Obituary Notices. 233 



Drumallan, advocate, in Aberdeen. In the year 1836 lie was 

 admitted a member of the Society of Advocates in Aberdeen, and 

 continued to practise bis profession tbere till 1853, when, on the 

 recommendation of the Prime Minister, the Earl of Aberdeen, he 

 was appointed one of the official searchers of records in the 

 Eegister House, Edinburgh. In 1873, he was promoted by the 

 Lord Clerk Eegister to the principal keepership of the Eegister 

 of Deeds. While yet resident in Aberdeen, Dr Stuart had given 

 ample evidence of that taste for archaeological research, the sub- 

 sequent development of which now constitutes his claim to public 

 remembrance. Becoming a corresponding member of the Scot- 

 tish Society of Antiquaries, he from time to time communicated 

 to that body the results of investigations he was led to make in 

 various parts of his native county. On removing to Edinburgh, 

 he became a full member of the Society, and being in the follow- 

 ing year, 1854, elected to the office of Secretary, he may be said 

 to have become from that time forward the guiding spirit of an 

 association in promoting whose objects he spared neither time 

 nor pains. 



In 1839, in conjunction with the late lamented Dr Joseph 

 Eobertson, he projected and carried out the establishment of the 

 Spalding Club — a society formed on the model of the Bannatyne 

 and Maitland Clubs, for the printing of the historical, ecclesias- 

 tical, genealogical, topographical, and literary remains of the 

 north-eastern counties of Scotland. This society, which con- 

 tinued to exist till the year 1870, was mainly indebted for its 

 great success to its founders ; and if it could not have been 

 carried on without the literary and antiquarian accomplishments 

 of Dr Eobertson, it had equal obligations to the industry and re- 

 search of Dr Stuart, and to his admirable and exact business 

 habits in discharging the office of secretary, which he held from 

 the institution of the club to its close. Of the thirty-eight 

 volumes which it from time to time gave to the world, no less 

 than fourteen were produced under Dr Stuart's editorship ; the 

 contributions of Dr Stuart consisting of The Miscellany of the 

 Club, in 3 vols., Extracts from the Preslytery Boole of Strathlogie, 

 BlackhaWs Brief Narrative, Extracts from the Council Register of 

 Aberdeen, Selections from the Records of the Kirk- Session, Preslytery, 

 and Synod of Aberdeen, Spalding's Troubles of Scotland, The Sculp- 

 tured Stones of Scotland, The Booh of JDeir, and a volume containing 



