BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES. 253 
Mr. Robert Alexander, Q.C., leader of the Northern Circuit, born 
1795. Dr. Alexander has taken a deep interest in the West Riding 
Geological Society, and contributed a paper to their transactions 
" On the Springs of Halifax geologically considered." He also wrote 
on the Adulteration of Food and Drinks, and many other papers on 
Medical and Sanitary Sciences. In 1879 he was appointed a Justice 
of the Peace for Yorkshire (West Riding), and he has served his 
generation well, and gained the esteem and respect of all classes of 
the community. 
Blenkinsop and the Leeds Locomotive. 
Mr, Blenkinsop was born at Walker, in 1782. His cousin, Thomas 
Barnes, was viewer of Walker Colliery, and when the proper time 
came, he was put under the care of this relative to learn the business 
of colliery management. Before he was of age his cousin died, but 
he had made good use of his opportunities, and although so young, 
was qualified to take a position of trust and responsibility in his 
profession. So, at least, thought Mr. Charles J. Brandling, for soon 
after the death of his teacher, he was appointed viewer of the collieries 
at Middleton, near Leeds, which had been opened upon an estate 
derived from the marriage of Ralph Brandling, in the seventeenth 
century, with Anne, daughter and heiress of John Leghe. At the 
time of his removal into Yorkshire, in 1801 or 1802, coal-owners and 
colliery-engineers were engrossed in the study of mechanical haulage. 
Various attempts were being made to apply steam to that purpose, 
both in the form of travelling engines drawing waggons behind, and 
fixed engines pulling them from point to point with ropes. Soon after 
his settlement at Middleton, a travelling engine was patented, by 
which Trevithick hoped to solve the problem that was baffling the 
best mechanics of the country. It did not answer, and a similar 
want of success atte:ided the racing steam-horse which the same 
engineer brought out in 1808. Ten years of experiment had failed 
to overcome the difficulties which beset the application of steam to 
locomotion, and it appeared as if the fixed engine would be the only 
means of mechanical transit available. The produce of the Middleton 
Collieries was conveyed into Leeds, a distance of between three and 
