Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/70

  Report, 1867 pp. 213–14, 1872 p. 224, and his Vital Statistics, 1885, pp. 321–2). Watt's tables were reproduced by John Thomson, Glasgow, 1888 (see, Story of a Great Delusion, 1885, pp. 439–52; , Vaccination Vindicated, 1887, p. 161; , History of Epidemics, 1894, ii. 652–60).

Watt published anonymously at Edinburgh in 1814 a small octavo volume entitled ‘Rules of Life, with Reflections on the Manners and Dispositions of Mankind,’ containing a thousand and one aphorisms. At this period he was leading a very active professional life. He was a member of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London, and contributed papers to that body; he was a founder and first president of the Glasgow Medical Society; and in 1814 was elected president of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons, and physician to the Royal Infirmary of Glasgow. From 1816 to 1817 he was president of the Glasgow Philosophical Society. But the continuous labour of preparing the ‘Bibliotheca’ impaired his health, and he withdrew from practice about the beginning of 1817. He retired to Campvale, a suburb of Glasgow, where he remained until his death. In the compilation of the ‘Bibliotheca,’ which he directed from a sick bed, he was assisted by his sons John and James, [q. v.], and Alexander Whitelaw. A sea voyage to London and a tour in England failed to restore his vigour. ‘Proposals’ for the publication of the work by subscription were circulated; the first part was advertised on 1 Dec. 1818 as ready to be issued in February 1819, but Watt ‘died when only a few of its sheets were printed off’ (Preface, p. v), on 12 March 1819 (Glasgow Herald, 22 March 1819).

He married Marion Burns (d. 1856), who bore him nine children, of whom John, the eldest, died in 1821, and James in 1829, both, like their father, victims to their devotion to bibliography. A daughter is said to have died in the workhouse at Glasgow in 1864 (London Reader, 28 May 1864).

Two portraits of Watt are preserved in the hall of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons at Glasgow, one as a young man; the other, in mature age, is said to be painted by Raeburn. A third portrait, of a date between the two, was exhibited at the Old Glasgow Exhibition in 1894. Watt was a tall and handsome man, and very robust in early life.

A month after Watt's death Dr. [q. v.] and some others issued a circular to assure the subscribers that the manuscript of the ‘Bibliotheca’ had been left by the author in an advanced state of readiness, and that his son would see it through the press. The work was finally completed in 1824, under the title of ‘Bibliotheca Britannica; or a general Index to British and Foreign Literature, by Robert Watt, M.D. In two parts, Authors and Subjects’ (Edinburgh, 4 vols. 4to). It came out in parts, of which Nos. 1 to 4 had the imprint of Glasgow, 1819–20, and 5 to 9 that of Edinburgh, 1821–4. The publication brought nothing but evil fortune to the Watt family. The author and his two sons were killed by it, and the Constables failed before they paid to Mrs. Watt a sum of 2,000l. which had been agreed upon for the compilation. Watt was ‘a practitioner of great sagacity and a philosophical professor of medicine’ (Farr in Reg.-Gen. Report, 1867, p. 214), but it is as a bibliographer that his fame will live. His industry and perseverance under difficulties were remarkable. The plan of a catalogue of authors, followed by an index of subjects, grew from the arrangement of his own medical collection; he enlarged this to include all medical works published in England, then to law and other subjects, and finally to foreign and classical literature. Articles from periodicals and the productions of famous printing presses were also included. In spite of many imperfections and the increase of modern requirements, the book is still one of the handiest tools of the librarian and bibliographer. After the death of Watt's last surviving daughter in 1864 the original manuscript was discovered, consisting of two large sacks full of slips. It is now preserved in the free library at Paisley, arranged in sixty-nine volumes.

