Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 47.djvu/184

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cellanies,’ vols. vi. and vii., 1875–8. Many of the interesting notes in the first three volumes of the ‘Chetham Miscellanies,’ in the ‘Life of Adam Martindale [q. v.] ’, and in Byrom's ‘Remains’ were from his pen. In 1845 he published ‘Memorials of Rochdale Grammar School,’ and in 1873 a ‘Sermon in Commemoration of Humphrey Chetham.’

He left to the Chetham Library, Manchester, his important collection of ‘Lancashire Manuscripts,’ compiled by himself in forty-four folio volumes. Part of these manuscripts have since been published by the Chetham Society, as 1. ‘Lives of the Vicars of Rochdale,’ edited by Sir H. H. Howorth, 2 vols. 1883. 2. ‘The Rectors and Wardens of Manchester,’ edited by J. E. Bailey, 2 vols. 1885. 3. ‘The Fellows of the Collegiate Church of Manchester,’ edited by Dr. F. Renaud, 2 vols. 1891. His unfinished life of Humphrey Chetham [q. v.], edited and completed by the writer of this notice, is being prepared for the press.

He died after a short illness at Scarborough on 17 Oct. 1878, aged 73, and was buried in Milnrow churchyard. A memorial was afterwards erected to him in the church. His library was sold at Manchester in December 1878. He married, on 21 Nov. 1836, Honora Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Major John Beswicke of Pike House, Littleborough, near Rochdale, by whom he had three daughters, two of whom survived him.

[Memoir by H. Fishwick in the Reliquary, xix. 219, and in Smith's Old Yorkshire, iv. 151 (portrait); Manchester Guardian, 18 Oct. 1878; Manchester Courier, 18 and 22 Oct. 1878 and 19 March 1879; Parkinson's Old Church Clock, ed. Evans, 1880, p. xciv; Notes and Queries, 8th ser. x. 211; Foster's Yorkshire Pedigrees; Bishop Lee's copy of Notitia Cestriensis, greatly enlarged by illustrations, was left by him to Owens College. Raines's letters to James Crossley are in the Manchester Free Library.]

C. W. S.

RAINEY, GEORGE (1801–1884), anatomist, was born in 1801 at Spilsby, Lincolnshire, and was sent to school at Louth. He was apprenticed to a doctor first at Horncastle and afterwards at Spilsby, where he supplemented his imperfect school training by a diligent course of self-education in Latin, Greek, and mathematics, as well as in professional studies. After serving as assistant to a Mr. Barker, a surgeon at Spilsby, and adding to his income by private teaching, he entered with very inadequate means, as a student of St. Thomas's Hospital in 1824, still supporting himself chiefly by tuition. He obtained the membership of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1827.

For the next ten years Rainey was an active and very successful private teacher of anatomy, at a time when the imperfection of the medical schools made that profession a more important one than it is now. In 1837 his health broke down, and, being threatened with consumption, he was sent to the south of Europe, where he resided for five years, chiefly in Italy. On returning to London he decided not to enter on medical practice, and was appointed curator of the museum and subsequently, in 1846, demonstrator of anatomy and of the microscope at St. Thomas's Hospital, an appointment which he held till his death on 16 Nov. 1884. For some years before his death he was in receipt of a government pension for his services to science.

Rainey was one of the old school of pure anatomists who had no other profession, and for many years was recognised as one of the ablest anatomical teachers in London. While closely occupied in teaching, scientific research was almost his sole recreation, and he made several important investigations in various branches of science. One of his favourite subjects of inquiry was the production of organic or quasi-organic forms by physical processes, and the deposition of mineral substances in organised bodies. On this he published a book ‘On the Mode of Formation of Shells, of Bone, and other Structures by Molecular Coalescence, demonstrable by certain artificially formed products,’ London, 1858, 8vo, as well as other memoirs. These researches have been important, not only as to their immediate object, but as tending to explain the formation of urinary calculi, and leading to subsequent researches on this subject, especially those of Vandyke Carter and Ord.

Another of Rainey's early researches was ‘An Experimental Enquiry into the Cause of the Ascent and Descent of the Sap, with observations on Endosmose and Exosmose,’ London, 1847, 8vo. To elucidate these and similar processes he made experiments extending over many years on ‘the existence of continued currents in fluids, and their action in certain natural physical processes,’ described in four papers in the ‘St. Thomas's Hospital Reports’ (vols. i. ii. iii. v.).

He also published several papers on points of minute anatomy, normal and pathological, in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ (vol. cxl. 1850, vol. cxlvii. 1857), ‘Proceedings of the Royal Society’ (vol. v. 1846), the ‘Medico-Chirurgical Transactions’ (vols. xxviii. xxix. xxxi. xxxii.), ‘Transactions of the Pathological Society’ (vols. iii. iv. v. vi.), and elsewhere.

Rainey was an indefatigable observer with