THE OSPREY. 13 



LIFE AND ORNITHOLOGICAL LABORS OF SIR JOHN 

 RICHARDSON. 



Compiled by Theodore Gill. 



One of the most remarkable men who have worked on the birds of 

 America was the John Richardson known as Dr. John Richardson, the arctic 

 traveler, when active in ornithology, and later as Sir John Richardson. He 

 is not to be confounded with the Sir John Richardson who was a Judge of 

 the Court of Common Pleas from 1818 to 1824 or half a dozen others of the 

 same name who made more or less of a mark in literature. For the general 

 features of his life, we take the liberty of invoking the assistance of Mr. G. S. 

 Boulger's sketch in the "Dictionary of National Biography" (vol. 48, p. 233- 

 235). 



I. HIS LIFE. 



Richardson was born at Nith Place, Dumfries, on 5 Nov. 1787. His 

 father, Gabriel Richardson, for some time provost of Dumfries and a justice 

 of the' peace for the county, was a friend of Robert Burns, who from 1790 to 

 1796 spent his Sunday evenings at Nith Place. Richardson's mother was 

 Anne, daughter of Peter Mundell of Rosebank, near Dumfries {Proceedings of 

 the Royal Society, vol. xv, p. xxxvii). 



Richardson was the eldest of twelve children, and was so precocious as to 

 read well when four years old. Burns lent him Spenser's 'Faerie Queen,' and 

 when, at the age of eight, he entered Dumfries grammar school, on the same 

 day as the poet''s eldest son, Robert, Burns is reported to have said to Gabriel 

 Richardson, 'I wonder which of them will be the greatest man.' To the rough 

 sports of his school-days Richardson attributed the fact that even beyond the 

 middle term of life he scarcely knew what fatigue was. In 1800 he was ap- 

 prenticed to his uncle, James Mundell, a surgeon in Dumfries, and in 1801 he 

 entered the university of Edinburgh. In 1804 he was appointed house-surgeon 

 to the Dumfries Infirmary, but returned to Edinburgh in 1806; and in Feb- 

 ruary 1807, having qualified as a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, 

 was gazetted assistant-surgeon on the frigate Nymphe, which accompanied Lord 

 Gamljier's fleet to the bombardment of Copenhagen. He was present in 

 August 1808 at the blockade of the Russian fleet in the Tagus, and was then 

 tranferred in quick succession to the Hibernia, the Hercule, and the Blossom. 

 As surgeon on the latter sloop he was sent to Madeira and Cape Coast Castle, 

 and in 1809 was engaged on convoy duly to Spain and to Quebec. Having in 

 1810 exchanged into the Bombay, he served at the siege of Tarragona, but 

 then obtained leave of absence in order to study anatomy in London. His last 

 service afloat was on the Cruiser in the Baltic fleet during 1813. 



