Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol I (1901).djvu/293

 was used with good results during the Abyssinian campaign in 1867.

From 1867 to 1869 Bolton was deputy-assistant quartermaster-general and assistant instructor in visual signalling at the School of Military Engineering at Chatham under Captain (afterwards Major-general) [q. v.], instructor in telegraphy. He was promoted on 8 July 1868 to an unattached majority in consideration of his special services in army signalling. Bolton was largely instrumental in 1871 in founding the Society of Telegraph Engineers and Electricians, of which he became honorary secretary. He edited the 'Journal' of the society, and was afterwards vice-president. In 1871 he was appointed by the board of trade under the Metropolis Water Act to be water examiner to the metropolis, lie was promoted to be lieutenant-colonel on 15 June 1877, and retired from the military service with the honorary rank of colonel on 1 July 1881. He was knighted in 1884.

Bolton interested himself in electrical matters, and the beautiful displays of coloured fountains and electric lights which formed prominent features of the exhibitions at South Kensington from 1883 to 1886 were designed by him and worked from the central tower under his personal superintendence. Bolton died on 5 Jan. 1887 at the Royal Bath Hotel, Bournemouth, Hampshire.

He was the author of 'London Water Supply,' 1884, 8vo, of which a new and enlarged edition, with a short exposition of the law relating to water companies generally, by P. A. Scratchley, was published in 1888; 'Description of the Illuminated Fountain and of the Water Pavilion,' 1884, 8vo, originally delivered as a lecture at the International Health Exhibition.

Bolton married in 1866 Julia, second daughter of R. Mathews of Oatlands Park, Surrey; she survived him.



BONAR, HORATIUS (1808–1889), Scottish divine, second son of James Bonar, second solicitor of excise, Edinburgh, was born in Edinburgh on 19 Dec. 1808. Educated at the high school and the university of Edinburgh, he had among his fellow-students [q. v.] and others, afterwards notable as evangelists. Licensed as a preacher, he did mission work in Leith for a time, and in November 1837 he settled at Kelso as minister of the new North Church founded in connection with Thomas Chalmers's scheme of church extension. He became exceedingly popular as a preacher, and was soon well known throughout Scotland. In his early years at Kelso he anticipated the methods of the evangelical alliance by frequently arranging for eight days or more of united prayer. He began the publication of pamphlets supplementary to his ministerial work, and he gradually produced evangelical books, such as 'God's Way of Peace' and 'The Night of Weeping,' the sale of the former almost immediately disposing of two hundred and eighty-five thousand copies, while of the latter an issue of fifty-nine thousand was speedily exhausted. For the advancement of his work in his congregation and his Sunday-school classes, he began in Leith the composition of hymns, continuing the practice in Kelso and afterwards. He joined the free church in 1843. On 9 April 1853 he received the honorary degree of D.D. from Aberdeen University. He was appointed minister of Chalmers Memorial Church, Edinburgh, on 7 June 1806. He was moderator of the general assembly of the free church in May 1883. A man of extraordinary energy and versatility; Bonar was one of the last among notable Edinburgh preachers to conduct services in the open air, and this he frequently did on a Sunday in addition to the regular work for his congregation. He died in Edinburgh on 31 July 1889.

Bonar married in 1843 Jane Katherine, third daughter of Robert Lundie (d. 1832), minister of Kelso. She sympathised fully with his work, and is herself said to have written religious verse. She predeceased him, as did also several members of his family. He was survived by three daughters and a son, who became a free church minister.

As a hymn-writer Bonar was able to consecrate a passing mood by giving it a tangible expression in verse. His best hymns are spontaneous, fluent, melodious, and devotional. Occasionally they are genuine lyrical poems, as e.g. 'When the weary seeking rest' and 'I heard the voice of Jesus say,' which Bishop Fraser of Manchester thought the best hymn in the language. His 'Hymns of Faith and Hope' were soon sold to the number of 140,729 copies. The standard value of his work is illustrated in the 'Scottish Hymnary'—used in common by the three Scottish presbyterian churches and the Irish presbyterians—in which eighteen of his hymns occur, along with devotional lyrics drawn from all possible sources. Early influenced by Edward Irving, who delivered in Edinburgh three series of lectures on the Apocalypse (1828-9-30), Bonar 