MACKENZIE, SIR ALEXANDER. 



MACKENZIE, HKNRY. 



nm*.' 



' 



1 a poem to illustrate George Cruikshank's celebrated etchings, 

 with 'The Drunkard,' a supplement In 1849, in conjunction with 

 Mr. Cooke Taylor, be produced "The World as it is, a System of 

 Modern Geography,' in 2 vole 4to, the third volume being furnished 

 by Mr. C. Stafford ; and edited Th* Streets of London.' by J. T. 

 Smith. IB 1860 he produced ' Egeria, or the Spirit of Nature, and 

 other poems,' and a romance entitled ' Longbeard, or the Revolt of 

 th* Saxons;' in 1851, 'M*moin of Extraordinary Delusions;' in 

 18U, 'The Salameodrin*,' hi* longest poem ; in 1856, ' The Lump of 

 Gold, and other poem*,' ' The Song* of th* Brave,' ' Ballads and Lyrical 

 IMS**.' and ' Under Green Leaves.' He has also issued at various 

 time* other poem*, and b* wrote ' The Thames and iu Tributaries,' 

 a work which is little better than a compilation. Mr. Mackay's highest 

 merit u as a wriUr of songs, in which be has succeeded in catching and 

 r*B**t*ag th* public feeling; many of bis songs having attained an 

 hwBMBM popularity, particularly bis ' Good Time Coming, Boys.' They 

 an usually fluent and well adapted to the music, but they often foster 



" MB, though w* believe th* writer i* perfectly honest in the 

 t of th* osntimente he inculcate*. For some yean be wrote 

 article* for 'The Illustrated News;' and his songs, with 

 i frequently furnished by himself still occasionally 



appear in ***** paper. 



MACKENZIE, SIR ALEXANDER, is said to have been a native 



in Scotland, from which he emigrated to Canada when 

 a young man. and there obtained a ntuation in the counting-house of 

 Mr. Gregory, one of the partaen of the North-Weet Fur Company. 

 II* bad resided for about eight yean in the service of Mr. Gregory 

 at Fort Chipewjan, at the head of th* Athabasca Lake, in the savage 

 BBBBBJI to th* west of Hudson's Bay, when the knowledge he had 

 oqBired of the country snd the people, and hi* intelligence and enter- 

 prising character, detenu L>eJ hi* employers to send him out on an 

 exploring expedition through the regions lying to the north-west of 

 that station, and conjectured to be bounded by the Arctic Oceania 

 part of which Hearne was supposed to have seen, and, as is now well 

 aaortained. actually bad wen on hi* visit to the Coppermine River in 

 1771. r**"fr*T- t '. attended by a German, four Canadians', and three 

 Indians, together with two Canadian and two Indian women, left Fort 

 i on th* 3rd of June 1789. Embarking in their four canoes 

 River, th* party reached the Slave Lake, with which it 

 i by a course of 170 miles, on the 9th of the same month. 

 Bsetl*g there six days, during which the ice somewhat gave way, they 

 d their eaooes again on the 16th, and skirting the margin of 

 a, reached th* entrance of the river which flows from its 

 extremity, end i* now called the Mackenzie River, on the 

 S9th. MackrnxM panned the north-westward course of this river, 

 with a perseverance and intrepidity which no daugen or difficulties 

 amid enbdae, till on to* 15th of July it brought him to the object of 

 hw hopes, the gnat Northern Ocean, in lat 69*. Returning by the 

 route, the party regained Fort Chipewyan on the 12tu of Sep- 

 r. On th* lOlh of October 1792. Mackenzie set out from the 

 i point OB another ad>enturoo* journey, the object of which was 

 t* nech th* Pacific ; an attempt, th* first mad* in North America, in 

 which be was alao successful Proceeding partly by the Ungigab or 

 Pose* Kivcr, and partly by land, after cnoounUiing still greater diffi- 

 calU** then on U* form, r expedition, he reached the sea on the 23rd 

 at July 1793, and returned in safety by nearly the aame route. Of 

 .both bis journeys Mackenzie ha* himself given a full account in his 

 Voyage* from Montreal, on the River 8t Lawrence, through the 

 Continent of North America, to the Frown and Pacific Ocean, in the 

 yean 1789 and 179S,' 4io. Land.. 1801. The account is preceded by 

 B giBal bietory of th* fur trad* (180 pages), and th* volume i* 

 hsslswiid with a portrait of the author, who soon after received the 

 honour of kBifththuod. Bodied in 1820. 



MACKENZIE, HIR UEOHUK, of Bos*haugh, son of Simon 

 M*tesis (brother of the Earl of Seaforth) by a daughter of Dr. 

 llrnos, principal of ftt Leonard's Collage, He Andrews, wa* born at 

 Dwnde* in lojo. snd ha.tog Iniahed bis grammar education, which 

 h* did with tuoch epplaow. he prooredtd to Itourg*., " the Athens of 

 seMlsh lawyer*,* a* b* calls it, to study the civil law. On bis r. t urn 

 he pasted advocate, January 1659, being then about twenty thre. 

 yean old- Th* n*st tear be published hi* 'Arrtina, or th* Serious 

 BorneSK*,' wh*. **y* K odd. man, h* giv.s " a very bright specimen 

 of has gy and exuberant geniiia.* Th* year following w* find him 

 in the important etlaaUao of ju*tie* depuU. an offio* in th* nature of 

 ' 'I jtatios u eyre, or of esaue; and in that character 

 to repair with hi* ralls*gn*s -once B w*k at least to 

 |h and Ualkeith, and to try and judg* *ueh ponon* a* 

 or thorcaboat aeoueed of witchcraft Mot many yean 

 at what Urn* hi not quite ssrt.ln. h* had th* 



were there 



of iBsiheViiiil In th* meantim* h* continued hi. literary 

 . InlOMU* 'Religio I^tW. or c%ort I>iacoune apoB erreral 

 ad Moral fcsbis***,' appeared; two years afurwarda, hi* 



DMn* 



Moral Kseay upon 



PtMW i wwv J*s*f Bs/WrWeUtil. HW 



whkh h* raalt* that elate abov* 



__, raotegos; aad in 1W7, hi* 'Moral 



y/ atteatiee in wnieb he attempt* to teteblUh th* moral 

 i on tb* principle* of honour. It WM shortly after this Urn* h* 

 B*j*Blll awrbameBt. representing th* county of BOM, when the influ 

 me* of ais fattihy wa< ptnrrfoT and *t*B*l; and in 1674 h* was 



appointed king's advocate in the room of Sir John Nisbet of Dirleton. 

 \f continued in the office till the accession of King Jaium, when it 



i given to Sir John Dalrymple ; but in a short time he was rein- 

 stated and continued in office till the Revolution. Previous to this 

 ast event he had published several of his legal works, and had been 

 ustrumental in founding the Advocates' Library. It was in 1682 

 hat this library wa* founded ; and at its foundation he delivered an 

 naugurate oration setting forth it* advantages. In 1678 he publitbed 

 lis ' Discourse on the Laws and Customs of Scotland iu Matters 

 'riininal.' In 1684 he published his 'Institutions of the Laws of 

 Scotland,' a concise and, generally speaking, excellent compendium 

 of the law ; and in 1 6S6 he published his ' Observations on the Scotch 

 Acts.' He seems also to have attempted the establishment of a chair 

 of law in the University of Edinburgh, but was unsuccessful in 

 obtaining that object. 



After the Revolution Sir George retired to Oxford, where he was 

 admitted a student on the 2nd of June 1690 ; but ho did not live 

 long afterwards to enjoy the retirement wbich he had early praised 

 and had now begun to experience. He died on the 2nd of May 1691 ; 

 and after lying several days in state in the abbey of Holyrood House, 

 Edinburgh, his body was conveyed to Grey friars churchyard, attended by 

 a procession consisting of the council, the nobility, the college of justice, 

 the college of physicians, the university, the clergy, and many others. 



Sir George was the correspondent of Dryden ami other writers of 

 England ; and he was among the first Scotchmen who wrote the 

 English language in a style approaching to purity. But it was as a 

 lawyer, and still more as an officer of state, that he was principally 

 distinguished ; and in this last character he received the appellation, 

 which will live with his name, of ' The blood-thirsty Advocate.' 



MACKENZIE, HENRY, was born at Edinburgh in August 1745. 

 He was the son of Dr. Joshua Mackenzie, a physician in extensive 

 practice and of literary habits. His mother belonged to an ancient 

 family in the county of Nairn. He was educated at the high school 

 and university of his native city ; and afterwards he became one of 

 the attorneys in the Scottish Court of Exchequer. His professional 

 duties, while he held this place, must have left him abundant leisure 

 for indulging his literary taste*. While in London iu 1705, studying 

 the English practice in Exchequer, he had begun to write his earliest 

 and best novel, ' The Man of Feeling,' which was published anony- 

 mously in 1771, and for some yean was not acknowledged by the 

 author. In 1783 he published his second novel, 'The Man of the 

 World:' and next came 'Julia de Roubigue,' his la-t considerable 

 work of this clan. Meantime ho had edited two well-known periodicals 

 in the manner of the ' Spectator : ' ' The Mirror,' which continued to 

 appear for seventeen months from January 1779 ; and ' The I>ounger," 

 wbich, begun in February 1785, came to a close about two yean 

 afterwards. To the 'Mirror' Mr. Mackenzie contributed forty-two 

 papen; to the 'Lounger* fifty-seven. Among these are his small 

 novels, such a* ' The Story of La Roche,' and a kindly criticism on 

 the poems, then new, of Robert Burns. The ' Transactions of the 

 Royal Society of Edinburgh ' received from him several papen ; and 

 one of these, a memoir on German tragedy, was follmvi-l in 17'Jl by 

 a volume of dramatic translations, which was one of the earliest 

 causes that drew the attention of Walter Scott to German literature. 

 The Highland Society likewise publinhed in their 'Transactions' 

 papen of Mr. Mackenzie, one of which was his account of the 

 Oaioanic Controversy. In 1793 he wrote, for an edition of the works 

 of the blind poet BUcklock, a memoir of the author ; and a ' Life of 

 John Home,' the author of 'Douglas,' which he read to the Royal 

 Society of Edinburgh in 1812, wa* afterwards prefixed to an edition 

 of 1 1. unn's works, and also published separately. Mr. Mackenzie 

 himself wrote several plays, which are more remarkable for refine- 

 ment of feeling, i.uagery, and language, than fur dramatic force or 

 effectiveo***. The collected edition of his works contains three of 

 tbeee: ' The White Hypocrite,' a comedy, which was once performed 

 at Covent Garden ; ' The Spanish Father,' a tragedy, which Garriok 

 had declined to bring on the stage on account of the harrowing nature 

 of the catastrophe; and 'The Prince of Tunis,' which had been 

 acted at Edinburgh with much applause iu 1773, and printed 

 eparaUly th* aam* year. 



Mr. Maokenzi* was likewise a political writer in the Tory interest. 

 His moat elaborate work of this sort was 'An Account of the Pro- 

 ceeding* of th* Parliament of 1784,' which wa* revised and corrected 

 by Mr. Pitt's own hand ; and he published some anti-jacobin tracts 

 at the Urn* of the French Revolution. The merit of these services 

 to th* government, set forth by his friends Lord Melville and Mr. 

 George Roe*, procured for him in 1804 the pliica of comptroller of 

 taxes for Scotland, an office of large emolument, but cousi terable 

 labour and niponaibility, which he held thenceforth till his death. 



In 1808 he edited a complete collection of his literary works, in 

 eight octavo volumes; and this was almost his last contribution to 

 literature. Indee t that tendency to sickly refinement, which ch.ir.ic- 

 Uriaed hit exquiiite novels, indicated a want of the vigour of ifiind 

 M*ntial to success in the highest walks of literary invention ; and 

 his is not the only eae in which genius of this cost has put forth all 

 it* strength in youth, snd been overborne in mature years by the 

 realities of life. Accordingly, for many years, Mr. Mackenzie'* leisure 

 wa* spent ciiher in the society of literary and other friends, or iu 



