6 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. [Sess. 
Solicitor-General and Lord- Advocate (1885). In 1887 he carried the Act 
for the Amendment of Criminal Procedure in Scotland, an important 
measure on which his fame as a Lord- Advocate chiefly rests. In 1888 
he succeeded Lord Moncrieff as one of the Lords of Session, and his 
political career automatically came to an end. As Lord Justice-Clerk he 
assumed the title of Lord Kingsburgli, by which name he was known till 
1915, when, on retirement from his judicial duties, he became familiarly 
known again as Sir John Macdonald. 
Sir John was a man of many interests, two of which call for special 
notice. He was keenly interested in all that pertains to the art of wal, 
being himself not merely an enthusiastic volunteer but one who by his 
suggestions and writings had an important influence on the methods of 
training in the regular Army. For many years he captained the Scottish 
Twenty Team in the National Challenge Trophy Competition, and was 
also Captain of the British Rifle Team which took part in an international 
match at the Philadelphia Centenary Exhibition. He filled the highest 
offices in the Volunteer Service, received the Volunteer Decoration in 1892 ; 
and on the occasion of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee was awarded 
Commemoration Medals as Adjutant-General of the Royal Company of 
Archers and as Brigadier-General in command of the troops on duty at 
the Royal Procession. He was the author of numerous books on drill and 
infantry tactics. 
Sir John was also greatly interested in applied science, especially in 
the development of motor traction, and in all things connected with the 
use of electrical power. As a Member of the Institution of Electrical 
Engineers he took an active part in the work of that Society, and was 
himself an inventor of several ingenious applications. He early divined 
the importance of motor traction, and was one of the first persons in this 
country to possess and to drive his own motor car — its number was S 1. 
He was President of the Scottish Automobile Club ; and so convinced was 
he of the growing importance of the motor vehicle that he very early 
argued for the disuse of all tramway systems, whether cable or electrical, 
and for the substitution in their place of the motor bus. 
As one of the Vice-Presidents of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, he 
was a regular attendant at the meetings, and his scientific and legal 
knowledge proved of great value in the deliberations and decisions of 
the Council. 
Sir John Macdonald was a delightful companion, full of human interest, 
with a fine humour and large repertoire of racy stories. Many of these 
will be found in his Life Jottings of an Old Edinburgh Citizen (1915), a 
