Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 08.djvu/119

 rightly been associated with the principal results [see ]. Bylot's name appears in the list of the company of the merchants-discoverers of the North-West Passage (Calendar of State Papers, Colonial—East Indies, 26 July 1612). The spelling of his name is uncertain. It appears in the different forms of Bylott, Bilot, and Byleth.

[Rundall's Voyages towards the North-West (Hakluyt Society), p. 97.]  BYNG, ANDREW, D.D. (1574–1652), Hebraist, was born at Cambridge, and educated at Peterhouse in that university. He was elected regius professor of Hebrew in 1608, and died at Winterton in Norfolk in March 1651–2. Byng was one of the translators of the authorised version of the Bible. About 1605 the chapter of York resolved to keep a residentiary's place for him, as he was then occupied in this business.

[Cooper's Annals of Cambridge, iii. 448; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Drake's Eboracum, app. p. lxxvii; Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. iv. 228.]  BYNG, GEORGE, (1663–1733), admiral, eldest son of John Byng, of a family settled for many centuries at Wrotham in Kent, was born on 27 Jan. 1662–3. In 1666 his father, having got into pecuniary difficulties, was obliged to part with the Wrotham estate, and went over to Ireland, where he would seem to have engaged in some speculations which were so far from fortunate that he lost what money had remained to him, and in 1672 he returned to England, flying, apparently, from his creditors. In 1678, by the interest of Lord Peterborough with the Duke of York, George Byng entered the navy as a king's letter-boy on board the Swallow. On 28 Nov. he was transferred to the Reserve, and again in June 1679 to the Mary Rose. The Mary Rose was paid off in June 1680, and in the following April young Byng was entered as a volunteer on board the Phœnix, commanded by Captain Blagg. The Phœnix was immediately afterwards sent to Tangier, where Byng's maternal uncle, Colonel Johnstone, was in garrison and on friendly terms with General Kirk, who, understanding that the boy complained of his captain's ‘ill-temper,’ offered him a cadetship in the grenadiers. This he gladly accepted, and was discharged from the Phœnix on 10 May 1681. In six months' time he was appointed as ensign, and early in 1683 was promoted to a lieutenancy. As this was held to be a grievance by his seniors, over whose head he had been promoted, Kirk appointed him as lieutenant of a galley which attended on the garrison, and shortly afterwards to the acting command of the Deptford ketch. From this, however, he was superseded at the end of the year by order of Lord Dartmouth, who consented at Kirk's request to give him a commission as ‘lieutenant in the sea-service,’ and appointed him (February 1683–4) to the Oxford. On the arrival of the fleet in England the officers and men of the Oxford were turned over to the Phœnix, fitting for a voyage to the East Indies, on which she finally sailed from Plymouth, 28 Nov. 1684. Byng had had his commission in the army confirmed by the king, and was at this time lieutenant of Charles Churchill's company of grenadiers, from which he received leave of absence to attend to his duty on board the Phœnix.

The work at Bombay consisted chiefly in suppressing European ‘interlopers’ and native pirates. These last were rude enemies and fought desperately when attacked. On one occasion Byng was dangerously wounded. The service against the ‘interlopers’ required tact, energy, and moral, rather than physical, courage, and Captain Tyrrell's views of it differed much from those held by Sir Josiah Child, the representative of the Company. It was thus that during an illness of Tyrrell's, Byng, being for the time in command, had an opportunity, by entering more fully into his designs, of cultivating Child's goodwill, with, as it would seem, very profitable results. Afterwards, on their return to England, 24 July 1687, Sir Josiah offered him the command of one of the Company's ships, which Byng declined ‘as being bred up in the king's service;’ and when the Phœnix was paid off he rejoined his regiment, then quartered at Bristol.

In May 1688 Byng, still a lieutenant, was appointed to the Mordaunt, and in September to the Defiance. While serving in this subordinate employment, he was, on Kirk's suggestion and recommendation, appointed as an agent for the Prince of Orange, with the special work of winning over certain captains in the fleet. He was afterwards deputed by these captains to convey their assurances of goodwill and obedience to the prince. He found William at Sherborne: the prince ‘promised that he would take particular care to remember him,’ and entrusted him with a reply to the officers of the fleet, and a more confidential letter to Lord Dartmouth, which may be said to have fixed his wavering mind (Brit. Mus. Addl. MS. 31958, ff. 15–21; Memoirs, appendix to pt. i., 314 et seq.) This was the turning-point of Byng's fortune; he had judiciously chosen 