Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/430

 of Lords in 1748 the titles were assigned to his cousin James, who became third earl of Stair, without, however, entering upon the possession of the estates. John Dalrymple succeeded to the title as fifth earl on the death of his cousin William, fourth earl of Dumfries and fourth earl of Stair, on 27 July 1768. He was chosen a representative peer in 1771, and in the House of Lords opposed the measures which led to the revolt of the American colonies. For presenting a petition on behalf of Massachussetts in 1774 he received the thanks of that province. Not having been returned at the general election of 1774, he found scope for his political proclivities in the composition of a number of pamphlets, chiefly on national finance, which, on account of the gloomy character of their predictions, earned for him, according to Walpole, the title of the ‘Cassandra of the State.’ They include: 1. ‘The State of the National Debt, Income, and Expenditure,’ 1776. 2. ‘Considerations preliminary to the fixing the Supplies, the Ways and Means, and the Taxes for the year 1781,’ 1781. 3. ‘Facts and their Consequences submitted to the Consideration of the Public at large,’ 1782. 4. ‘An Attempt to balance the Income and Expenditure of the State,’ 1783. 5. ‘An Argument to prove that it is the indispensable Duty of the Public to insist that Government do forthwith bring forward the consideration of the State of the Nation,’ 1783. 6. ‘State of the Public Debts,’ 1783. 7. ‘On the Proper Limits of Government's Interference with the Affairs of the East India Company,’ 1784. 8. ‘Address to, and Expostulation with, the Public,’ 1784. 9. ‘Comparative State of the Public Revenue for the years ending on 10 Oct. 1783 and 10 Oct. 1784,’ 1785. He died on 13 Oct. 1789. By his wife, a daughter of George Middleton, banker, London, he had one son John [q. v.], who succeeded him as sixth earl.

[Douglas's Scottish Peerage (Wood), ii. 534; Walpole's Royal and Noble Authors (Park), v. 166–9.]  DALRYMPLE, JOHN (1726–1810), fourth baronet of Cranstoun, and afterwards by right of marriage Sir John Dalrymple Hamilton Macgill, author, was the eldest son of Sir William Dalrymple of Cranstoun, and was born in 1726. He was educated at the university of Edinburgh and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and in 1748 was admitted advocate at the Scottish bar. For some time he held the situation of solicitor to the board of excise. On the death of his father, 26 Feb. 1771, he succeeded to the baronetcy. In 1776 he was appointed baron of the exchequer, an office which he held till 1807. In 1757 he published an ‘Essay towards a General History of Feudal Property in Great Britain under various Heads,’ which reached a fourth edition, corrected and enlarged, in 1759, and of which Hume, writing in 1757, says: ‘I am glad of the approbation which Mr. Dalrymple's book meets with; I think it really deserves it’ (, Life of Hume, ii. 37). In 1765 he published a pamphlet, ‘Considerations on the Policy of Entails in Great Britain.’ His ‘Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland from the Dissolution of the last Parliament of Charles II until the Sea Battle of La Hogue,’ 3 vols. 1771, illustrated by collections of state papers from Versailles and London, caused some sensation from their revelations as to the motives actuating some of the more eminent statesmen of that time. The work was reprinted in 1790 with a continuation till the capture of the French and Spanish fleets at Vigo. Hume, while admitting the collection to be ‘curious,’ was of opinion that it threw no light into the civil, whatever it might into the ‘biographical and anecdotical history of the times’ (ib. ii. 467). Nichols states that Dalrymple had the use of Burnet's ‘History,’ with manuscript notes by his ancestor Lord Dartmouth (Literary Anecdotes, i. 286), and that he was largely indebted to the ‘Hardwicke Papers,’ which he consulted every day in the Scots College at Paris (ib. ii. 514). Boswell chronicles various conversational criticisms by Johnson of the work. Johnson in 1773 visited Dalrymple at Cranstoun. He was accidentally detained from keeping his appointment at the hour fixed, and amused himself by describing to Boswell the imaginary impatience of his host in language resembling that of the ‘Memoirs.’ According to Boswell, the visit was not a success. Dalrymple occupied his leisure with various chemical experiments of a useful kind. He discovered the art of making soap from herrings, and in 1798 gave instruction at his own expense to a number of people who were inclined to acquire a knowledge of the process (Diary of Henry Erskine, 260–1). Robert Chambers (Life and Works of Burns, Lib. ed. ii. 30) records an anecdote of his resigning Burns's favourite stool to the poet in Smellie's office, when Dalrymple's ‘Essay on the Properties of Coal Tar’ was passing through the press. As a lay member of the assembly of the church of Scotland, Dalrymple spoke in favour of Home, who incurred the censure of the church for having his play of ‘Douglas’ acted in the Edinburgh theatre in 1756 (, Life and Times, 116). In addition to the works already mentioned, Dal-