Volume 3 > Half-Volume 6

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French and Spanish embassies. He enjoyed a fine
practice in London, and was in 1837 nominated to
the well-deserved honour of extraordinary physician
to her majesty. He lived to a great age, continu-
ing to the last his physical researches, although he
had retired from medical practice eighteen years be-
fore his death, which took place at London, 2d
March, 1874.
About 1823 Dr. Arnott delivered in his own house
a series of lectures on natural philosophy, and these,
so highly lauded by his auditors, formed the basis
of his Physics, the first volume and first edition of
which appeared in 1827. This work was something
more than a success: it was a work of scientific value,
receiving at once the approbation of the most scrupu-
lous scientific men, and the favourable verdict of
numerous readers, who found here a subject, hitherto
so forbidding, expounded with lucidity and in a most
fascinating style. The Physics soon became a stan-
dard work; in Britain it passed through five editions,
in spite of its incompleteness, in a few years; it was
several times reprinted in America; and was trans-
lated into different European languages. Though
thus successful, it remained for many years incom-
plete, owing to the engagements pressing on its
author in the exercise of his profession; and it was
not till 1865, long after the previous issues had been
disposed of, that the sixth edition appeared, revised
and augmented by chapters on astronomy and elec-
tricity. This work, eminently readable and at times
even soberly eloquent, has through two generations
fulfilled a lofty mission; and though it will become
superseded by others, owing to the rapid and con-
stant growth of scientific knowledge, yet the labours
of Dr. Arnott ought never to be forgotten, inasmuch
as he, more perhaps than almost any other of his
time, helped towards that improved taste for natural
philosophy which has been so widely disseminated
during the last thirty or forty years.
Dr. Arnott's labours were by no means confined
to this single work, nor to the single subject of
natural philosophy�commonly so called�although
it is on his popular expositions in this field that his
fame will in the end chiefly rest. In 1838 he
issued a treatise on Warming and Ventilating, a
happy brochure on the philosophy of the homely sub-
ject of fireplaces, and about twenty years later a new
edition of the same book, containing a full descrip-
tion of his latest inventions. Besides these, he wrote
two works on education: the first, in 1861, entitled
A Survey of Human Progress, an acute and readable
book, seeking to portray the advancement of the
race from the lowest form of savage life to the high-
est stage of civilization. The other was his latest
work, and appeared in 1870�he was then over
eighty�under the title of National Education.
Besides being a popular expositor, Dr. Arnott
made a name for himself in the field of practical ex-
periment and in that of useful application of scientific
theories. To this category belongs his famous stove,
which, though it obtained the Rumford Medal from
the Royal Society in 1854, and has been generally
regarded as the most economical of all arrangements
for burning fuel, even in spite of its successful use by
its inventor in his own residence, failed to secure the
general adoption recommended by these various
proofs of its excellence. We can only mention two
other useful inventions, his ventilating chimney-valve,
and his 'water-bed' for the protection of the sick
against bed-sores�a perfect witness of his large hu-
man sympathy. If further evidence of his humanity
were needed, it would be found in his generous
refusal to take out patents.
He took a deep interest in the sanitary schemes
and educational movements of the country. In the
latter connection it may be mentioned that he advo-
cated the claims of science as against the study of the
ancient classics. He was nominated a member of
the senate of London University in 1836, and it was
to a great extent due to his efforts that the new
scientific degrees were introduced into that institution.
He gave a donation of �2000 to this university for
the foundation of a scholarship in physical science,
and the half of that sum to each of the four univer-
sities of Scotland.
BELL, HENRY GLASSFORD, LL.D., sheriff of
Lanark, favourably known as a poet and connoisseur
in art, was the son of a Scottish advocate, who held
for some time the post of town-clerk of Greenock,
and died while his family was yet young. Henry
ultimately followed his father's profession, and was
admitted to the Scottish bar in 1832, when twenty-
seven years of age. In 1838 he was appointed sheriff-
substitute to Sir Archibald Alison in Lanark, and in
1867 succeeded the historian as sheriff-principal.
He attained his popularity, however, not through
great legal attainments�he was not a learned lawyer
by any means�but through his contributions to
literature, his patronage of art, and his social rich-
ness. His literary taste appeared early in his life.
He was still in his "teens" when he started a penny
paper in Edinburgh with the somewhat pedantic
title of Lapsus Lingu�; and in 1828 he made
another, though considerably loftier, attempt at
journalistic editorship. In spite of the skilful super-
intendence of Bell and the faithful support of many
of his friends�literati of such a high order as John
Wilson, James Hogg, and Thomas Aird,�and the
kindly notice in the Nodes Ambrosian�, the
Edinburgh Literary Journal, a Weekly Register of
Criticism and Belles Letlres, did not prove a com-
mercial success, and after a life of three years was
quietly amalgamated with Tait's Edinburgh Weekly
Chronicle. Although his labours as a journalist may
not have been very remarkable, yet the associations
into which they brought him gave him a rich fund of
stories about the literary characters of his early days,
that helped to make him so popular a man of society.
There was a charm about the big, hearty, witty
gentleman, who could tell how, when a youth, he
had handed the kettle to Joanna Baillie to make her
tea, had danced with Letitia Landon, and had walked
round the Calton Hill in the moonlight with Mrs.
Hemans. During this same period he contributed
two works to Constables Miscellany, the one a little
scientific compilation, the other his well-known
chivalrous Life of Mary Queen of Scots (2 vols. 1828).
He was a most enthusiastic advocate of Mary, who
was in his eyes a martyr. His opinion of her is
written in his motto, taken from Mary's own words,
�"Ayez memoire de 1'ame et de 1'honneur de
celle qui a este votre royne;" he denies the genuine-
ness of the casket letters; maintains that her faults
"leant to virtue's side;" and closes with the assertion
that, "if Mary's innocence from all the blacker
crimes with which she has been charged must still
continue matter of doubt, it is not too much to de-
clare all history uncertain, and virtue and vice merely
convertible terms."
But Henry Glassford Bell was better known as a
poet than as an historian. His first volume of poems,
Summer and Winter Hours (1831), contained, among
others of much greater worth, a rhetorical piece en-
titled " Mary Queen of Scots," afterwards republished
in 1866 in a second volume of verses entitled Ro-
mances and Minor Poems. He has been called
Wordsworthian, and so on, even Byronic�it is hard