X 



was for some time under his charge. All the buildings in the Royal 

 Botanic Gardens and the Zoological Gardens were designed by him. 

 Curiously enough he never during his long career was called upon to 

 erect any church or ecclesiastical edifice of any importance, but he 

 was employed conjointly with his friend Sidney Smirke in the resto- 

 ration of the Temple Church. 



In 1869 Mr. Burton retired from the active pursuit of his profes- 

 sional duties, having realised an ample competence by their exercise, 

 and spent the remaining years of his life partly at St. Leonard's, 

 where he had built himself a charming villa residence, and partly in 

 London, in Gloucester Houses, where he died. Notwithstanding his 

 failing health during these last few years, he continued to dispense 

 the most genial hospitality, and to enjoy the social intercourse of his 

 numerous friends to the very last He died the most peaceful of 

 deaths at the ripe old age of eighty-one years, December 14, 1881. 



J. F. 



By the death of the Rt. Hon. Sir James Colvile, the Society 

 lost a Fellow of the Privileged Class, one whose disinterested and 

 judicious labours as President of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, con- 

 tributed materially to the progress of science in British India for a 

 decade of years, during which time all the resources of his cultivated 

 intellect, of his high official position, and of his hospitable house, were 

 as unobtrusively as liberally placed at the services of the Society, and 

 its members individually. 



James William Colvile, born in 1810, was the eldest son of 

 Andrew Wedderburn Colvile, Esq., of Ochiltree and Crombie in Fife, 

 and the Hon. Louisa Mary Eden, sister of the second Lord Auckland ; 

 the latter as Governor- General of India, and subsequently as First 

 Lord of the Admiralty, was no less distinguished than his nephew for 

 his efforts in the advancement of science. From Eton he went to 

 Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating as M.A. in 1834, after having 

 attained the rank of Senior Optime ; the late Bishop Selwyn being 

 Junior Optime in the same year. At Cambridge he formed what 

 proved to be a life-long friendship with our Fellow, Lord Houghton. 

 He was called to the Bar (Inner Temple) in 1835, and practised as an 

 equity draftsman for ten years at chambers in Lincoln's Inn. In 1845 

 he accepted the office of Advocate- General to the Hon. East India 

 Company ; proceeding thereupon to Calcutta. In 1848 he was raised to 

 the Bench as Puisne Judge of the Supreme Court of Bengal and, as is 

 usual in such cases, was knighted. In 1855 he succeeded to the 

 Chief Justiceship, which he held for four years, retiring and returning 

 to England in 1859. 



During his residence in India Sir James married Frances Elinor, 

 daughter of Sir John Peter Grant, K.C.B., G.C.M.G.,of Rothiemurchus, 



