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166 America, was created in 1542, Ramirez was ap- poinied judge, and took possession of his office in Comayagua in 1543. In 1546, when Pedro de la Gasca (q. v.) arrived at Santa Marta. Ramirez was commissioned by the audieneia to carry to him a re- enforcement of 200 men, and took part in the liattle of Xaquixaguana. He returned to Guatemala in 1549, went to Spain in 1552, and on his return to Guatemala was ordered by royal decree to subdue the rebellious Indians of Putehutla and Lacandon, which he did in less than three months. As a re- ward for his numerous services, in 1565 he was elected president of the Confines, and later he was promoted to Lima, where he died.

RAMOS ARIZPE, Miguel (rah'-mos-ah-rith'- pay), Mexican statesman, b. in San Nicolas (now Ra- mos Arizpe), Coahuila, 15 Feb., 1T75 ; d. in Mexico, 2X A i nil, 1843. He studied in the Seminary of Mon- terey and the College of Guadalajara, where he was graduated in law, and began to practise his pro- fession, but later he entered the church, and was ordained in 1803 by the bishop of Monterey, who made him his chaplain. Soon he was appointed professor of civil and canonical law in the Semi- nary of Monterey, and afterward he became vicar- general and ecclesiastical judge of several parishes in Tamaulipas. In 1807 he returned to Guadala- jara, and was graduated as doctor in theology and canonical law, and made a canon of the cathedral. He was elected in September, 1810, deputy to the cortes of Cadiz, took his seat in March, 1811, and labored to prepare for the independence of his country ; but when the constitution was abrogated by the returning king in 1814, and Ramos refused honors that were offered him to renounce his principles, he was imprisoned. When the con- stitution was re-established in 1820, he regained his liberty, took his seat again in the cortes, and was appointed in 1821 precentor of the cathedral of Mexico. In the next year he returned to his country, was elected to the constituent congress, and formed part of the commission that modelled the Federal constitution of 1824. In November, 1X'J.>. he was called by President Guadalupe Vic- toria to his cabinet as secretary of justice and ecclesiastical affairs, which place he occupied till March, 1828. In 1830 he was sent as minister to Chili, and on his return in 1831 he was appointed dean of the cathedral of Mexico. When President Manuel Gomez Pedraza took charge of the execu- tive in December, 1832, he made Ramos Arizpe secretary of justice, which portfolio he also held under Valentin Gomez Farias till August, 1833. In 1841 he was a member of the government coun- cil, and in 1842 he was deputy to the constituent congress, which was dissolved by President Nicolas Bravo. He was afterward a member of the junta de notables, but failing health forced him to retire, and soon afterward he died.

RAMSAY, David, physician, b. in Lancaster county, Pa.. 2 April, 1749"; d. in Charleston, S. C., 8 May, 1815. He was graduated at Princeton in 1765, at the medical department of the University of Pennsylvania in 1773, meanwhile teaching for several years. Settling in Charleston, he soon ac- quired celebrity as a physician, and also was active with his pen in behalf of colonial rights. At the beginning of the Revolutionary war he took the field as a surgeon, and served during the siege of Savannah. He was an active member of the South Carolina legislature in 1776-'83, and a member of the council of safety, in which capacity he became so obnoxious to the British that, on the capture of Charleston in May. 1780. he was included among the forty inhabitants of that place that were held in clc.se confinement at St. Augustine for eleven months as hostages. Dr. Ramsay was a delegate to the Continental congress in 1782-'6, long a mem- ber of the South Carolina senate, and its president for seven years. His death was the result of wounds that he received from the pistol of a maniac, concerning whose mental un- si mildness he had testified. During the progress of the Revolution, Doctor Ramsay collected materials for its his- tory, and his great impartiality, his fine memory, and his acquaintance with many of the actors in the contest, emi- nently qualified him for the task. His occasional papers relating to the times had considerable popularity. Among these was a "Sermon on Tea," from the text " Touch not. taste not, handle not," and an "Oration on American Independence" (1778). His other works include " History of the Revolution of South Carolina from a British Province to an Independent State " (Trenton, 1785); " History of the American Revo- lution" (Philadelphia. 1789); "On the Means of Preserving Health in Charleston and its Vicinity " (Charleston, 1790); "Review of the Improvements, Progress, and State of Medicine in the Eighteenth Century" (1802); "Life of George Washington" (New York, 1807); "History of South Carolina from its Settlement in 1670 to the Year 1808" (Charleston, 1809) ; " Memoirs of Mrs. Martha Lau- rens Ramsay, with Extracts from her Diary" (1811); "Eulogium on Dr. Benjamin Rush " (Phila- delphia, 1813) ; " History of the United States, 1607-1808," continued to the treaty of Ghent by Samuel S. Smith and others (Philadelphia, 1816-'! 7), forming the first three volumes of " Universal His- tory Americanized, or an Historical View of the World from the Earliest Records to the Nineteenth Century, with a Particular Reference to the State of Society, Literature, Religion, and Form of Government of the United States of America" (12 vols., 1819). Dr. Ramsay married, first, Frances, a daughter of John Witherspoon. and then Martha, daughter of Henry Laurens.—His second wife. Martha Laurens, b. in Charleston, S.C., 3 Nov., 1759; d. there, 10 June, 1811, accompanied her father, Henry Laurens, on his missions abroad, and so spent ten years of her early life in England and France. While Mr. Laurens was minister at Paris he presented his daughter with 500 guineas, with part of which she purchased 100 trench testaments and distributed them among the destitute of Vigan and its vicinity, and with the rest she established a school. In 1785 she returned to Charleston, and in 1787 she married Dr. Ramsay. Subsequently she assisted her husband in his literary work, and prepared her sons for college. See " Memoirs of Mrs. Martha Laurens Ramsay, with Extracts from her Diary " by her husband (Charleston, 1811). Dr. Ramsay's brother, Nathaniel, soldier, b. in Lancaster county, Pa., 1 May, 1751: d. in Baltimore. Md., 23 Oct., 1817. was graduated at Princeton in 1767. and. after studying law. was ad-