himself to his new office. He made friends with the great lawyers of the day, such as Eldon, Stowell, Kenyon, and Erskine, and cultivated the society of the junior members of the bar and the law students. Again, through Pitt's influence, he was appointed in 1805 dean of Winchester, and extensive repairs took place in the fabric of the cathedral under his direction. In consequence of growing infirmities, heightened probably by the premature death of his only son, he resigned the mastership of the Temple in 1827, when he wrote a touching letter of farewell to the Inns of the Inner and Middle Temple. He died at the deanery, Winchester, on 31 March 1840, in his eighty-seventh year. In 1786 he married at Winchester Sarah, eldest daughter of Sir William Blackstone, the judge, by whom he had an only son, Thomas (1787–1824) [q. v.]
Rennell's reputation stood high as a scholar and divine. He was long an intimate friend of Henry Handley Norris [q. v.] and the rest of the high-churchmen who formed what was called the ‘Hackney phalanx’ and the ‘Clapton sect.’ Dr. Samuel Parr described his as ‘most illustrious.’ He printed nothing except a volume of sermons—‘Discourses on various Subjects’ (1801), most of which had been previously printed separately. They are scholarly productions, and the writer shows erudition in the notes; but they must have required the fire and energy of delivery, for which he is said to have been remarkable, to acquire for him the reputation he enjoyed as a great preacher.
[Ann. Register and Gent. Mag. 1840; Some Account of the Life and Writings of Thomas Rennell, 1824, republished from the Christian Remembrancer; Dr. Parr's Works, Letter to Dr. John Milner; Churton's Memoir of Joshua Watson.]
RENNIE, GEORGE (1749–1828), agriculturist, son of James Rennie, farmer, of Phantassie, Haddingtonshire, and elder brother of John Rennie [q. v.], the engineer, was born on his father's farm in 1749. On leaving school he was sent by his father, at the age of sixteen, to Tweedside to make a survey of a new system of farming which had been adopted by Lord Kames, Hume of Ninewells, and other landed gentry of the district. In 1765 he became superintendent of a brewery which his father had erected. The elder Rennie died in 1766, and, after leasing the business for some years, the son conducted it on a large scale from 1783 to 1797, when he finally relinquished it to a tenant. Rennie then devoted himself to the pursuit of agriculture on the Phantassie farm, and in 1787 he employed Andrew Meikle [q. v.], the eminent millwright (to whom his brother, John Rennie, the engineer, had been apprenticed) to erect one of his drum thrashing-machines. This was driven by water. When Meikle's claims as the inventor were disputed, Rennie wrote a letter in his favour, which was printed in ‘A Reply to an Address to the Public, but more particularly to the Landed Interest of Great Britain and Ireland, on the subject of the Thrashing Machine.’ Rennie died on 6 Oct. 1828. He was one of the authors of ‘A General View of the Agriculture of the West Riding of Yorkshire. … By Messrs. Rennie, Brown, and Shirreff,’ London, 1794, 4to, written at the request of the board of agriculture. His son, George (1802–1860) [q. v.], is separately noticed.
[Anderson's Scottish Nation; Irving's Eminent Scotsmen; Donaldson's Agricultural Biogr. p. 71.]
RENNIE, GEORGE (1802–1860), sculptor and politician, born in 1802, was the son of George Rennie (1749–1828) [q. v.], agriculturist, of Phantassie, Haddingtonshire, and nephew of John Rennie (1761–1821) [q. v.], the engineer. In early life he studied sculpture at Rome, and exhibited statues and busts at the Royal Academy from 1828 to 1837. He also exhibited three times at the Suffolk Street Gallery during the same period. His most important works at the academy were: ‘A Gleaner’ and ‘Grecian Archer,’ 1828; ‘Cupid and Hymen’ and busts of Thorwaldsen and John Rennie, 1831; ‘The Archer’ (which he afterwards presented to the Athenæum Club) and bust of Wilkie, 1833; ‘The Minstrel,’ 1834; a group of four figures in marble, 1837. With a view to improving the state of the arts in this country, he turned his attention to politics. In 1836 he suggested to Sir William Ewart the formation of the parliamentary committee which led to the establishment of the schools of design at Somerset House, and assisted the efforts of Joseph Hume to obtain for the public freedom of access to all monuments and works of art in public buildings and museums. He was returned for Ipswich, as a liberal, in 1841. At the next general election (1847) he had every prospect of success, but retired in favour of Hugh Adair. On 15 Dec. in the same year he was appointed to the governorship of the Falkland Islands, and raised that small colony from an abject condition to one of as great prosperity as its limited resources allowed; while he offered a firm resistance to the extravagant claims of the United States, with-
