BLOCH, 



BLOMFIELD, CHARLES JAMES. 



7.' I 



On UM o notion of the great e 

 presented to the Collage by UM govern, 

 kia collection of .bout 900 praam 

 patbolosj. In 179 h published a we 

 Improvciocat of Hospitals and other C 

 be pointed out the evils that exist* 

 institutions intended for the relief of 



i followed by beneficial improvement in many of the metropolitan 



ion of John Hunter being 

 Mr. BlUard presented alo 

 cimeos in anatomy and 

 titled 'SoflVMlioM for tho 

 ible Institutions' in which 

 that time in the various 

 and it* publication 



In 1603 Mr. BlUard wai appointed to present an addrew to the 

 kin* from the College of Surgeons, when he received tha honour of 

 knighthood. In 1819 he founded the Huuterian Society. He also 

 was the founder of the Samaritan Society, which was instituted with 

 the tiew of examining the circumstance* of oases in hospitals that 

 hare a claim upon benevolence, of obtaining a fund from which relief 

 might be afforded, and providing a body of men who might properly 

 execute and perpetuate the good design. He was one of the first 

 fellows of the Horticultural Society. He was one of the founder*, and 

 for many years vice-president of the London Institution. 



Besides being Surgeon to the London Hospital and a member of 

 the Council of the College of Surgeons, he held the offices of Consulting 

 Surgeon to the Deaf and Dumb Asylum, the Marine Society, the Clergy 

 Orphan Asylum, and the London Orphan Asylum. Hut with all his 

 activity au>l industry, with the exception of an attack of fever, caught 

 by working night and day in hii dissecting-room, his health never 

 failed him to the last. In 1827 he was in his eighty-fifth year, but 

 strong enough to make his flirt visit to Edinburgh. His eyesight 

 Utterly {ailed him, and when thU was discovered to be owing to cata- 

 ract, he insisted, in npite of the entreaties of his friouds, on having the 

 operation of extraction performed. ThU was done by Mr. Lawrence 

 in 1834, after which he regained the use of his eyes. He waa however 

 now in hi* ninety-tWrd year, and during the following year his strength 

 an I health visibly failed him, although he attended a meeting of the 

 court of examiners at the college the Friday before his death. He 

 died on the 23th of August 1835. 



Sir William was most punctilious on points of etiquette, and retained 

 the fashions of the last century to the day of his death. At one time 

 it was customary for physicians and surgeons to attend at coffee-houses 

 to be consulted. Sir William Wizard is said to hare been the last 

 medical man in the metropolis who pursued this practice. He regularly 

 frequented, for this purpose, Bataon's coffee-house, Cornhill. 



In early life Sir William was in politics a great reformer, and con- 

 tributed to many of the periodicals of the day, under the signature of 

 Curtius. As he grew older however, and his position iu society im- 

 proved, he became law democratic, was an admirer of Mr. Pitt, and a 

 member of the Pitt Club. Subsequently, in his position of a member 

 of the Council of the College of Surgeons, he was an opponent of all 

 change in that body. 



Aa a surgeon Sir William lilizard never took the highest position 

 in hii day, but he was a good anatomist. HU contributions to medical 

 literature are few, and, considering the vast opportunities he must have 

 had of witn-aing all forms of disease in one of the largest hospitals 

 in London, not so important or valuable as might have been antici- 

 pated. Among his principal papen are ' Observations on the Uses 

 of Electricity in Deafness,' 1790; ' Lecture to the Scholars of the 

 Maritime School at Chelsea, on the Situation of the Large Blood- 

 Ves<els of the Extremities, explaining the Use of the Tourniquet,' 

 ISao, 1798, written with the view of affording some knowledge of 

 what could be done in caies of emergency from wounds of various 

 kinds; ' Hunterian Oration.,' 1815. 1823, 1828; 'An Address to the 

 Chairman and Members of the House Committee of the London 

 Hospital, oo the subject of Cholera,' 1 831. He also wrote Desultory 

 Uenecti .ns oo Police, with aa Essay on the Means of Preventing 

 Crimes and Amending Criminals,' 1785. and some nepers in the ' Philo- 

 sophical Transactions.' 



(Cooke, A Bruf Memoir of Kir WilKmm Bliaanl, AX.) 

 BLOCH. MABCU.S ELIKSKH. was born in 1723, at Ansbach in 

 Bavaria, of extremely poor Jewish parents. Having made up by 

 urtease indu.try the aVtftoieocie* of bis early education, and acquired a 

 wide extent of knowledge, especially in the department of natural 

 history and anatomy, to which he had particularly devoted himself, 

 be took the d-gre of M.D. at FratikfurVon-the-Oder, and returned to 

 Berlin to exercise his art as a physician. In this city be was highly 

 prised not only for his knowledge but for the excellence of his private 

 duncter, and her* be died on August 0, 1799. On his settling at 

 Berlin as a nlie>l pracUtiooer he began to publish. HU first work 

 was ' Medical Observations, with a Treatise on the Mineral Waters of 

 l-jnnont, 1774; and be followed this by other valuable medical 

 treatUet. But bin great work, and that on which his fame principally 

 resU, was on the natural history of Ash, published in two series, 

 OekostomUche Natorgesamchte der Fische DeuUchlands ' (' Natural 

 Ili.cwy of the FUh of U-nnany. with reference to their Management'), 

 in a vole., 172-4; and ' KatorgeschichU Auslandischer FUche' 

 t S.t-irU ll..l.ry of F.jrei(o Fish'), iu 12 vol.., 17ai-9. r >. The two 

 works contain 432 coloured plate*, of which the excellence U even now 

 ackuo. l lgJ, and the work itself U regarded as the foundation of the 



sncoo* of iehthyolocy. Bloch left uncompleted a ' Systema Ichthyo- 

 logiv IcoBitms ex. Ul.ictrstam/ which wa, published by Schneider in 



1801. The valuable collection which Bloch had formed waa purchased 

 by the government, and now forms a part of the collections of the 

 llerlin Zoological Museum. (Conttriatunt-Ltjikun.) 



HI. <KM.\KT, ABRAHAM, an historical painter, was born at 

 G.ircunj in 1567. Bloemart appears not to have travelled beyond 

 Paris, and he derived little advantage from his visit to that city. He 

 principally resided in Utrecht. HU works have remained almost 

 entirely in hU native country, and are chiefly at Amsterdam. There 

 are pictures of his in some of the churches at Brussels and Mechlin. 

 Bloemart possessed originality and feeling, but was a complete man- 

 nerist, making nature subservient to his own peculiar style. In some 

 of his historical pictures the figures are as large as life, which shows 

 that he had the ambition of doing something great ; but the costume 

 is still Dutch, no matter what the subject may be. He acquired 

 however considerable skill in the practice of hU art. Besides historical 

 pictures he executed some landscapes, which have been admired, ami 

 he waa not a stranger to the etching needle. He died in 1647 

 according to some accounts, but other* say 1657. There are engravings 

 of his works very spiritedly executed by BoUwert. 



Cornelius, his eldest son, obtained some celebrity as an engraver, 

 and introduced certain improvements in the practice of hU art, giving 

 A softer edge to hia shadows than his predecessors. His other sons 

 practised painting and engraving, but witbout much success. 



BLOMEFIELU, FRANCIS, was born at Fresfield in Norfolk, July 

 23rd, 1705. He received the elements of education at Disa and 

 Thetford, and in 1724 was sent to Qoiiville and Caius College, Cam- 

 bridge. He took his degree of B.A. in 1727, and iu the sama year was 

 ordained deacon of the church of St Giles's iu-theKiel< Is, Lou Km. 

 In 1 728 he was made a licensed preacher by Dr. Tanner, then Chancellor 

 of Norwich. In 1729 he was instituted rector of Hsrgham in Norfolk, 

 and in September of the same year he was instituted rector of Fresfield 

 on the presentation of his father, Henry JUomelieKl, Qeub ; soon after 

 which ho relinquished Hargham. Blomefield's death occurred from 

 small-pox, January 15, 1751. HU great work, which in it* completed 

 form constitutes one of the best county histories we possess, was pub- 

 lished under the modest title of ' An Essay towards the Topographical 

 History of the County of Norfolk.' It was printed in his own house 

 at Fresfield, and the publication began in numbers in 1739. It was to 

 a great extent owiug to hU being hU own printer aud publisher that 

 the slow progress of the work waa owing ; but it* issue was greatly 

 retarded by a fire having, when the first volume was completed, 

 destroyed not only all the parts printed, but also the printing appa- 

 ratus. It was left unfinished at his death, when he had carried it to 

 nearly the end of the third (folio) volume ; and the completion was 

 ultimately undertaken by the liev. C. Parkin, rector of Oxburgh, who 

 had rendered some assistance to Blomefield in the previous portiou, 

 and had himself formed considerable collections. This gentleman 

 finished the third volume, and added two more, which are con- 

 inferior to those by Blomefield. The second volume was publish' <1 iu 

 1743 ; the third, completed by Parkin, not till 1709; the fifth and 

 final volume appeared in 1775. Blomefield was greatly assisted iu hU 

 work by the collections which had been formed by Peter le Neve, 

 norroy kiug-at arms, who spent above forty years in amassing at great 

 expense and trouble the most extensive collection of facts for the 

 history of Norfolk that had beeu formed for any county in the 

 kingdom. Blomefield's own last-printed work was the ' 

 Cautabrigiensia,' a collection relating to Cambridge university, town, 

 and county. 



(//('/. a f XoifM ; Cough, JBritith Topography.) 



BLOJUIBLD, CHARLES .IA.MKS, Bisuop of London, was born 

 at liury .si. Edmunds, Suffolk, where his father was a school- 

 master. Having been first well-grounded in classics he proceeded to 

 Trinity College, Cambridge, ami both there aud in the uu:. 

 examinations he attained great distinction. Ho graduated iu 1 

 third wrangler, and was senior medallist the same year ; subsequently 

 be was elected fellow of Trinity College. The first published speci- 

 men of hU philological aud critical abilities was an i.lin >n of the 

 ' Prometheus' of -Kschylus, which appeared in 1810; this was followed 

 by the 'Seven against Thebes,' 1812; the 'Persians;' the ' Choc- 

 phone;' and the Agamemnon.' A valuable edition of Callimachus 

 was published under his supervuion in 1824. It is on the.-e work* 

 that the fame of Bishop Blouifield as a classical scholar chiefly rests. 

 But they arc far from exhibiting the extent of his labours iu tho 

 acalomic field. In 1812 he o.liteil iu conjunction with Kennel the 

 ' Muan Cantabrigiensis ; ' and in conjunction with Monk the 'Post- 

 humous Tracts' of I'orsou, a work which he followed, two years 

 later, by editing alone the 'Adversaria Porsoui.' But besides these 

 he U known to have written numerous critical papers on Greek litera- 

 ture, some of them of a rather trenchant character, iu the quarterly 

 reviews and classical journaU ; and he compiled in 1823 a Greek 

 grammar for.schools. 



UU first preferment in the church was in 1S10 to tho living of 

 Warrington ; aud in the same year he received that of Duntou iu 

 Essex. In 1819 he became chaplain to 11 jwloy bishop of Lotulou, 

 and very soon after he received lliu valuable rectory of .St. liuioliih, 

 Bubopsgate, iu the city of London, and was made Archdeacon of 

 Colchester. From this time hU career of active clerical influence may 

 be dated. In 1824 he was raised to tho epucopal bench as Bishop of 



