Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/115

Rh he had gone in the hope of recovering his health, and Dr Buchanan, succeeding him in his estates, adopted his mother's family name of Hamilton. He now fixed his residence at Leney, where he amused himself with adding to the natural beauties of one of the loveliest spots in Perthshire, such improvements as a cultivated taste and an ample fortune enabled him to supply. In this sweet retirement he still found pleasure in prosecuting the studies and scientific pursuits which had engrossed the busier part of his life. His garden occupied much of his attention; he introduced into his grounds many curious plants, shrubs, and flowers; he contributed largely to the scientific journals of the day, particularly the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, the Edinburgh Journal of Science, the transactions of the Linnaean Society of London, the Memoirs of the Hibernian Natural History Society, and the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Also in the Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society are several papers taken from his statistical survey of the provinces under the Presidency of Fort William, deposited in the Library of the East India Company: these papers, at the instance of Dr Buchanan were liberally communicated to the Society, accompanied with explanations by Henry Thomas Colebrooke, Esq., one of the Directors. In 1819, he published his History of the Kingdom of Nepal, already mentioned, and in the same year a Genealogy of the Hindoo Gods, which he had drawn up some years before with the assistance of an intelligent Brahman. In 1822 appeared his Account of the Fishes of the Ganges, with plates.

Dr Buchanan was connected with several distinguished literary and scientific societies. He was a member of the Asiatic Society of Calcutta—a fellow of the Royal Society, the Linnaean Society, and Society of Antiquaries of London—an ordinary member of the Society of Scottish Antiquaries—a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh—a member of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, &c. &c. In 1826, he was appointed a deputy lieutenant for Perthshire, and took a warm interest in the politics of the day. His own principles were Tory, and he was not a little apt to be violent and overbearing in discussion with men of the opposite party. But although hasty in his tempor and violent in his politics, Dr Buchanan was of a generous and liberal disposition: he was extremely charitable to the poor, warm in his personal attachments, and just and honourable in his public capacity of magistrate. He married late in life, and fondness for the society of his children, joined with studious habits, left him little leisure or inclination for mixing in the gayeties of the fashionable world. He lived, however, on terms of good understanding and easy intercourse with his neighbours. His own high attainments and extensive information eminently qualified him for enjoying the conversation and appearing to advantage in the society of men of liberal education, and to such his house was always open. His intimate acquaintance with oriental manners, geography, and history, made his conversation interesting and instructive; his unobtrusive manners, his sober habits, his unostentatious and unaffected hospitality made him an agreeable companion and a good neighbour; while the warmth and steadiness of his attachments rendered his friendship valuable. The following high estimate of his character we find in Dr Robertson's statistical account of the Parish of Callander, so early as the year 1793. 'The most learned person who is known to have belonged to this parish is Dr Francis Buchanan, at present in the East Indies. In classical and medical knowledge he has few equals, and he is well acquainted with the whole system of nature.' Dr Buchanan carried on an extensive correspondence with men of eminence in the literary and scientific world; he repeatedly received the public thanks of the Court of Directors, and of the Governor-General in council, for his useful collections and his information