Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 55.djvu/384

 was also secretary of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club from 1858 until his death.

Tate chiefly interested himself in the archæology and natural history of his town and district, and especially distinguished himself by his geological explorations. His ‘History of Alnwick,’ which appeared in parts between 1865 and 1869, was his chief publication. It included the history of Alnwick Castle and the Percy family, with accounts of old customs, sports, public movements, local nomenclature, the botany, zoology, and geology of the district, and biographies of the notabilities of the town. On the completion of its publication a banquet was given in Tate's honour in the town-hall, 21 May 1869, and he was presented with a valuable testimonial. He also published in 1865 ‘Sculptured Rocks of Northumberland and Eastern Borders.’ He examined other ancient British remains, and wrote papers on them for the proceedings of the Berwickshire Naturalists' Club. Of these the most important were ‘The old Celtic Town of Greaves Ash’ and ‘The Hut-circles and Forts on Yevering Bell.’ Besides monographs on the Farne Islands, Dunstanborough Castle, Long Houghton church, and Harbottle Castle, he prepared accounts of the Cheviot Hills, St. Cuthbert's beads, porpoises, the bulk and colour of the hair and eyes of the Northumbrians, the orange-legged hobby, and the common squirrel.

His account of his journey along the Roman wall, with his examination of its geology, was published as a part of John Collingwood Bruce's work entitled ‘The Roman Wall’ (2nd edit. 1853). His account of the fossil flora of the eastern border was incorporated in George Johnston's work, ‘The Natural History of the Eastern Borders,’ 1854; and that of the geology of Northumberland in Baker and Tate's ‘New Flora of Northumberland and Durham.’ He was the first to record marks of ice action on rocks in Northumberland.

Tate formed a museum which was especially rich in fossils collected in the course of his investigations in the carboniferous and mountain limestone formations, and his name has been given to three species by Professor T. Rupert Jones—Estheria striata var. Tateana, Candona Tateana, and Beyrichia Tatei.

He died on 7 June 1871, and was buried on the 9th in Alnwick churchyard, on the south side of the church. He married, in 1832, Ann Horsley, also of Alnwick, who died on 21 Dec. 1847. Two sons and three daughters survived him.



TATE, JAMES (1771–1843), schoolmaster and author, born at Richmond in Yorkshire on 11 June 1771, was only son of James Tate, a native of Berwick, by his wife, Mary Compton, of Swaledale in Yorkshire. James was educated at Richmond school from 1780 to 1789, and on 2 Nov. 1789 was admitted sizar of Sidney-Sussex College, Cambridge; he matriculated 11 Nov. 1790, graduated B.A. 1794 and M.A. 1797. He was elected a fellow of his college in March 1795, and was engaged in tutorial work until his appointment as master of Richmond school, 11 Feb. 1796. The attainment of that position is said to have been his main ambition when a child. On 8 Oct. 1808 he was also appointed rector of Marske in Yorkshire. He remained at Richmond till January 1833, and during this period proved a remarkably successful schoolmaster. He was an admirable classical scholar. Surtees and Tate on the occasion of their first meeting (, Memoir of Surtees, 1852, p. 128) spent the night in quoting the ‘Iliad,’ and Sydney Smith, who by accident travelled in the same coach as the master of Richmond, declared to a friend that he had fallen in with ‘a man dripping with Greek.’

The most important of Tate's works, which were mainly of a scholastic order, was ‘Horatius Restitutus,’ published in 1832, an attempt to arrange the books of Horace in chronological order. The work is preceded by a life of Horace, and the chronological method adopted is based on Bentley's theory. It was well received (Quart. Rev. lxii. 287; Edinb. Rev. October 1850), and went through three editions.

In January 1833 Tate was appointed by Lord Grey canon of St. Paul's, and by virtue of his canonry became incumbent of the parish church of Edmonton. He died 2 Sept. 1843, and was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral. He married, 29 Sept. 1796, Margaret, daughter of Fielding Wallis, from the north of Ireland; by her he had a son James, who succeeded him as master of Richmond.

Half of the present grammar school at Richmond was built as a Tate memorial, and opened in 1850. There is a bust of Tate in plaster in the scientific library at Richmond, and his portrait by Pickersgill, which was engraved by Cousins, is in the possession of the Rev. James Tate, rector of Bletsoe, Bedford.

Besides the work mentioned he wrote or edited:
 * 1) Andrew Dalzel's ‘Ἀνάλεκτα