Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 7.djvu/229

Rh grey of the morning, the worst fears of the poet's friends were realized, by the discovery of his coat lying at the side of a pool in the vicinity of Paisley, which pointed out where his body was to be found. This melancholy event happened on the 17th of May, 1810, when he had only reached his thirty -sixth year.

Tannahill's appearance was not indicative of superior endowment. He was small in stature, and in manners diffident almost to bashfulness. In mixed company he seldom joined in general conversation, yet from the interest he manifested in all that was said, his silence was never offensive. Among intimate friends he was open and communicative, and often expressed himself with felicity. His sympathies invariably went with the poor and unfortunate, and perhaps it was the result of his education and position in society, that he was jealous of the attentions of the wealthy, and disposed rather to avoid than to court their company. In his disposition he was tender and humane, and extremely attached to his home, his kindred, and his friends. His life was simple and unvaried in its details, but even the uneventful character of his existence renders more striking and more affecting its tragic close. In 1838 an enlarged edition of his poems and songs, with memoirs of the author and of his friend, Robert Archibald Smith, by Mr Philip A. Ramsay, was published in Glasgow.

TAYLOR,, whose name must ever bear a conspicuous and honourable place in the history of the invention of steam navigation, was born, May 3, 1758, at the village of Leadhills, in Lanarkshire, and received the rudiments of his education at the academy of Closeburn. After fitting himself to enter the medical profession, he was engaged, in the year 1785, by Mr Patrick Miller of Dalswinton, to superintend the education of the two sons of that gentleman, who were in attendance at the university of Edinburgh. It was also the aim of Mr Miller, that Mr Taylor, whose scientific acquirements had been warmly spoken of by the common friend who recommended him to the situation, should assist him in those mechanical pursuits with which for some years he had been in the habit of amusing his leisure hours. In the year just mentioned, Mr Miller was engaged in a series of operations for applying paddle-wheels to vessels, rather with a view to extricating them from perilous situations against the impulse of wind and tide, than with any expectation that such machinery, driven, as he contemplated it to be, by human power alone, could be of use in ordinary navigation. Mr Taylor entered at once into Mr Miller's views, and aided in the preparation of a double vessel, of sixty feet in length, with intermediate paddles, driven by a capstan, which Mr Miller tried in the Firth of Forth, in spring, 1787, against a custom-house wherry, which it easily distanced. On this occasion Mr Taylor became convinced of the utility of the paddles; but, observing that the men were much exhausted by their labour, he was equally convinced that a superior mechanical power was wanting, in order to realize the full value of the invention. Having communicated his thoughts to Mr Miller, he received from that gentleman the following answer: "I am of the same opinion, and that power is just what I em in search of. My object is to add mechanical aid to the natural power of the wind, to enable vessels to avoid and to extricate themselves from dangerous situations, which they cannot do on their present construction." Invited to co-operate in this object, Mr Taylor applied himself to the consideration of all the mechanical powers already in common use, but without being able to convince himself of the applicability of any of them. At length the steam- engine presented itself to him; and though he might be naturally supposed to have been himself startled at the boldness of such a thought, he soon convinced himself of its being practicable. On suggesting it to Mr Miller, he found he had excited more astonishment at the novelty, than respect for the feasibility of the scheme. Mr Miller allowed the sufficiency of the power; but was disposed to