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SIB "Introductio ad Historiam Rerum a Romanis Gestarum, in eâ Borealis Britanniæ parte, quæ ultra murum Picticum est," folio, Edinburgh, 1711. He also wrote "Scotia Illustrata, sive Prodromus Historiæ Naturalis Scotiæ," folio, Edinburgh, 1684; "Phalainologia nova, sive Observationes de rarioribus quibusdam Balænis in Scotiæ littus nuper ejectis," 4to, Edinburgh, 1692; and "Auctarium Musei Balfouriani," 8vo, Edinburgh, 1697. Sir Robert vacillated in his religious opinions. From scepticism he was converted to the Roman catholic faith, which he afterwards renounced. He died about 1712.—F. C. W.  SIBBES,, a famous puritan divine, was born at Tostock in Suffolk in 1577. He was educated at the free school of Bury St. Edmund's, and entered St. John's college, Cambridge, as a subsizar in 1595, passed B.A. in 1598, was admitted a fellow in 1601, and elected college preacher in 1609. But in 1615, through the influence of Laud, he was "outed" from his position in the university. In the following year, however, he was chosen preacher of Gray's Inn, London. In 1626 he was elected master of St. Catherine hall, Cambridge, and he held the mastership till his death. In 1627 Sibbes passed D.D., and in 1633 he was presented by King Charles I. to the vicarage of Trinity church, Cambridge. After a life of earnest evangelical labour, he died on the 5th of July, 1635. Sibbes was a man of gentle, patient, and loving soul. He was not of the highest order of divines in intellectual power or in erudition, but the unction of his sermons and his own "heavenly" character endeared him to the best men of his times. His numerous works breathe a saintly spirit; and his "Bruised Reed," and his "Saint's Conflict," were left as precious legacies to his son and daughter by Izaac Walton. Many of his treatises have been frequently reprinted, and his works were published in 1812 in three volumes octavo. But this edition, which is very defective, and indeed all others, are now superseded by a new, full, and correct edition in course of publication, and edited by the Rev. A. B. Grosart of Kinross.—J. E.  SIBTHORP,, a distinguished botanist, was born at Oxford, 28th October, 1758, and died at Bath, 8th February, 1796, in the thirty-eighth year of his age. He was the youngest son of Dr. Humphrey Sibthorp, professor of botany at Oxford. Young Sibthorp prosecuted his studies at the university of his native town, and took the degree of B.A. in 1780. He also took the degree of M.B. He obtained a Radcliffe travelling fellowship. For some time he prosecuted his medical studies at Edinburgh, and then went to France and Switzerland. On his return to Oxford in 1784 he took the degree of M.D., and on the resignation of his father he was chosen professor of botany. After spending a short time at Göttingen, he proceeded to Greece with M. Bauer, the artist. He visited various parts of that country, as well as Crete, Constantinople, Cyprus, and Asia Minor, and returned to England at the end of 1787. In 1794 he again visited Greece, with the view of completing the examination of its flora. He had a stormy voyage, and exposure brought on consumption, of which he died. He was an F.R.S., a fellow of the Linnæan Society, and regius professor of botany. He published a flora of Oxford in 1794, and in his will he left a sum of £200 a year for the purpose of publishing his "Flora Græca," in ten folio volumes, with one hundred plates in each, drawn by Bauer. A genus of plants was named Sibthorpia after his father, who was the successor of Dillenius.—J. H. B.  SICARD,, was born on the 20th of September, 1742, at Fousseret near Toulouse. He completed his preparatory studies in the city of his birth, and then entered into holy orders. He gave himself from this period to the instruction of persons born deaf and dumb. The archbishop of Bordeaux wished to establish an institution for this purpose, and Sicard, after going to Paris and studying the method of the Abbé de l'Epée, was in 1786 placed at the head of the new establishment. His success was amazing; his tact was great, and his heart was in his work. His superior honoured him by promotion. In 1789 he was chosen successor to the Abbé' de l'Epée, and removed to Paris. In August, 1791, during the Reign of Terror, he fell under suspicion of being a royalist, and was arrested and imprisoned, being transferred in September to the Abbaye, where during a brief period he was in constant risk of being massacred in those scenes of indiscriminate carnage. By the interposition of some friends in the assembly his life was saved. He suffered no further molestation, and when, after the fall of Robespierre, the normal school was founded in 1795, he was appointed professor of grammar, and made a member of the Institute. As one of the conductors of a periodical work, Annales religieuses, politiques et litteraires, he was condemned by the directory, and sentenced to exile. After his return he recommenced his philanthropic labours with all his former energy. He set up a printing-press in the institution, where his works were printed by his pupils. He made various improvements on previous modes of instruction, and advanced to still higher forms and themes of communication with his deaf mutes. But he seems to have been neglected in his old days; his appeals to Bonaparte were unheeded, and he suffered the results of his generous improvidence. After the Restoration some honours were conferred upon him—he was made a knight of the legion of honour and of the order of St. Michael. He received attentions from various foreign princes who came to Paris in 1814-15. In the last of those years he visited England, and was welcomed with honour. Sicard died 10th May, 1822. He was the author of various works—"Théorie des Signes;" "Cours d'Instruction d'un sourd muet de Naisance;" "Elemens de Grammaire Générale appliquée à la Langue Française." Sicard was an ingenious and practical educationist in one of the most difficult spheres of tuition, and the first to instruct his pupils in ideas as well as objects, and thus awaken their mental capabilities. The results may be witnessed in the schools for the deaf and dumb throughout the kingdom.—J. E.  SICKINGEN,, a celebrated German patriot and politician, was born at the castle of Sickingen, grand-duchy of Baden, 1st March, 1481. He entered the army at an early age. To protect the weak, to punish the wrong-doers, and to defend the liberties of the nobility as well as the citizens against the despotism of princes and the arrogance of the clergy, was his chief pursuit. He was at the same time a powerful patron of the Reformation and of liberal-minded scholars, such as Reuchlin and Ulrich von Hutten. He successively made war against the duke of Lorraine, the elector of Mayence, the king of France, and the elector of Treves. In the siege of his castle of Landstuhl he was mortally wounded, and died 7th May, 1523.—(See Life by Munch, Stuttgart, 1827-28, 2 vols.)—K. E.  SIDDONS,, the greatest of English tragic actresses, was born on the 5th of July, 1755, at Brecon, South Wales. She was the sister of John Philip and of Charles Kemble (q.v.), and the eldest of the family. As already stated in the memoir of the Kembles, her father Roger Kemble was a provincial manager and a Roman catholic; but her mother being a protestant, it had been agreed that the sons only should be brought up in the faith of the father. At ten, as she told her friend and biographer, the poet Campbell, she used to pore over Paradise Lost; at thirteen she sang very tolerably; and from an early age she was accustomed to figure on the stage as a member of her father's troupe. It included a handsome young actor of the name of Siddons, who fell in love with his employer's pretty daughter, and after considerable opposition from her parents, they were married at Coventry on the 26th of November, 1773. While she was playing at Cheltenham after her marriage, her personation of Belvidera strongly impressed some aristocratic visitors of that fashionable watering-place, and in this way she was made known to Garrick, who gave her a London engagement. When little more than twenty she made her first appearance in London at Drury Lane, on the 29th of December, 1775, in the character of Portia. She was nervous and timid, and the chief impression which she produced was that she was very pretty. Garrick did not re-engage her. Seven years afterwards, however, with a further experience and a high provincial reputation, she reappeared at Drury Lane on the 10th of October, 1782, playing Isabella in the Fatal Marriage, when she at once took possession of the tragic throne. Her subsequent theatrical career was an almost uninterrupted series of triumphs. She bade a formal farewell to the stage on the 29th of June, 1812, but her latest public appearance was in the character of Lady Randolph, at Covent Garden, on the 9th of June, 1818. Mrs. Siddons' style of acting was the grandiose and classical. Her Lady Macbeth was her greatest personation. Her private character was irreproachable, and she was a welcome guest in the best society. Campbell calls her "a great simple being." She died of erysipelas on the 8th of June, 1831, at her house in Baker Street, London.—F. E.  SIDMOUTH. See.  SIDNEY,, an illustrious English patriot, was the <section end="244Zcontin" />