knees amongst the viscera of the great tenant of the deep, alternately cutting away, with his large and dexterous knife, and regaling his nostrils with copious infusions of snuff, while he pointed out, in his usual felicitous manner, the various contrasts or agreements of the forms of the viscera with those of other animals and of man." Barclay was the means of establishing, under the auspices of the Highland Society, a veterinary school in Edinburgh. He might be called an enthusiast in his profession: there was no branch of anatomy, whether practical or theoretical, that he had not cultivated with the utmost care; he had studied the works of the ancient and modern, foreign and British anatomists with astonishing diligence. Whatever related to natural science was certain of interesting him. The benevolence and generosity of his temper were also unbounded. No teacher was ever more generally beloved by his pupils than Dr Barclay, to which his uniform kindness and affability, and readiness to promote their interest upon every occasion, greatly contributed. Many young men in straitened circumstances, were permitted to attend his instructions gratuitously; and he has even been known to furnish them with the means of feeing other lecturers.
It is a curious circumstance, that Dr Barclay often declared that he had neither the sense of taste nor of smell.
His last appearance in the lecture-room was in 1825, when he delivered the introductory lecture. He died 21st August, 1826, and was buried at Restalrig, near Edinburgh, the family burying-ground of his father-in-law, Sir James Campbell. His funeral was attended by the Royal College of Surgeons as a body.
A bust of Dr Barclay, subscribed for by his pupils, and executed by Joseph, was presented to the College of Surgeons, to which he bequeathed his museum—a valuable collection of specimens, particularly in comparative anatomy, and which is to retain his name. His design in this legacy was to prevent it from being broken up and scattered after his death.
BARCLAY, Robert, the celebrated Apologist for the Quakers, was born on the 23rd of December, 1648, at Gordonstoun, in Moray. His father, Colonel David Barclay, of Ury, was the son of David Barclay, of Mathers, the representative of an old Scoto-Norman family, which traced itself, through fifteen intervening generations, to Theobald de Berkeley, who acquired a settlement in Scotland at the beginning of the twelfth century. The mother of the Apologist was Catherine Gordon, daughter of Sir Robert Gordon, of Gordonstoun, the premier baronet of Nova Scotia, and well-known historian of the house of Sutherland.
The ancient family of de Berkeley became possessed of the estate of Mathers, by marriage, in the year 1351. Alexander de Berkeley, who flourished in the fifteenth century, is said to have been the first laird of Mathers who changed the name to Barclay; a change which says little for his taste, however recommended by that principle of literal and syllabic economy which seems to have flourished at all periods in a greater or less degree, though chiefly at the present era. This laird, however, is reputed to have been a scholar, and to him are attributed the excellent verses, known by the title of the Laird of Mathers' Testament, which, for their piety and good sense, cannot be too widely disseminated, or too warmly recommended. These verses are subjoined in the modified form under which they have come down traditionally to our time:
Gif thou desire thy house lang stand
And thy successors bruik thy land,
Abuve all things, lief God in fear,
Intromit nocht with wrangous gear;
Nor conquess[1] nothing wrangously;
With thy neighbour keep charity.
- ↑ Acquire.
