Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/428

 on a journey to Rome in 1607 (Historia Ecclesiastica, ed. 1829, i. 197). In reality he died at Paris in November 1605. He married in 1572 Janet, sister of John Russell, an advocate of some note, and had several children.

He is the author of: 1. 'Notes to be presentit to my speciall good Lord my Lord Hunsdon,'&c. 1584; in the 'Bannatyne Miscellany,' i. 85. 2. 'The Palinod of John Colvill, wherein he doth penitently recant his former proud offences,. . . ,' Edinburgh, 1600, 8vo; reprinted with Colville's ' Original Letters.' 3. 'Parænesis Ioannis Colvilli Scoti (post quadraginta annorum errores in gremium Sanctse Catholicae Romanes Ecclesiae quasi postliminio reuersi) ad suos Tribules & Populares,' Paris, 1601, 8vo; it also appeared in lowland Scotch under the title of 'The Paraeneseor admonition of lo. Col uille,' Paris, 1602, 8vo. 4. 'Oratio Funebris exequiis Elizabethae nuperae Anglise, Hiberniae, &c., Reginae, destinata,' Paris, 1603, 8vo. 5. 'In Obitv Beatiss. Papae Clementis Octaui Lacrymae Joannis Colvilli Scoti. Eiusdem in felicissima Assumptione Beatiss. PapaeLeonis Vndecimi Gaudia,' Paris, 1605, 4to. 6. 'Original Letters, 1582-1603,' edited for the Bannatyne Club (Edinb. 1858, 4to) by David Laing, who has prefixed an admirable memoir of Colville, and who conjectures that he was also the author of 'The Historie and Life of King James the Sext' (edited for the Bannatyne Club by Thomas Thomson, 1825), embracing the period from 1556 to 1596 with a short continuation to 1617. This anonymous work was first published, with unjustifiable interpolations and omissions by David Crawfurd, as 'Memoirs of the Affairs of Scotland, containing a full and impartial account of the Revolution in that kingdom, begun in 1567. Faithfully publish'd from an authentick MS.,' London, 1706, 8vo; reprinted in 1753 and 1757. It was not till 1804 that the genuine work, from 1566 to 1582, was printed under the editorship of Malcolm Laing.  COLVILLE or COLVILL, WILLIAM (d. 1675), principal of Edinburgh University, was the son of Robert Colvill of Cleish, and studied at the university of St. Andrews, where he graduated in 1617. He was elected second minister of Trinity College in 1635, elected to the second charge of Greyfriars in January 1638, and translated to the Tron Church in January 1639. In the same year he was sent by the covenanters to the king of France to solicit aid against the despotic proceedings of Charles I, but in travelling through England had his papers seized and was incarcerated till the victory of Newburn gained him his release in August 1640. In December 1641 he was removed to the Tron Church. He was suspended by the assembly in July 1648 and deposed in 1649 for 'favouring the unlawful engagement.' He then was for some time minister of the English church at Utrecht. In 1652 he was elected principal of the university of Edinburgh, but, having been carried prisoner to the castle for praying for Charles II, was not permitted by the government of Cromwell to take possession of the office, which was declared vacant on 17 Jan. 1653. He, however, received a year's stipend, in consideration of his having demitted his charge in Holland. In 1654 he was reponed by the assembly and became minister of Perth. On Leighton's resignation in 1662 he was again appointed principal of the university. He was the author of a work entitled 'Ethica Christiana' and of sermons on the ' Righteous Branch.' He died in 1675.  COLVIN, JOHN RUSSELL (1807–1857), lieutenant-governor of the north-western provinces of Bengal, second son of James Colvin of the well-known mercantile house of Colvin, Bazett, & Co. of London and Calcutta, was born in Calcutta in May 1807, educated until near the age of fifteen at St. Andrews in Fifeshire, and, after remaining a short time with a private tutor, highly distinguished himself as a student at the East India College at Haileybury, whence he passed as a writer on 30 April 1825. He went to Bengal in the following year, and, after receiving his certificate from the college of Fort William, was on 21 Sept. 1826 gazetted extra assistant to the registrar of Sudder Dewanny and Nizamut Adawlut, and was promoted to be third assistant on 15 Feb. 1827. His next appointment was as second assistant to the resident at Hyderabad on 14 Dec. 1827. In 1830 Lord William Bentinck created the office of assistant-secretary in each of the government departments at Calcutta, on the model of the English under-secretaryships, and Colvin was selected on 4 Jan. 1831 to be assistant to the secretary of the judicial and revenue departments. In these departments he remained some years, having become the deputy secretary, 18 Sept. 1832. He was appointed secretary to the Sudder board of 