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appendices by himself, and brings down the account of families and 
descent of property in that county from the death of those biogra- 
phers, about the middle of the last century, to the present time. 
Mr. Gilbert’s additions and criticisms form no small part of its value ; 
he has introduced also copious scientific notices by Dr. Boase and 
other modern authors, relating to the geology of the county, a sub- 
ject, he observes, of such recent origin, that the very word does not 
occur in Chambers’s Encyclopedia printed in 1783. In acknow- 
ledgment of his indirect influence upon this science, I am bound to 
state with gratitude that my Bridgewater Treatise would never have 
existed, had not the appointment to write it been conferred upon 
me by Mr. Gilbert whilst President of the Royal Society. 
Mr. Gilbert was an assiduous collector of ancient traditions, le- 
gendary tales, songs and carols, illustrating the manners, sports, and 
pastimes of the peasantry of Cornwall ; and he was a writer of several 
anonymous letters and papers in the Gentleman’s Magazine. He 
possessed great memory and powers of quotation and anecdote, 
enriched by vast stores of traditional information as to the personal 
history of many of the most distinguished individuals of his time, 
much of which will have perished with him. It has been truly said 
of him by a contemporary biographer, that “ His most endearing 
talent was his power of conversation. It was not brilliant; it was 
something infinitely beyond and better than mere display ; it was 
a continued stream of learning and philosophy, adapted with ex- 
quisite taste to the capacity of his auditory, and enlivened with 
anecdotes to which the most listless could not but listen and learn. 
“ His manners were most unaffected, child-like, gentle, and na- 
tural. As a friend, he was kind, considerate, forbearing, patient, 
and generous; and when the grave was closed over him, not one 
man, woman, or child, who was honoured with his acquaintance, 
but will feel that he has a friend less in the world. Enemies he can 
have left not a single one.” 
During the last twelve months his strength had been rapidly de- 
clining, but he retained full possession of his intellectual faculties 
till within a few hours of his death; he breathed his last in the 
bosom of his family at East Bourne, on the 24th of December 
last, in the seventy-third year of his age. An exact and admirable 
representation of his finely-formed head and intelligent countenance 
