648 



STOW, BARON. 



STRANGFORD, VISCOUNT. 



feeling that lie possessed as yet the vigor and the 

 intellectual ability to do his heloved country 

 service. On the death of Commodore Barren 

 he became the senior officer of the service, and 

 when a special act of Congress was passed in 

 1861, conferring upon him the title of senior 

 flag-officer on the active list, he refused the 

 commission, claiming that he already held that 

 rank. In July, 1862, he was commissioned as 

 the first rear-admiral under the new law. 

 In 1841 a resolute effort was made by some 

 of his friends to place him in nomination for 

 the presidency, but, failing to receive his sanc- 

 tion or approbation, nothing came of it. He sym- 

 pathized most heartily with the Union cause in 

 the late war, and, though eighty-three years of 

 age at its commencement, pleaded most earnest- 

 ly to be allowed an active command. His coun- 

 sels, clear, and wise as ever, were of great ser- 

 vice to the Administration. He had purchased 

 a home in Bordentown, in 1816, but his long 

 absences and official duties had prevented his 

 occupying it very constantly until after 1855. 

 His last illness was protracted and attended 

 with intense suffering, but it was endured with 

 the most heroic patience. 



STOW, BARON, D. D., an American Baptist 

 clergyman and author, born in Croydon, Sulli- 

 van County, N. H., June 16, 1801 ; died in Bos- 

 ton, Mass., December 27, 1869. In his childhood 

 his parents removed to Newport, N. H., where 

 his youth was passed. He was fitted for col- 

 lege at Newport, and entered Columbian Col- 

 lege, Washington, D. C., in 1821, graduating 

 with the highest honors of his class in 1825. 

 For the next two years he was editor of the 

 Columbian Star, a religious paper published 

 in Washington, and meanwhile was prosecuting 

 his theological studies nnder the direction of 

 Rev. Dr. Staughton. On the 24th of October, 

 1827, he was ordained pastor of the Baptist 

 Church in Portsmouth, N. H. Here he re- 

 mained five years, and, in 1832, accepted the 

 call of the Baldwin-Place Baptist Church of 

 Boston, to become tneir pastor. He remained 

 with them until 1848, and then became pastor 

 of the Rowe Street (now the Clarendon Street) 

 Church. In the autumn of 1867 he resigned 

 his pastorate, and since that time had been 

 without a charge, but had been one of the 

 editorial corps of the Watchman and Reflector. 

 He was an able preacher, an excellent exec- 

 utive officer, and a faithful and affectionate 

 pastor. At all times, and under all circum- 

 stances, he sought the things that make for 

 peace, shrinking sensitively from strife and 

 debate, and ever ready for any service in the 

 cause of Christian love and duty. He had, 

 from his first entering upon the ministry, man- 

 ifested a deep interest in the cause of missions. 

 He was Recording Secretary of the Board of 

 the General Missionary Convention, afterward 

 merged in the American Baptist Missionary 

 Union, from 1838 to 1846. He served thirty 

 years or more on its Executive Committee, 

 and was several times elected Corresponding 



Secretary, but in each case declined, from a 

 preference for pastoral work. Dr. Stow also 

 served as President of the Trustees of the 

 Newton Theological Institution, and was a 

 member of the Board of Fellows of Brown 

 University and of the Board of Overseers of 

 Harvard. His published works, apart from 

 occasional sermons, numerous articles in re- 

 views and periodicals, etc., were: "Daily 

 Manna for Christian Pilgrims," "Christian 

 Brotherhood," "The Psalmist," " First Things, 

 or Development of Church Life," " The Whole 

 Family in Heaven and Earth," "History of 

 the Danish Mission on the Coast of Coroman- 

 del," "Memoir of Harriet Dow," "Question 

 Book of Christian Doctrine," and " History of 

 the English Baptist Mission to India." In 

 1840-'41 Dr. Stow made the tour of Europe, 

 and in 1859 he spent some time in Great 

 Britain. 



STRANGFORD, PERCY ELLEN ALGERNON 

 FREDERICK WILLIAM SMYTHE, eighth Viscount, 

 Baron Penshurst, F. R. S., F. R. G. S., F. R. A. 

 S., etc., a British Orientalist, philologist, geog- 

 rapher, and diplomatist, born in St. Peters- 

 burg, November 26, 1825; died in London, 

 January 9, 1869. His father was, at the time 

 of his birth, and had been for some years, 

 British minister at St. Petersburg, and though 

 Percy was removed to England when but a 

 few months old, the Russian tongue was that 

 which he first spoke. He was educated at 

 Harrow and Oxford, and at Harrow, being un- 

 able, from extreme near-sightedness, to join in 

 the athletic sports of the school, he occupied 

 his out-of-school hours in acquiring a knowl- 

 edge of Persian, while he was foremost in his 

 classical studies. At Oxford he mastered 

 Arabic, and when appointed, in 1845, one of 

 the student attaches of the Constantinople 

 embassy, he speedily made himself thoroughly 

 familiar with the structure, idioms, and history 

 of all the Asiatic languages except the Chinese, 

 beginning with the Sanscrit, and acquiring 

 such a thorough command of all of them that 

 he spoke them with the fluency of a native, 

 distinguished the different dialects and the place 

 of their origin whenever he encountered them, 

 and habitually thought in Persian. He was 

 not, however, simply a linguist, though few 

 living men are masters of so many languages as 

 he was ; but he was a philologist and ethnologist 

 in his thorough study of the structure, prog- 

 ress, and history, of all these languages, and of 

 the knowledge to be derived from them of 

 the migrations of the tribes to whom they 

 were native. He was passionately fond of 

 physical geography, and had made his linguistic 

 studies contribute to his acquirements in that 

 fascinating study, and possessed a remarkable 

 ability for careful and extended generalization 

 of the great? mass of facts so patiently and la- 

 boriously gathered. He remained in Constan- 

 tinople until 1858, a paid attach^ of the em- 

 bassy from 1849 to 1851, and thenceforward 

 Oriental Secretary, till his succession to the 



