Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 6.djvu/277

Rh native land; hut it was otherwise ordained. His lady, with a favourite son, had returned to England a year before, in consequence of an illness of the latter, which, it was thought, required this change of climate; and thus while the inducements to remain in India were greatly lessened, those to return to his native land were increased. While awaiting the arrival of his successor, Sir Thomas unfortunately came to the resolution of paying a farewell visit to his old friends in the Ceded Districts, where the cholera was at that time raging with great violence. Alarmed for his safety, his friends endeavoured to dissuade him from his intended excursion, but to no purpose. Towards the end of May, he set out from Madras, attended by a small escort, and on the 6th of July following, reached Putteecondah, where he was seized with the fatal distemper about nine o'clock in the morning, and expired on the evening of the same day at half past nine, in the 66th year of his age. In an hour and a half after his death, his body was removed to Gooty, where it was interred with such military honours as the remoteness of the situation, and the despatch which it is necessary to observe on such occasions in India, could afford.

Few events ever occurred in India which excited so general a sensation, or created so universal a feeling of regret, as the death of Sir Thomas Munro. Natives as well as Europeans mourned his loss with unfeigned sorrow. His justice, humanity, benevolence, and eminent talents, had secured him the esteem and respect of all who knew him, and he was known nearly throughout the whole extent of the eastern world. No man perhaps, in short, ever descended to the grave more beloved or more lamented, and none was ever more entitled to these tributes of affection from his fellow men, or ever took such pains to deserve them as Sir Thomas Munro.

With regard to his talents, had there been no other proof of their existence than that which his letters afford, these alone would have pointed him out as a remarkable man ; and as one who, had he chosen it, might have become as eminent in literature as he was in the profession of arms. Three volumes of these compositions, strung upon a memoir of the writer, have been published under the superintendence of the Rev. Mr Gleig, author of "The Subaltern."

MURE, (, of Rowallan, a poet, was born about the year 1594. He was the eldest son of Sir William Mure of Rowallan, by a sister of Montgomery, the author of the "The Cherry and the Slae." The family was one of the most ancient of the order of gentry in that part of the country, and through Elizabeth Mure, the first wife of Robert II., had mingled its blood with the royal line: it recently terminated in the mother of the late countess of Loudoun and marchioness of Hastings. Of the poet's education no memorial has been preserved, but it was undoubtedly the best that his country could afford in that age, as, with a scholar-like enthusiasm, he had attempted a version of the story of Dido and Æneas before his twentieth year. There is also a specimen of Sir William's verses in pure English, dated so early as 1611, when he could not be more than seventeen. In 1615, while still under age, and before he had succeeded to his paternal estate, he married Anna, daughter of Dundas of Newliston, by whom he had five sons and six daughters. The eldest Ron William, succeeded his father; Alexander was killed in the Irish Rebellion, 1641; Robert, a major in the army, married the lady Newhall in Fife; John was designed of Fenwickhill; and Patrick, probably the youngest, was created a baronet of Nova Scotia in 1662. One of the daughters, Elizabeth, was married to LJchter Knox of Ranfurly. Sir William Mure married, secondly, dame Jane Hamilton, lady Duntreath; and of this marriage there were two sons and two daughters; James, Hugh, Jane, and Marion.

The earliest of Sir William's compositions to be found in print is an