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Burnard and while rallying his men was killed by a spear-wound in the throat. It was said, but perhaps without foundation, that he was the cause of the great hazard in which at one time the square was placed, by incautiously and impetuously calling on the 'heavies' to charge. It was also said that Sir Herbert Stewart named him as first in command in the event of his own death, but this has not been confirmed.

Besides his travels Burnaby published a lecture on 'Practical Instruction of Staff Officers in Foreign Armies,' delivered on 8 July 1872, and was keenly interested in the development of military ballooning. He had made nineteen balloon ascents, often alone, and was a member of the council of the Aeronautical Society. His first ascent was with M. Godard in a Montgolfier balloon, in July 1864. He was once in a balloon of novel form, which burst in mid air, but acting as a parachute fortunately broke his descent; and prompted by the failure of Wright, the aeronaut, he attempted, on 23 March 1882, to cross the Channel alone in the balloon Eclipse from Dover, and succeeded after considerable perils and an ascent to the height of 10,000 feet. He landed at the Château de Montigny, Envermeu, Normandy. He published an account of this under the title 'A Ride across the Channel.' He also left the manuscript of a political novel after his death. Though after his quarrel in 1882 with General Owen Williams, which nearly led to a sensational libel suit, he lived much alone, he was very popular in London and Paris. He was a good disciplinarian and a humorous speaker; his voice was thin and piercing, his features Jewish and Italian, and his unEnglish appearance led him to resist attempts to procure portraits of him. He married, on 25 June 1879, Elizabeth, only daughter of Sir St. Vincent Hawkins Whitshed, bart., of Killoncarrick, county Wicklow, who has written 'The High Alps in Winter,' a plea from personal experience for Alpine mountaineering in winter, and by her had one son. He was lord of the manor of Somerby, Leicestershire. A window to his memory has been placed in St. Mary's Church, Bedford, and an obelisk with a medallion portrait in St. Philip's churchyard, Birmingham.

 BURNARD, NEVILL NORTHEY (1818–1878), sculptor, was the son of George Burnard, a mason, and Jane, his wife. He was born at Alternun in Cornwall in 1818, and baptised in that parish on 1 Nov. in that year. He was brought up by his father as a mason, and at a very early age he showed remarkable facilities for carving in stone. At the age of sixteen he carved in slate the group of the 'Laocoon,' which he sent in 1836 to the exhibition of the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society at Falmouth. This carving in bas-relief, executed in an obscure village, without instruction—his only pattern being a woodcut in one of the numbers of the ' Penny Magazine,' and his tools even being of his own making—was considered so very remarkable a production, that the society awarded Burnard their first silver medal. Again in 1841 another silver medal was given to this youthful sculptor for three medallion portraits. Sir Charles Lemon, bart., M.P., who was for many years the president of the Cornwall Polytechnic Society, took considerable interest in the progress of this young man, and specially introduced him to the notice of Chantrey, who secured for him employment as a carver in one of the most celebrated ateliers in London. Through the solicitation of Sir Charles Lemon the queen was pleased to allow Burnard access to Buckingham Palace to model a bust of the young Duke of Cornwall. During the progress of the modelling her majesty did the artist the honour of inspecting the work and expressing her approval of the likeness. Again, on the completion of the bust in marble, the queen was pleased to direct that it should be exhibited at the society's annual exhibition in Cornwall. The cost of this marble bust of the Prince of Wales was met by a fund subscribed in Cornwall, and when placed in the Polytechnic Hall in Falmouth, the opinion unanimously expressed was, that it amply sustained the early expectation which had been formed of the artist s excellence.

This fairly launched Burnard in the world of art, and his remarkable powers as a carver in marble secured him employment in the studios of some of the first sculptors of the day. Among others may be named Bailey, Marshall, and Foley, who highly appreciated his powers.

On the return of Richard Lander from Africa, after having traced the course of the Niger, Burnard was employed to execute the statue for the column erected in his honour at Truro. His only other public work was the statue of 'Ebenezer Elliott, the Corn-law Rhymer,' which stands in the market-place of Sheffield. Burnard executed many portrait-busts of men of eminence, the best known works being marble busts of General Gough, of Professor John Couch Adams, the