Boswell he visited Edinburgh and the highlands in 1777. In August 1781 he made the ‘western tour’ in England, calling in every town on ‘a doctor, apothecary, or chemist,’ about his health, and extracting at the same time information about the place and its surroundings. Two years later (June 1783) he was going to Paris and then to Flanders, to study the pictures of Claude Lorraine. Miss Seward, an old acquaintance but no relation, met him at Buxton in June 1793.
Seward was a member of the Eumelean Club that met at the Blenheim tavern in Bond Street, and of the Essex Club founded by Dr. Johnson early in 1784. He was elected F.R.S. on 11 Feb. 1779 and F.S.A. on 25 March 1779. He died of a dropsy at his lodgings, Dean Street, Soho, on 24 April 1799, and was buried in the family vault at Finchley on 1 May. His portrait was painted by George Dance on 5 May 1793, and engraved by William Daniell. A second portrait of him, by J. G. Wood, was engraved by Holl, and published on 3 June 1799.
Seward was ‘in action all benevolence.’ In the ‘Poems of Mrs. John Hunter’ (2nd edit. 1803, pp. 74–5) is an elegy in praise of his benevolence. He did not ‘disdain’ Tom Paine, and he subscribed ten guineas towards purchasing an annuity for Porson (Watson, Life of Porson, p. 99). While doing good to every one, he spoke well of nobody, yet he could be, when he chose, a piquant and stimulating conversationalist. Miss Burney, who made his acquaintance in 1777, had always ‘a true esteem for him,’ as his pretence of affectation and his spirit of satire were but ‘quizziness’ (cf. Clayden, Early Life of Rogers, pp. 168–74).
Many articles, including a series of ‘Reminiscentia,’ were supplied by Seward to the ‘Whitehall Evening Post,’ and he contributed anecdotes and literary discoveries to Cadell's ‘Repository’ and the ‘European Magazine.’ His papers of ‘Drossiana’ in the ‘European Magazine,’ beginning in October 1789, p. 243, formed the basis of his anonymous ‘Anecdotes of some Distinguished Persons’ (1795–7), 5 vols., which passed into a fifth edition in four volumes in 1804. This was followed in 1799 by two volumes of ‘Biographiana.’ These works showed much reading and were deservedly popular. Mathias in the ‘Pursuits of Literature’ (2nd dialogue, lines 61 and 62), speaks of Seward as a ‘publick bagman for scraps,’ but in a note describes the volumes as ‘very entertaining but very dear,’ and their author as the best ‘compiler of anecdotes except Horace Walpole.’
[Foster's Alumni Oxon.; European Mag. October 1799, pp. 219–20 (by Isaac Reed, and with engraved portrait); Gent. Mag. 1799, i. 439–40; Monthly Mag. 1799, p. 334; Memoirs of Dr. Burney, ii. 87–9, 154; Early Diary of F. Burney, ii. 153; Madame d'Arblay's Diary, i. 140–1, 178, 226, 231–3, 426, ii. 66, 71, 88–9, 95, 233–4, iv. 173–4, vi. 187; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. ii. 553, 638, iii. 399, ix. 467; Goldsmith's Works, ed. Gibbs, v. 412–14; Anna Seward's Letters, iii. 265–6, iv. 53–8; Hayward's Piozzi, ii. 75; Boswell, ed. Hill, ii. 337, iii. 123, iv. 198, 423, 445; Johnson's Letters, ed. Hill, i. 346, ii. 33, 35, 299, 434.]
SEWARD, WILLIAM WENMAN (fl. 1800), writer on Irish politics and topography, published at Dublin:
- ‘The Rights of the People asserted, and the Necessity of a more equal Representation in Parliament stated and proved,’ &c., 1783, 8vo (a fervidly patriotic effusion, dedicated to ‘the Volunteers of Ireland,’ displaying, however, considerable knowledge of political and constitutional history).
- ‘The Hibernian Gazeteer,’ 1789, 12mo.
- ‘Topographia Hibernica … giving a Complete View of the Civil and Ecclesiastical State of the country: arranged alphabetically, with Appendices,’ 1795, 4to; it is dedicated to William Robert, duke of Leinster, and has for frontispiece an engraving of the Round Tower of Roscrea, Tipperary; for the ancient topography, Archdall and Ledwich were followed; a copy in the British Museum (interleaved) has manuscript notes by the author; among these is an alphabetical list of the English adventurers in Ireland during the first English invasion, under Henry II; the book is described in Peel's ‘Bibliotheca Hibernica’ as ‘a valuable topographical dictionary.’
- ‘Collectanea Politica; or the Political Transactions of Ireland, 1760–1803,’ 1803, 8vo (the British Museum has no copy).
[Seward's Works; Allibone's Dict. Engl. Lit. ii. 2000.]
SEWEL, WILLIAM (1654–1720), quaker historian, son of Jacob Williamson Sewel, a free citizen and surgeon of Amsterdam, was born there in 1654. His paternal grandfather, William Sewel, a Brownist of Kidderminster, emigrated from England to escape religious persecution, and married a native of Utrecht. His mother, Judith Zinspenning, daughter of a German papist, afterwards a baptist, was a woman of strong character. She joined the quakers in 1667, after hearing William Ames (d. 1662) [q. v.], became an eloquent minister, visited England in 1663, was author of 'A Serious Reproof to the Flemish Baptists,' 1660, a 'Book of Pro-
