Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Glassford, James

by Wentworth Francis Wentworth-Sheilds

GLASSFORD, JAMES (d. 1845), legal writer and traveller, was son of John Glassford of Dougalston [q. v.] by his third wife, Lady Margaret Mackenzie, sixth daughter of the third Earl of Cromarty. Glassford was admitted a member of the Faculty of Advocates in 1793, and became sheriff-depute of Dumbartonshire. He succeeded to Dougalston on the death of his elder brother Henry in 1819. He was one of the commissioners of inquiry into the state of education in Ireland, and in that capacity visited Ulster, Leinster, and Munster in 1824, and Connaught in 1826. He also acted as one of the commissioners for inquiring into the duties and emoluments of the clerks and other officers of the courts of justice in Scotland. He died at Edinburgh on 28 July 1845. His published works are as follows:

1. ‘Remarks on the Constitution and Procedure of the Scottish Courts of Law,’ Edinburgh, 1812, 8vo.
2. ‘An Essay on the Principles of Evidence, and their application to subjects of Judicial Enquiry,’ Edinburgh, 1812, 8vo.
3. ‘Exemplum Tractatus de fontibus Juris, and other Latin Pieces of Lord Bacon. Translated by James Glassford, Esq., Advocate,’ Edinburgh, 1823, 8vo.
4. ‘Frondes Caducæ,’ Chiswick, 1824, 16mo.
5. ‘Letter to the Right Hon. Sir John Newport, Bart., M.P., on the subject of the Fees payable in the Courts of Justice and the Stamp Duties on Law Proceedings,’ London, 1824, 8vo.
6. ‘Letter to the Right Hon. the Earl of Roden on the present state of Popular Education in Ireland,’ London, 1829, 8vo.
7. ‘Lyrical Compositions selected from the Italian Poets,’ with translations, Edinburgh, 1834, 8vo (favourably noticed in the ‘Edinburgh Review,’ January 1835). A second edition was published in 1846 after the author's death, greatly enlarged. Several of these translations were republished in London in 1886 in a volume of the ‘Canterbury Poets,’ entitled ‘Sonnets of Europe,’ edited by Mr. Samuel Waddington.
8. ‘Notes of Three Tours in Ireland in 1824 and 1826,’ Bristol, 1838, 8vo. This work was printed for private distribution in 1831. It was republished, however, during the following year, and is identical with the former edition, except for the insertion of a new title-page
9. ‘Letter by the Chancellor D'Aguesseau to a Friend on the subject of the Christian Mysteries, by James Glassford, Esq., and extracted by permission from the Scottish “Christian Herald.”’ This letter is published among a number of treatises entitled ‘Unitarianism tried by Scripture and Experience, … with a General Introduction by a Layman,’ London, 1840, 8vo.
10. ‘Miscellanea,’ Edinburgh, 4to, pp. 83. This volume, printed at Edinburgh for private circulation, contains translations of Addison's ‘Machinæ Gesticulantes,’ Froude's ‘Cursus Glaciales,’ &c. Glassford also published ‘Elegiæ,’ without place or date, pp. 31; another edition, pp. 39.

[Martin's Privately Printed Books, pp. 244, 426; Edinb. Review, lx. 1835; Sonnets of Europe (Canterbury Poets Series).]

W. F. W. S.