long been regarded as the very arbiter elegantiarum. Of any sort of merit in those literary arts in which he himself excels, he has ever been to others a kind and zealous patron. He is one of the directors of a subscription-concert which has long been maintained at Edinburgh, upon a plan highly agreeable to the public. He is extremely fond of the rural diversions of fowling, hunting, and fishing. In all those exertions which have been found nccessary, since the year 1791, to support the government, and preserve the peace of the country, there has been no person more honourably nor more usefully zealous and active than he.

His fortune, never uncomfortably small, is not even now invidiously great. His business in the Exchequer yields probably an income of about 800%. a year he is comptroller-general of taxes for Scotland, with a salary of 600l. a year: and his other emoluments may perhaps raise the whole amount of his annual income to somewhat more than 2000. He has a family of eleven amiable and promising children.

He is an eminent member of a "Literary Club," in which a few of the most eminent members of the Royal Society of Edinburgh occasionally meet før literary and friendly converse at a convivial meal in a tavern. His conversation is ever the charm and the pride of every society which he enters.

It is peculiarly pleasing to contemplate a life in which the praise of literature is so happily, so elegantly, so gracefully associated with the best virtues

of

of social and domestic life, and with the steady and judicious exercise of the most respectable talents for business-it is peculiarly pleasing-for, alas! the example is singularly rare.

The readers of this memoir may be assured, that it is not the eulogy of a friend to him whose merits it Its writer has endeavoured only to

commemorates.

mention without prejudice, facts of which he had authentic information. But if, in spite of this care, any prejudices may have influenced him in relating what he knew, those prejudices have certainly not been in favour of the subject of the memoir.

H.

THOMAS BUSBY, Mus. D. LL.D. &c.

THE leading particulars of this gentleman's life afford a striking and exemplary instance of selfacquired excellence; and prove that a mind endowed with a strong, natural conception, a discriminating judgment, and a thirst for literary and scientific information, may, by perseverance, hope for every thing, independent of foreign aid; and will ultimately surmount every barrier opposed to its progress to professional success and honourable distinction.

Dr. Thomas Busby was born in Westminster, in December 1755; and is the only surviving son of the late Mr. Thomas Busby, coach-painter, and many years an inhabitant of Blackman-street, South

wark.

The education of his earlier years was only

of that common description which includes reading, writing, and arithmetic; nor were his father's connections, or local situation, calculated to awaken in his juvenile mind the idea of higher attainments. He, however, discovered in his amusements so much eccentricity, and novelty of thought, as to obtain among the neighbours the appellation of a remarkably odd boy; and frequently produced repartees, and made observations, so much beyond his years as to attract the notice of his parents and friends.

Nature having given him an uncommonly fine voice, the notice and encomium it drew upon him gradually induced the habit of singing; and his father possessing an excellent natural taste, much improved by listening to Beard, Lowe, Vernon, and all the best vocal performers of his time, the youth insensibly caught his manner, his turns and graces, and at length formed a style of his own, which at once delighted and surprised the best judges. He was yet entirely ignorant of music; nor was it till he had attained the age of twelve or thirteen, that his father thought of that science for his profession. An effort was then made to place him in the choir of Westminster Abbey; but Dr. Cooke, at that time master of the boys, thought him too old for admis sion; calculating that by the time he acquired suffi cient knowledge to be useful, his voice would probably fail. He then received a few lessons in singing of Mr. Samuel Champness, and afterwards on the harpsichord of Mr. Charles Knyvett.

He had, however, acquired such a laxity and vola

tility of mind from being to so late a period unhabituated to regular study, that he made but little progress, except in sight-singing; which he has always said he attained without rule, and he knows not how.

It now being deemed necessary to place him under some master of acknowledged superiority and established reputation, Mr. Champness recommended to his father that real genius and eminent master the late Mr. Jonathan Battishill. From that gentleman he received lessons for some time, when his voice still continuing, and his taste being greatly improved, his father was applied to for his permission for young Busby's performance at Vauxhall-gardens; and he there, in the summer of 1769, was engaged with Mr. Vernon and Mrs. Weichsell, the mother of the present Mrs. Billington, at a salary of ten guineas per week. Vauxhall was at that time much more distinguished for the respectability of its singers than at present. The first amateurs listened with delight to the vocal performances; and he was received with such high and distinguished applause, that other very advantageous offers were immediately made; but the failure of his voice soon afterwards, terminated his vocal career.

Soon after this he was articled to Mr. Battishill for five years as a resident pupil, when seriously commencing his studies, he soon gave such indications of innate genius and rapidly maturing judgment as astonished his tutor: and though, except in musical acquisitions, his mind, when he first left his father's house, was almost a total blank; yet, finding at Mr. Battishill's

Bb 3

Battishill's an extensive and well-chosen library, the opportunity of literary information was seized with an avidity which evinced a capacious intellect, and a secret fitness for the reception of polite and useful knowledge. All the time not occupied by his professional avocations was dedicated to the perusal of the best English authors. The consequent expansion of his ideas was incredibly sudden: from a raw, ignorant boy, he soon became a well-informed youth; he taught himself grammar, exercised his mind in literary compositions of various kinds; and in some poetical attempts discovered an originality of thought, and an ear for melody of numbers, which argued uncommon scope of talent.

But he never suffered the praise these pursuits excited to seduce him into a neglect of his musical studies. Both practice and theory were attended to: his hand was in continual exercise; the works of the greatest masters, foreign and English, were daily meditated; and so great was his progress, that at the end of two years he had produced many pleasing compositions, one of which, a ballad called the Nymph of the Hill, was published by Longman and Lukey. He already occasionally attended for Mr. Battishill pupils that had been under tuition six, and seven years; and before three years of his articleship had expired he composed some vocal pieces, particularly two double chorusses to words of his own, from the contrivance and science of which his tutor predicted that he would be an honour to his profession; and he repeatedly proposed to introduce him to Dr.

Boyce