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personally, but little known in English scientific circles; in America, 

 however, not in Baltimore only, but in many other parts of the States' 

 especially among the younger physiologists, he has left behind him 

 a memory which will not soon pass away ; while those in this country 

 who knew the brightness of his early days will always hold him in 

 affectionate remembrance. 



M. F. 



BRIAN HOTTGHTON HODGSON, of the Bengal Civil Service, oriental 

 scholar, zoologist, and diplomatist, was born in February, 1800, at 

 Prestbury, Cheshire, and was the eldest son of B. Hodgson, Esq., of 

 Lower Beech, in that county. He belonged to a long-lived family 

 his father attaining his ninety-second year, and a grandmother 

 and a great-grandmother their ninetieth. He was educated at 

 Dr. Davies' school, Macclesfield, and was, according to the wishes 

 of his greab uncle the Bishop of London, and relative the Dean of 

 Carlisle, intended for the Church ; but, having no desire for holy 

 orders, at sixteen years old a nomination to the East India College of 

 Haileybury was obtained for him. Pending the passing his pre- 

 liminary examination at Haileybury, young Hodgson was the guest 

 of Professor Malthus, then preparing the seventh edition of his 

 *' Principles of Population," who directed his attention to politics 

 as a career; whilst a casual presentation at the Governor's house 

 to Canning, then President of the Board of Control, who addressed 

 the youth with a brilliant sketch of the career possible to an 

 Indian civilian, fired him with ambition to become a diplomatist,, 

 of which his stirring career, at the Court of Nepal, was the fruit. 

 At Haileybury, Hodgson gained high honours in languages and 

 political economy, finally passing out in 1817 as " First of his 

 year." In 1818 he sailed for Calcutta, where he passed a year in 

 the College at Fort William, studying the vernacular, Sanskrit, and 

 Persian, and becoming a proficient in the latter. At Calcutta his 

 health broke down, and, after a severe attack of fever, no choice was 

 left him between abandoning the service or obtaining a hill appoint- 

 ment. The latter an all but unattainable prize for an untried youth 

 was, nevertheless, thanks to his early promise, and more to the 

 private influence of powerful friends with the Government, obtained 

 for him, and he was appointed Assistant to the Commissioner of 

 Kumaon, a province of the Western Himalaya ceded by the Ne- 

 palese a few years previously. 



Fortunately for Hodgson, his chief, G. W. Traill, was a first-rate 

 official, and, equally fortunately, Kumaori was in a condition of 

 disorganisation and savagery that taxed the highest qualities of its 

 new rulers. It was Traill's first duty to obtain the confidence of a 

 people driven into the jungles of all but pathless mountains by the 



VOL. LX. G 



