Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/311

Rh and Leith, on the 2d of October, 1852, and was interred in the Dean Cemetery. His character was thus appropriately summed up by Lord Murray at the ensuing Anniversary of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland—" In the death of my old and valued friend, Mr. Thomas Thomson, the Society has to deplore the loss of one, whose contributions to our antiquarian literature, and to the facilities of the historical student of the Records of Scotland, have conferred a boon upon the country, such as it would be difficult to over-estimate in value. He was a man of great and varied learning, and a highly refined mind. His enthusiasm was undamped by the intricacy and forbidding aspects of one of the most perplexing and protracted labours which ever engrossed the life-labour of the legal antiquary; and yet, while devoting his fine mind to such labours in his study, he united to all the acquirements requisite for such pursuits, manners the most pleasing, and a warmth and geniality of feeling which have embalmed him in the memories of a numerous circle of friends and admirers."

TOD, .—Of the early life of this distinguished historian of the East we have been able to glean only a few particulars. Such, however, is frequently the case with his countrymen. Their talents and enterprise lead them to eminence, and place them full in the view of the world; but when the general curiosity is expressed in, Where was he born?—who were his parents?—how was he trained and educated for the place he so worthily occupies?—the biographer is compelled to confess his ignorance, or feel his way at hap-hazard and by conjecture.

With these remarks we judge it necessary to premise a notice of Lieutenant-Colonel Tod, of the Honourable East India Company's Service, and their political agent in the Western Rajpoot states. He was born in Scotland about the year 1782; but in what district, or of what parentage, we are unable to ascertain. In March, 1800, he went to India, being then only in his eighteenth year, and obtained a commission in the second Bengal European regiment. Although he commenced his career thus early, he appears to have arrived in India an unbefriended adventurer; for, instead of waiting for promotion like his brother officers, who had patronage to back their merits, he volunteered for the Molucca Isles, was transferred to the marine service on board the Mornington, and afterwards, to use his own expression, "ran the gauntlet from Calcutta to Hurdwar." In the course of this run, however, he not only escaped the dangers that crossed it, but reached the starting place of a new and better career. At the close of 1805, when he was nothing more than a subaltern in the subsidiary force at Gwalior, an embassy was to be sent, at the close of the Mahratta war, to Sindhia, at that time encamped at Me war, in Rajpootana. Tod's friend, Mr. Graeme Mercer, was sent as ambassador on this occasion, while Tod himself was to accompany him as assistant. The country of Rajast’han, of which it formed a part, was thenceforth to be the "home of his adoption," as he affectionately called it, and the place to which the best part of his life was to be enthusiastically and usefully devoted.

On settling down amidst the official duties with which he was intrusted, Tod, now scarcely twenty-four years old, resolved to be something more than a mere political resident. Great capacities, hitherto undeveloped, were struggling within him, which the new land of his abode was calculated to call forth; and, under this inspiration, he successively became geographer, historian, and archaeologist. As was natural, the geography of Rajast'han was the first subject of his inquiry, into which he threw himself with ardour, almost as soon