Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 30.djvu/342

 bers of the committee, taken prisoner and sent to the Tower, to which he was committed on 29 Sept. He declared that he had never ‘been in arms against the state’ (Cal. State Papers, Dom. Ser. 1654, p. 163). Nevertheless, he was excluded from Cromwell's Act of Grace, and, although more than once he petitioned for an examination, which he stated would infallibly establish his innocence, he was retained a prisoner till the Restoration. He was, however, by no means rigorously dealt with while in confinement, being allowed a servant, and occasionally having the liberty of the Tower. On 13 April 1652 he agreed to give orders for the deliverance up of Dunnottar Castle, on condition that a fit place of residence was provided for his wife and family (ib. 1651–2, p. 231). On 21 Dec. 1655 he petitioned for release, stating his willingness to give assurance for his good behaviour (ib. 1655–6, p. 36), and although this was refused, he obtained liberty of one month for the sake of the recovery of his health, the period being also extended more than once. In 1656 the yearly value of his estate was stated at 2,409l. 19s. 6d., and his debts at 58,948l. 14s. 9d. (ib. p. 362). After the Restoration he was sworn a privy councillor and appointed keeper of the privy seal of Scotland. He died in 1661. By his first wife, Lady Elizabeth Seton, daughter of George, earl of Winton, he had a son, William, lord Keith, who died in infancy, and four daughters: Mary, married first to Sir James Hope of Hope, and secondly to Sir Archibald Murray of Blackbarony; Elizabeth, to Robert, second viscount Arbuthnot; Jean, to George, third lord Banff; and Isabel, to Sir Edward Turner, bart. By his second wife, Lady Jean Douglas, eldest daughter of Robert, earl of Morton, he had no issue.

[Spalding's Memorialls of the Trubles (Spalding Club); Gordon's Scots Affairs (Spalding Club); Sir James Balfour's Annals; Robert Baillie's Letters and Journals (Bannatyne Club); Cal. State Papers, Dom. Ser., during the Commonwealth; Peter Buchan's Ancient and Noble House of Keith; Douglas's Scottish Peerage (Wood), ii. 194–5; Gardiner's Hist. vol. ix.]  KEITH-FALCONER, ION GRANT NEVILLE (1856–1887), Arabic scholar, third son of Francis Alexander Keith-Falconer, ninth earl of Kintore, was born at Edinburgh on 5 July 1856. His family were the representatives of the Keiths, earls Marischal of Scotland [see under, first ]. Ion was educated first at home, and afterwards at Cheam, under the Rev. R. S. Tabor, whence he passed to Harrow at the age of thirteen, obtaining an entrance scholarship. He left Harrow in 1873 to read mathematics with the Rev. L. Hensley, vicar of Hitchin, and in the October term of 1874 he commenced residence at Trinity College, Cambridge. After his first year he gave up mathematics, and entered for theological honours, graduating B.A. as first class man and Hebrew prizeman in January 1878. From his schooldays he had taken an interest in evangelistic efforts. At Barnwell, a poor suburb of Cambridge, he worked among the neglected poor. He spent much time and money in similar work in London, especially in connection with Mr. F. N. Charrington at the Great Assembly Hall in the Mile End Road.

Keith-Falconer was specially attracted by the biblical, and pre-eminently the Hebrew, part of his studies. After taking his degree he turned his attention to oriental languages, Hebrew and Syriac, and ultimately Arabic. At these he worked hard, first at Cambridge, where he won the Tyrwhitt University Hebrew scholarship, and obtained a first class in the newly founded Semitic Language Tripos, and afterwards at Leipzig, where he spent the winter of 1880–1. During the spring of 1881 he made the acquaintance of Charles George Gordon [q. v.] in London, a congenial hero, whom he had already learnt to admire. He spent the winter of 1881–2 at Assiout on the Nile, gaining familiarity with modern spoken Arabic. From his undergraduate days Keith-Falconer was an enthusiastic bicyclist. He was elected vice-president of the Cambridge University Bicycle Club before he commenced residence (June 1874), and was president of the London Bicycle Club from May 1877 until he left England. His bicycling successes, from 1874 to 1882, were very numerous. At the two-mile race of 11 May 1878 at Cambridge he defeated the well-known professional champion, John Keen, by five yards, and in the fifty-mile bicycle union amateur championship race at the Crystal Palace, on 9 July 1882, accomplished in 2h 43߱ 583/5″, he beat all previous records. In June 1882 he made a then unprecedented bicycle ride, from Land's End to John o' Groat's House, a journey of 994 miles, in thirteen days less forty-five minutes.

On 4 March 1884 Keith-Falconer was married, at Trinity Church, Cannes, to Gwendolen, daughter of Mr. R. C. L. Bevan of Trent Park, Hertfordshire, and after his wedding trip settled down at Cambridge to work chiefly at Arabic. He was already Hebrew lecturer at Clare College, Cambridge, and had been since 1881 engaged upon a translation from the Syriac version,