Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 05.djvu/414

 of ye Spanish Navy,’ 26 Feb. 1589 (Lausd. 52 (40)). There are also letters from William Borough to the privy council, &c., preserved at Hatfield, 2 Oct. 1595, Oct. 1596, 9 June 1597, 4 July 1597 (see Hist. MSS. Comm. 5th Rep. pp. 277, 285, 287, 291).

It will be observed in the above sketch that there is a lacuna in the movements of William Borough between the years 1583 and 1587. In the ‘Leicester Correspondence' (Camden Society, 1844) is printed a journal of the proceedings of the Earl of Leicester in the Low Countries, written by the admiral who conducted the fleet from Harwich to Flushing in December 1585. Down to a recent period it was held that the admiral was no other than the elder Borough, Stephen [q. v.] Mr. R. C. Cotton, however, in his able paper (Dev. Assoc. Rep. vol. xii.) shows that it was impossible to have been Stephen Borough, who died in July 1584, as is proved both by his monument and by the parish register in Chatham Church. This writer, however, suggests that there must have been a second Stephen Borough, also a seaman. This theory we are not prepared to accept. A reference to the original manuscript (Harl. 8225 serves to show that the original docketing which we take to be W. Borough, badly written as to the first initial) has been cancelled and re-docketed in error by a later hand and assigned to Stephen. If the original docketing was understood to refer to Stephen, it remains for the objector to show cause why the correction was made at all. The acceptance of the greater probability, that the whole transaction is referable to William, not only goes a great way to settle the question of doubtful authorship, but it possesses the advantage of allowing the command of the fleet in 1585 to fall naturally into its place in a more ample sketch of the life of William Borough, which is yet a desideratum among the lives of our English worthies of the period of the Tudors.

 BORRELL, H. P. (d. 1851), numismatist, after learning business in London, established himself as a trader at Smyrna, where he resided for thirty-three years. He devoted much of his attention to the discovery of inedited Greek coins, in which he was remarkably successful. The results of his discoveries ivere given in papers contributed to the ‘Revue Numismatique,’ the ‘Numismatic Chronicle,’ and various German periodicals devoted to numismatic science. In 1836 he published at Paris ‘Notice sur quelques médailles grecques des rois de Chypre.’ His collection of coins, antiquities, and gems was sold at London in 1851. He died at Smyrna 2 Oct. of the same year.

 BORRER, WILLIAM (1781–1862), botanist, was born at Henfield, Sussex, on 13 June 1781, and died there on 10 Jan. 1862. He received his earlier education in private schools at Hurstpierpoint and Carshalton in Surrey. Although he left school at an early age, he continued his studies under tutors, and obtained a good knowledge of the classics and French. His father wished him to adopt agriculture as a pursuit, though his own proclivities were towards medicine; but, being possessed of an ample fortune, he devoted himself to the study of botany, especially of his own country. He made repeated journeys in all parts of Britain, and endeavoured to cultivate every critical British species and all the hardy exotic plants he could obtain, having at one time as many as 6,660 species. His knowledge of the difficult genera Salix, Rubus, and Rosa was great, and his help was eagerly sought and willingly rendered both by purse and time.

He published but little—a few pages in the ‘Phytologist,' some descriptions in the supplement to ‘English Botany,’ and his share with Dawson Turner in the privately printed ‘Lichenographia. Britannica,’ of which only a few sheets were printed and issued long after, in 1839. He wrote the descriptions of the species of Myosotis. Rosa, and nearly all of Rubus for Sir W. Hooker's ‘British Flora’ in 1830 and subsequent editions. He was a fellow of the Royal, Linnean, and Wernerian societies, and justice of the peace for Sussex. Several plants were named after him, and the genus Borreria of Acharius amongst lichens, but the genus Borreria of G. W. Meyer is now merged in Spermacoce. The following species were named after him: Rubus Borreri, Poa Borreri, Parmelia Borreri, Hypnum Borrerianum, Callithamnion Borreri. His rich and critical herbarium of British plants is kept at the Royal Gardens, Kew. 