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Latey that Sir John Robinson, governor of the Tower, had given orders for the pulling down of several meeting-houses in London, Latey, who held the title of the one in Wheeler Street, hurried back and managed to prevent its demolition. In 1671 Latey, in spite of the warning of his patron, Sir William Sawkell (? Salkeld), that he had orders to arrest all who should be present at the Hammersmith meeting on the following Sunday, preached there for an hour, and was accordingly arrested and fined.

In 1679 Latey again went by Bath and Bristol to Cornwall. He visited Thomas Lamplugh [q.v.], bishop of Exeter, afterwards archbishop of York, by whose influence he hoped to moderate the persecution of Friends in the west (letter from the bishop, dated 24 March 1693–4, in Brief Narrative).

Soon after the accession of James II, Latey and Whitehead, who in the preceding reign had always been well received at court, induced the new king, after long attendance at Whitehall, to order the release of fifteen hundred Friends who were at the time in prison, and to remit the prisoners' fines of 20l. a month for non-attendance at church. Subsequent interviews of Latey with James led to the pardoning of other Friends in Bristol and elsewhere, and, in 1686, to the restoration of meeting-houses at the Savoy and at Southwark which had been seized as guard-houses for the king. Latey's house at the Savoy communicated with the meeting-house by a stone passage and flight of steps ( and, London Friends '  Meetings). In December 1687 a third visit paid by Latey and Whitehead to the king was followed by another proclamation of pardon. With William and Mary, Latey's personal influence was exerted no less successfully. On their accession he presented an address, with the result that a hundred quakers, most of whom were imprisoned for refusing the oath of allegiance, were set at liberty. It was owing to Latey and Whitehead's personal and persistent applications at court that parliament passed the act in 1697 by which the quaker affirmation became equivalent to an oath. The act was made perpetual in 1715.

Latey continued to preach at Hammersmith and elsewhere until his death on 15 Nov. 1705. He was buried at Kingston-on-Thames. He married Mary, only daughter of John and Ann Fielder of Kingston, by whom he had eleven children, ten of whom died young.

Latey wrote an address: 'To all you Taylors and Brokers who lyes in Wickedness,' London, 1660. In this he deprecates the deceits practised in his trade, the invention of 'vain fashions and fancies unlike to sober men and women,' and the 'decking of themselves and servants' liveries so that they may be known to serve such and such a master.' Besides this he wrote four small tracts in conjunction with other quakers.

Latey's character was of sterling integrity. His influence with the nobles, bishops, and great men was never used for his own ends. A courtier said of him that no man 'bore a sweeter character at court.' Whitehead calls him 'a sensible man, of good judgment.' An epistle of his, dated from Hammersmith 22 Aug. 1705, shows he was one of the earliest to advocate the employment of women in offices of the society.

[A Brief Narrative of the Life and Death, &c., by Latey's nephew, Richard Hawkins, London, 1707; Beck and Ball's London Friends' Meetings, 1869, pp. 92, 131, 163–8, 220, 240, 250, 262, 312; Boase and Courtney's Bibl. Cornub. i. 306, Suppl. p. 1265; Friends' Library, Philad., 1837, vol. i.; Sewel's History, i. 340; Webb's Fells of Swarthmoor, pp. 207–8, 217, 226, 234; Registers at Devonshire House.]  LATHAM, JAMES (d. 1750?), portrait-painter, was a native of Tipperary. When young he studied art at Antwerp, and about 1725 began to practise portrait-painting in Dublin. Latham was the earliest native artist who gained any repute in Ireland, and from his skill in painting portraits he was called the 'Irish Vandyck.' It is stated that he also worked for a short time in London. Latham's works are seldom met with out of Ireland, but are to be found in many family mansions there. His portraits of Margaret Woffington and of Geminiani the composer attracted much notice. Several of his portraits were engraved, including those of Bishop Berkeley and Sir John Ligonier by John Brooks, Sir Samuel Cooke by John Faber, jun., and Patrick Quin by Andrew Miller. Latham died in Trinity Street, Dublin, about 1750.

[Pasquin's Artists of Ireland; Gilbert's Hist. of Dublin, iii. 329; Walsh's Dublin, ii. 1163; Chaloner Smith's British Mezzotinto Portraits.]  LATHAM, JOHN (1740–1837), ornithologist, was born 27 June 1740 at Eltham, Kent, where his father, John Latham, had long practised as a surgeon, and died 23 Aug. 1788. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School, studied anatomy under Hunter, and practised medicine for many years at Dartford. He soon acquired a considerable fortune, and, retiring from practice in 1796, settled at Romsey, Hampshire. He received the degree of M.D. at Erlangen in 1795.

Throughout his life Latham was an 