Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 04.djvu/157

 #  of Scotland,' 1849; the last being an attempt to supply words for the old national airs of such a correct and conventional type as not to offend the susceptibilities of the most fastidious. The verses are generally tasteful and spirited, but in no case have they been successful in supplanting those associated with the old melodies.



BELL, BEAUPRÉ (1704–1745), antiquary, was descended from the ancient family of Beaupré, long resident in Upwell and Outwell, Norfolk, a co-heiress of whom married Robert Bell [see, d. 1577], an ancestor. His father, Beaupré Bell, who married Margaret, daughter of Sir John Oldfield, of Spalding, wasted the patrimony through improvident habits and violent passions. The vicissitudes of his career may be realised from an advertisement in the 'London Gazette,' No. 7613, May 1737, from Lord Harrington, the secretary of state, setting out that the life of Beaupré Bell had been threatened, his servant shot, and his house beset several times, and promising free pardon for any one who revealed his accomplices; as a further inducement Mr. Bell added a reward of fifty pounds. The son was educated at Westminster School and at Trinity College, Cambridge, taking the degree of B.A. in 1725, M.A. in 1729. He devoted himself to the study of antiquities, taking especial pleasure in ancient coins, and, by the possession of property worth, even in its reduced state, as much as 1,500l. a year, was enabled to gratify his tastes to the utmost. He issued proposals for a work on the coins of the Roman emperors; but though the book was in a forward state long before his death, it was never published. Beaupré Bell was an active member of the Spalding Society, and several papers which he communicated to it are mentioned in the 'Reliquiæ Galeanæ' (Bibl. Topog. Britt. iii.), pp. 57-66. The same volume also contains several letters to and from him (pp. 147-490). Four of his letters on the 'Horologia of the Antients' are printed in the 'Archæologia,' vi. 133-43; two are in Nichols's 'Lit. Illustrations,' iii. 572, 582; and several others may be found in the 'Stukeley Memoirs' (Surtees Soc.) He assisted Blomefield in his history of Norfolk, and Thomas Hearne in many of his antiquarian works, and C. N. Cole's edition of Dugdale's 'Imbanking' (1772) was corrected from a copy formerly in his possession. Bell died of consumption on his road to Bath in August 1745, when the estate passed to his youngest sister, but he left his personal property of books, medals, and manuscripts to his college at Cambridge. His remains are said to have been laid in the family burying-place in St. Mary's chapel, Outwell church, but there is no entry of the burial in the parish register, nor is there any mention of his name among the members of his family commemorated in the inscriptions on the family tomb in the chapel.



BELL, BENJAMIN (1749–1806), surgeon, son of George Bell, descended from landed proprietors of long standing in Dumfriesshire, was born at Dumfries April 1749. After education at Dumfries grammar school he was early apprenticed to Mr. James Hill, surgeon, of Dumfries; but at seventeen he was sent to the Edinburgh medical school, where the Monros, Black, and John Gregory were among his teachers. After being house-surgeon to the Royal Infirmary for about two years, he travelled on the continent, and especially studied at Paris. In August 1772 he was appointed surgeon to the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, which office he held for twenty-nine years. He married Grizel, daughter of Robert Hamilton, D.D., about 1775, and soon afterwards, owing to a severe accident, settled on a farm three miles south of Edinburgh, retiring from practice for a couple of years. In 1778 he became surgeon to Watson's Hospital. His first professional work, on the 'Theory and Management of Ulcers' (1779), attracted considerable attention, was translated into French and German, and reached a seventh edition in 1801. His most important work, 'A System of Surgery,' appeared in six volumes, 1782-7; it likewise reached a seventh edition in 1801, and was translated into French and German. It was a valuable work in its day, though now out of date. Bell is much to be commended for his advocacy of saving skin in every operation, a practice till then much neglected. Another of his works, 'On Hydrocele,' was published at Edinburgh in 1794. He gained a large practice, being a skilful and dexterous operator, and accumulated money, being distinguished for his calculating business habits. He also engaged considerably in agriculture, and wrote a number of essays on agriculture between 1783 and 1802, which were collected in a volume in 1802. They opposed corn laws and prognosticated great improvements in modes of