published, after elaborate preparations, his magnum opus, which he designated 'The Chronology and History of the World, from the Creation to the Year of Christ 1753, illustrated in fifty-six tables.' It was modestly dedicated to the lord chancellor (Hardwicke), and was published by subscription. In the preface he acknowledged great obligations to the Earl of Bute, and announced certain supplementary dissertations, which never appeared. The plan and scope of the work originated with Dr. Hugh Blair's scheme of chronological tables. The 'Chronology' was reprinted in 1756, 1768, and 1814. It was revised and enlarged 'by Willoughby Rosse in Bohn's 'Scientific Library,' 1856. In 1768 Blair published 'Fourteen Maps of Ancient and Modern Geography, for the illustration of the Tables of Chronology and History; to which is prefixed a dissertation on the Rise and Progress of Geography.' The dissertation was separately republished in 1784.
Blair's first book was well received. In 1755 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, and in its 'Transactions' appeared a paper by him on the 'Agitation of the Waters near Reading' (Phil. Trans. x. 651, 1755). He had previously obtained orders in the church of England, and in September 1757 was appointed chaplain to the Princess-dowager of Wales and mathematical tutor to the Duke of York. In March 1761, on the promotion of Dr. Townshend to the deanery of Norwich, Blair was given a prebend al stall at Westminster. Within a week the dean and chapter of Westminster presented him to the vicarage of Hinckley. In the same year he was chosen fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. In September 1763 he left with the Duke of York on a tour on the continent, and was absent until 1764. In 1771 he was transferred, by presentation of the dean and chapter of Westminster, to the vicarage of St. Bride, London, and again to the rectory of St. John the Evangelist, Westminster, in April 1776. He was also rector of Horton (Milton's Horton) in Buckinghamshire. He died on 24 June 1782. The statement that his last illness was aggravated by the sad death of his gallant brother, Captain Blair [see Blair, William, 1741-1782], is erroneous. They were only cousins. Blair's 'Lectures on the Canons of the Old Testament, comprehending a Dissertation on the Septuagint Version,' 1785, was a posthumous publication.
[Notes and Queries, 6th series, vii. 48; Anderson's Scottish Nation; researches in Edinburgh.]
BLAIR, PATRICK, M.D. (fl. 1728), botanist and surgeon, was born at Dundee, where he practised as a doctor, and in 1706 dissected and mounted the bones of an elephant which had died in the neighbourhood, and of which he contributed a description, under the title of 'Osteographia Elephantina,' to the Royal Society of London, published in 1713. Being a nonjuror and Jacobite, he was imprisoned as a suspect in 1715. He subsequently removed to London, and delivered some discourses before the Royal Society on the sexes of flowers. But he soon settled at Boston, Lincolnshire, where he published 'Miscellaneous Observations on the Practice of Physick, Anatomy, and Surgery' in 1718, 'Botanick Essays' in 1720, and 'Pharmaco-botanologia' in 1723-8, which closed with the letter H, it is presumed through his death. His ' Botanick Essays ' formed his most valuable work. In them he clearly expounded the progress of the classification of plants up to his time, and the then new views as to the sexual characters of flowering plants, which he confirmed by his own observations.
[Pulteney's Progress of Botany in England, 1790, ii. 134-140; Chalmers's Biog. Dict.]
BLAIR, ROBERT (1593–1666), divine, a native of Irvine, Ayrshire, was born in 1593. His father was a merchant-adventurer, John Blair of Windyedge, a younger brother of the ancient family of Blair of that ilk; his mother was Beatrix Muir (of the house of Rowallan), who lived for nearly a century.
From the parish school at Irvine Blair proceeded to the university of Glasgow, where he took his degree of M.A. He is stated to have acted as a schoolmaster in Glasgow. In his twenty-second year he was appointed a regent or professor in the university. In 1616 he was licensed as a preacher of the gospel in connection with the established church (presbyterian) of Scotland. In 1622 he resigned his professorship, 'in consequence,' it is alleged, 'of the appointment of Dr. Cameron, who favoured episcopacy, as principal of the university ' (Anderson, Scottish Nation). This reason seems improbable, for having gone over to Ireland he was called to Bangor there and ordained by the Bishop of Down on 10 July 1623. But he was suspended in the autumn of 1631, and deposed in 1632 for nonconformity. By the interposition of the king (Charles I) he was restored in May 1634. Yet the former sentence was renewed, with excommunication, by Bramhall, bishop of Derry, the same year.
