 valuable one, was peculiarly rich. He died in Wimpole Street on 

 the 21st of October in the last year, leaving an only daughter the 

 heiress of his very considerable wealth. His election into the Lin- 

 nean Society bears date in 1821. 



James Thomson, Esq., F.R.S., was born at Blackburn on the 6th 

 of February, 1779. His family were nearly connected with that of 

 the late Sir Robert Peel. At the early age of fifteen he went to 

 pursue his studies at Glasgow ; there he entered into relations of 

 confidential friendship with Gregory Watt (son of the inventor of 

 the steam-engine), after whose early death he remained on terms 

 of intimacy with James Watt himself, and with Thomas Campbell 

 the poet. He remained at college but for one year, and then entered 

 the mercantile house of Joseph Peel and Co. in London, where he 

 resided for six years, associating with many of the most remarkable 

 literary and scientific men of the age ; Sir Humphry Davy, Wol- 

 laston and Person being among his intimate friends. His know- 

 , ledge of chemistry attracted the notice of his employers, who think- 



