with hardly even the exception of the “Bibliotheca Croftsiana”’ (Bibliomania, pp. 74, 497). The books were sold in London in 1778, and produced about 2,500l. Nanswhyden House was destroyed by fire on 30 Nov. 1803, with its collections of ancient documents, the records relating to the Stannary parliament, and a valuable cabinet of minerals.
[Polwhele's Cornwall, 1806, v. 94–6; Parochial History of Cornwall, 1867, i. 233–4; Nichols's Illustrations, v. 863; Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, iii. 730, viii. 449, 481, 709, ix. 709–10; Boase and Courtney's Bibl. Cornub. p. 246.]
HOBSON, EDWARD (1782–1830), botanist, was born in Ancoats Lane, Manchester, in 1782. When three years old he lost his father, and his mother having given way to drink he was put under the care of an uncle at Ashton-under-Lyne. His sole education was obtained at a day school there and at Manchester; but at the age of either ten or eleven he was sent to work. About 1809 he attended for the first time a meeting of the Society of Botanists, where he formed the acquaintance of George Caley, a botanical collector for the royal gardens at Kew, and then recently returned from New South Wales. Hobson studied cryptogamous as well as flowering plants, and in this department became a correspondent of Dr. (afterwards Sir William Jackson) Hooker [q. v.], Dr. Taylor, his associate in the ‘Muscologia Britannica,’ Dr. Greville of Edinburgh, and other active and prominent botanists. They all freely acknowledged their indebtedness to Hobson for specimens sent to them.
In 1818 he brought out the first volume of his ‘Musci Britannici,’ and three years later was busy on the second. At this period he was in the employ of Mr. Eveleigh, a Manchester manufacturer, who was also a naturalist and mineralogist. Entomology thenceforward became a favourite pursuit with Hobson. The Banksian Society was founded in January 1829, and Hobson was unanimously chosen its first president. Shortly afterwards the curatorship of the museum of the Manchester Society for the Promotion of Natural History was offered to him at a salary of 100l. per annum; but he declined to leave his old employer, although his wages were very small.
He died on 17 Sept. 1830 at Bowden, and was buried at St. George's Church, Hulme, where a mural tablet was placed by his old colleagues. The herbarium formed by him passed into the keeping of the Manchester Botanical and Horticultural Society at Old Trafford, and his collection of insects came into the possession of the Mechanics' Institute.
On hearing of Hobson's death Sir W. J. Hooker wrote as follows: ‘His publication of specimens of British mosses and hepaticæ will be a lasting testimony to his correctness and deep research into their beautiful families; and in this country he has been the first to set the example of giving to the world volumes which are devoted to the illustration of entire genera of cryptogamous plants by beautifully preserved specimens themselves.’ Hobson published: ‘Musci Britannici; a Collection of Specimens of British Mosses and Hepaticæ,’ 2 vols. 1818–24.
[Mem. Lit. and Phil. Soc. Manchester, 2nd ser. vi. 297–324; Gardener's Mag. vi. 749; Cash's Where there's a Will there's a Way, pp. 41–66.]
HOBSON, RICHARD, M.D. (1795–1868), physician, was born at Whitehaven, Cumberland, in 1795. After school education he was sent to study medicine at St. George's Hospital, London. He became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, and finally deciding to become a physician, went to Queens' College, Cambridge, and there graduated M.B. in 1825, M.D. in 1830. In 1831 he settled in practice in Leeds, and on 30 Sept. 1833 was elected physician to the infirmary there, a post which he resigned in 1843. During this period he published in the ‘Medical Gazette’ some notes on diabetes, and on the external use of croton oil. His tastes led him to frequent the turf. He belonged to the Harewood coursing club, bred racehorses, and hunted with the Bramham hunt. For a short time he kept a pack of harriers. He had some knowledge of natural history, and in 1836 became acquainted with Charles Waterton, the naturalist, who lived at Walton Hall, about twelve miles from Leeds. Here Hobson became a frequent visitor and physician to the family. Waterton often wrote to him. Their intercourse ceased a few years before Waterton's death. While it lasted Hobson states that he showed Waterton a memoir which he had written of the naturalist. This statement was not believed at Walton Hall, and the book, ‘Charles Waterton; his Home, Habits, and Handiwork,’ which Hobson published in 1866, contains abundant internal evidence that the statement about Waterton's approval of the manuscript is untrue. Many of the stories in the book are false, the letters given have been altered, and the only faithful parts of the work are the engravings of Walton Hall, some of them drawn from photographs taken by Hobson himself. A fall from his carriage
