Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/67

 a ‘History of the Indian Archipelago,’ a work of sterling value and great interest, in 3 vols. 1820. Having completed this work he returned to India, only, however, to leave it again immediately for the courts of Siam and Cochin China, to which he was accredited as envoy by the Marquis of Hastings. This delicate mission he carried through with complete success, and on the retirement of Sir Stamford Raffles from the government of Singapore in 1823, he was appointed to administer that settlement. In this post he remained for three years, at the end of which time he was transferred as commissioner to Pegu, whence, on the conclusion of peace with Burma, he was despatched by Lord Amherst on a mission to the court of Ava. To say that any envoy could be completely successful in his dealings with so weak and treacherous a monarch as King Hpagyīdoa would be to assert an impossibility; but it is certain that Crawfurd, by his exercise of diplomatic skill, accomplished all that was possible under the conditions. In the course of the following year Crawfurd finally returned to England, and devoted the remainder of his long life to the promotion of studies connected with Indo-China. With characteristic energy he brought out an account of his embassy to the courts of Siam and Cochin-China in 1828, and in the following year a ‘Journal’ of his embassy to the court of Ava (1 vol. 4to), which reached a second edition in 1834 (2 vols. 8vo). Among his other principal works were ‘A Grammar and Dictionary of the Malay Language,’ in 2 vols., 1852, and ‘A Descriptive Dictionary of the Indian Islands and Adjacent Countries,’ 1856; in addition to which he published many valuable papers on ethnological or kindred subjects in various journals. Endowed by nature with a steadfast and affectionate disposition, Crawfurd was surrounded by many friends, who found in him a staunch ally or a courteous though uncompromising opponent in all matters, whether private or public, in which he was in harmony or in disagreement with them. For many years Crawfurd was a constant attendant at the meetings of the Geographical and Ethnological Societies, discussing authoritatively all matters connected with Indo-China. He unsuccessfully contested, as an advanced radical, Glasgow in 1832, Paisley in 1834, Stirling in 1835, and Preston in 1837. Crawfurd died at South Kensington on 11 May 1868, aged 85.

[Gent. Mag. 1868; Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, 1868; Times, 13 May 1868; and the works above cited.]  CRAWFURD or CRAWFORD, THOMAS (d. 1662), author of a ‘History of the University of Edinburgh,’ was educated at St. Leonards College in the university of St. Andrews, where he matriculated in 1618 and graduated M.A. in 1621 (St. Andrews University Rolls). He was an unsuccessful candidate for the professorship of philosophy in the university of Edinburgh in 1625, but on 29 March of the following year he was inducted professor of humanity in the same university. On 26 Feb. 1630 he was appointed by the town council of Edinburgh to the rectorship of the high school. On the occasion of the visit of Charles I to Scotland in 1633 Crawfurd was appointed to assist John Adamson [q. v.], principal of the university, and William Drummond [q. v.] of Hawthornden in devising the pageants and composing the speeches and verses. These were published under the title ‘Εἰσόδια Musarum Edinensium in Caroli Regis ingressu in Scotiam,’ 1633. On 31 Dec. 1640 he returned to the university as public professor of mathematics, and on 3 Jan. following he was in addition made one of the regents of philosophy, the total annual salary granted him for discharging the duties of both chairs being six hundred merks (33l. 6s. 8d.) At the M.A. graduation ceremony Crawfurd introduced the custom of publishing ‘Theses Mathematicæ.’ In a document in the university library he is styled ‘a grammarian and philosopher, likewise profoundly skilled in theology, and a man of the greatest piety and integrity.’ He died 30 March 1662. Crawfurd's ‘History of the University of Edinburgh from 1580 to 1646’ was published in 1808, from the transcript in the university library made by Matthew Crawford from the original, which he states to be then in the possession of Professor Laurence Dundas of the university. He was also the author of ‘Locorum Nominum propriorum Gentilitium vocumque difficiliorum, quæ in Latinis Scotorum Historiis occurrunt, explicatio vernacula,’ which, edited with additions and emendations by C. Irvine, was published in 1665; and ‘Notes and Observations on Mr. George Buchanan's History of Scotland, wherein the difficult passages of it are explained, the chronology in many places rectified, and an account is given of the genealogies of the most considerable families of Scotland,’ 1708, printed from a manuscript in the Advocates' Library. All these works are in the library of the British Museum. In the Advocates' Library there are some manuscript notes of Crawfurd's on ‘Virgil.’

[Histories of the University of Edinburgh by Crawfurd, Dalzell, and Grant; Stevens's History of the High School of Edinburgh; British Museum Catalogue.] 