1812 Dr. Holland; John Cam Hobbouse 241 



eventually entered Parliament and represented several con- 

 stituencies in succession from 1818 to 1832. He was the 

 first to translate into English and publish a Chinese work. 

 Elected into the Royal Society in 1803 he was also one of 

 the original founders of the Royal Asiatic Society. 



A few visitors who appeared for the first time at the 

 dinners this year may be noticed here. The " Dr. Holland " 

 introduced by Humphry Davy on i6th January was doubt- 

 less the future Sir Henry Holland who had graduated M.D. 

 the year before at Edinburgh. While he rose to an extensive 

 and lucrative practice and became probably the leading 

 physician of the day in London, he would never allow his 

 professional duties to usurp the two months which he from 

 the first resolved to devote each year to travel abroad. It 

 was natural that when he had acquired an adequate fortune 

 he should retire from medical practice, and give free rein 

 to his passion for visiting foreign countries. Early in the 

 year 1815 he was elected into the Royal Society. He was 

 made a baronet in 1853. From 1865 to 1873 (in which 

 latter year he died on his birthday at the age of 85), he 

 was President of the Royal Institution. In 1872 he 

 published the volume of " Recollections " from which 

 quotations have been given in the foregoing pages. He 

 was born at Knutsford in Cheshire, and his eldest son, 

 when raised to the peerage, took the title of Viscount 

 Knutsford. Dr. Charles Henry Parry was another successful 

 physician who, after studying at Gottingen and Edinburgh, 

 took his degree at the latter University and ultimately 

 settled in London. 



John Cam Hobhouse, son of one of the members of the 

 Club, Benjamin Hobhouse (who this year had a baronetcy 

 conferred on him for his political services), bore a name 

 now familiar to every reader of Byron, for he lived and 

 travelled in the closest intimacy with the poet, who in dedi- 

 cating to him the last magnificent Canto of Childe Harold, 

 described him as " one whom I have known long, and 

 accompanied far, whom I have found wakeful over my 

 sickness and kind in my sorrow, glad in my prosperity and 



Q 



