Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 01.djvu/289

 ‘propagandists of Christianity in Palestine’ who attended ‘the numerous young family’ of Bishop Alexander, who at the time of his death was the father of eight children, then living, all under sixteen years of age. A committee was formed to provide for his family, of which the Earl of Shaftesbury, then Lord Ashley, was chairman.

Bishop Alexander published:
 * 1) ‘The Hope of Israel, a Lecture,’ &c., 8vo, London, 1831.
 * 2) ‘The Glory of Mount Zion, a Sermon,’ &c., 8vo, London, 1839.
 * 3) ‘Farewell Sermon,’ &c., 8vo, London, 1841, all of which were delivered at the Episcopal Jews' Chapel, Palestine Place, respectively on Sunday evening, 2 Oct. 1831; on the first Sunday of Advent, 1838; and on Monday evening, 8 Nov. 1841, being the day after the preacher's consecration.
 * 4) ‘An Introductory Lecture delivered publicly in King's College, London, 17 Nov. 1832.’
 * 5) ‘The Flower fadeth (Is. xl. 7), Memoir of Sarah Alexander,’ 18mo, London, 2nd edition, 1841.

 ALEXANDER, WILLIAM,  (1567?–1640), was a poet and statesman. If, in connection with this name, the reader be covetous of an example of those ‘endless genealogies’ against which even an apostle warned, let him secure ‘Memorials of the Earl of Stirling and of the House of Alexander, by the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D.’ 2 vols. 8vo 1877). Solid (documentary) fact seems first to be reached in the three sons of Somerled, Lord of the Isles, to wit, Donald, Ronald, and Angus. We have to do only with the last. His grandson John (also called Lord of the Isles) married, as a second wife, Margaret, daughter of King Robert II (of Scotland), and his third son by this marriage, Alexander, lord of Lochaber, had two sons, Angus and Alister (or Alexander). The latter founded the house of MacAlexander (sometimes written M'Alexander and MacAlister), and on removing from the West assumed the more euphonious name of Alexander. In a legal instrument (among the ‘Argyle Family Papers’), dated 6 March 1505, Thomas Alexander de Menstray is associated with certain others in an arbitration connected with the division of lands in Clackmannanshire, about which a dispute had arisen between the abbot of Cambuskenneth and Sir David Bruce of Clackmannan (Chartulary of Cambuskenneth Abbey, p, 86). The lands of Menstray or Menstry had been assigned to the before-named Alexander by relatives of the Argyle family. Well-nigh innumerable manuscripts verify and confirm the original grant.

Passing over all others, it is now to be stated that William was son of Alexander Alexander—son of William Alexander—of Menstrie, and of Marion, daughter of an Allan Couttie. The marriage of his parents was ‘about 1566 or 1567,’ and as he was the first child (and only son: two daughters later, Janet and Christian), the probabilities are that he was born in 1567, or not later than 1568. The birth-year has been (traditionally) accepted as 1580 because of the inscription around Marshall's engraved portrait of him, ‘ætatis suæ 57,’ which occurs occasionally in copies of his ‘Recreations with the Muses’ of 1637. But the portrait was not prepared for the ‘Recreations,’ and is undated. Besides, Alexander must have been some few years at least older than the Earl of Argyle, to whom we shall see he was tutor, and who was born before 1571. (See Dr. Memorials, as before.) Unfortunately the parish registers of Logie have long since disappeared, i.e. of the period. The manor house of Menstrie still survives. It is pleasantly nestled on the confines of the two parishes of Logie and Alloa; later it was the birthplace also of Sir Ralph Abercromby (1734).

His father died on 10 Feb. 1580–1, and he was left in charge of a paternal grand-uncle, James Alexander, ‘burgess of Stirling,’ who was by the father nominated in his will as ‘tutor to his bairnes.’ As this tutor was resident at Stirling, it may safely be assumed that William received his early education at the grammar school of that town. The rector of this school was then Thomas Buchanan, nephew of the more celebrated George Buchanan. From the Hawthornden