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Hunter mind was none the less bent on executing the project of a history of India, which he had formed long ago during his first years of service in Birbhum. How thorough were his early researches may be seen from the three volumes of 'Bengal MS. Records,' which he calendared at that time, though he did not publish them till 1894, with a dissertation on the permanent settlement. He also compiled a catalogue of 380 historical manuscripts in the library of the India office. Hunter was not destined to carry his original design to completion. He was reluctantly compelled to realise that no individual, however laborious, could compass the entire field. He therefore abandoned the early period of Hindu and Muhammadan dynasties, and devoted himself to tracing the growth of British dominion. This limited design, on the scale sketched out by the author, would have filled five volumes. Only one appeared in his lifetime (1899), which barely opens the subject, for it stops with the massacre of Amboyna in 1623, before the English company had founded its first settlements on the mainland of India. A second volume, continuing the narrative to the close of the seventeenth century, was published in November 1900. The sample given is sufficient to enable us to realise what the bulk would have been, and how great the loss caused by the author's premature death. By his painstaking investigation of contemporary documents, often hidden in Portuguese and Dutch archives, Hunter satisfied the most austere standard of an historian's duty. By his wide generalisations and his recognition of the influence exercised by national character and sea power, he shows himself a representative of the modern school of historical writing. The vigour and picturesqueness of his literary style are all his own.

In the winter of 1898-9 Hunter was called upon to undertake the tedious railway journey across Europe to Baku on the Caspian, to sit by the sick-bed of a son. On his return influenza seized him, and ultimately affected his heart. He died at Oaken Holt on 6 Feb. 1900. He was buried in the churchyard of Cumnor, his funeral being attended by representatives of the university of Oxford, by many distinguished Anglo-Indian friends, and by a crowd of villagers who mourned their benefactor.

Hunter was appointed C.I.E. in 1878, C.S.I, in 1884, and K.C.S.I. on his retirement from India in 1887. In 1869 his own university of Glasgow gave him the degree of LL.D. When he first settled at Oxford, in 1889, the university conferred upon him the exceptional distinction of M.A. by decree of convocation, which carried with it full rights of suffrage. Cambridge made him an honorary LL.D. in 1887. He was a vice-president of the Royal Asiatic Society, and member of many learned bodies both in England and on the continent. He was also proud of being elected by his neighbours as county councillor for the Cumnor division of Berkshire. On 4 Dec. 1863 Hunter married Jessie, daughter of Thomas Murray (1792-1872) [q. v.] She accompanied him in many of is journeys, and shared his literary toils. She survives him, together with two sons, of whom the elder is a captain in the army. [Private information. An authorised biography of Sir W. W. Hunter is being written by F. H. B. Skrine, formerly of the Bengal Civil Service.]

 HUTTON, RICHARD HOLT (1826–1897), theologian, journalist, and man of letters, born at Leeds on 2 June 1826, was the grandson of Joseph Hutton (1765–1856), Unitarian minister of Eustace Street congregation, Dublin, and the third son of Joseph Hutton (1790–1860), Unitarian minister at Mill Hill chapel, Leeds. His mother was Susannah Grindal, eldest daughter of John Holt of Nottingham. In 1835 his father removed to London to become the minister of the congregation at Carter Lane. Richard was educated at University College School and at University College, under Augustus De Morgan [q. v.], graduating B.A. in 1845 and M.A. in 1849, and obtaining the gold medal for philosophy besides high distinction in mathematics. At University College he became intimate with Walter Bagehot [q. v.], when neither was more then seventeen. They both delighted in discussing their subjects of study, and Hutton relates how on one occasion they 'wandered up and down Regent Street for something like two hours in the vain attempt to find Oxford Street,' so absorbed were they in debating 'whether the so-called logical principle of identity (A is A) was entitled to rank as a law of thought or only as a postulate of language.'

After spending two semesters at German universities, first at Heidelberg in 1841 and then at Berlin, he entered Manchester New College in 1847 to prepare for the Unitarian ministry. There he studied under James Martineau [q. v. Suppl.] and John James Tayler [q. v.] His intention of entering the ministry, however, came to nothing ; for though he preached occasionally, he received no call to a permanent charge, his intellectual discourses, adorned by no grace of delivery, failing to secure appreciation. For a short time he filled the office of principal of 