224
of the kind previously published, and has taken its
place as a standard. In the Student's Dictionary the
etymology is more carefully elaborated than in either
of the two preceding works, while the meanings are
arranged in their natural order of sequence more
logically than in any previous dictionary whatsoever,
the root meaning being regularly placed the first.
In all these three dictionaries illustrative engrav-
ings, inserted in the text, are extensively employed
as a means of elucidating significations not otherwise
easy of comprehension. The Imperial Dictionary
was the first in which this useful element was re-
cognized since the days of Bailey.
The last work produced by Dr. Ogilvie was an
"English Dictionary, Etymological, Pronouncing, and
Explanatory, for the use of Schools," which was
published in 1867. It stands in the same relation
to the Studenfs Dictionary as the Comprehensive
does to the Imperial, being a succinct and successful
abridgment. It was pronounced the most compre-
hensive and intelligible of all school dictionaries.
In all these works, which are so extensively known
and highly prized, it is perhaps unnecessary to add
that there is abundant proof of Dr. Ogilvie's ability,
scholarship, extensive reading, sound judgment, and
patient industry. In the preparation of the two lesser
dictionaries it is just to add that he received much
valuable assistance from Mr. John Wilson, A.M.
From this list the nature of Ogilvie's authorship will
be seen, as well as the variety of his talents and his
unwearied industry, which had thus found an outlet
in the way most suited for it. His productions are
a literary life-task which few would have dared to
face, and which not one litterateur in a thousand
could have done so well. Still, with ardour un-
diminished, he was employed upon a new edition of
his great work the Imperial Dictionary, when death
unexpectedly arrested the brain that had toiled so
unweariedly and the hand that had written so much.
Little remains to be added to this brief memoir of
Ogilvie. He remained in office in Gordon's Hospital
for about thirty years, and in his situation of teacher
acquitted himself so satisfactorily, that about eight
years before his death, when he retired from office,
he was presented by his pupils with a substantial
token of their gratitude. During his long tenure of
office not only his zeal as a teacher, but his quaint
sayings and caustic jokes, had won upon their esteem.
He was a man of very retiring manners, yet he was
distinguished by his social qualities in company,
though sometimes thought misanthropical by those
who did not know him, or were unable to appreciate
his dry humour. With his life of intellectual toil is
also to be taken into account his health, which had
never been vigorous after the accident above re-
ferred to, and the fact that for many years before
his death he was almost blind. In recognition of
the boon he had conferred on the nation at large
by the eminently useful character of his literary la-
bours, an application was made by his friends to
obtain for him a pension on the civil list; but
although the application was made by leading men
of all sects and parties, it did not meet with the
response which might well have been expected.
He was seized with typhoid fever in the midst of his
literary labours, and after two months of suffering
died at Strawberry Bank, Aberdeen, on the 21st of
November, 1867, aged seventy years.
OGILVY, JOHN, a poet and geographer, was
born in the year 1600 at or near Edinburgh. While
he was very young his parents removed with him to
London, where his father, some time after, fell into
debt, and was confined in the King's Bench Prison.
Notwithstanding family misfortunes the subject of
this memoir was able to pick up a slender knowledge
of Latin grammar. What is still more to his praise,
he put himself apprentice to a teacher of dancing,
and with the first money he procured from his master
freed his father from confinement. A sprain which
he got in dancing at a masque put a temporary stop
to his career in this profession and made him slightly
lame ever after, yet he is found to have been retained
by the celebrated Earl of Strafford as teacher of
dancing in his lordship's family, at the same time
that he accompanied the earl to Ireland as one of
his troop of guards. At this time he wrote a humor-
ous piece, entitled the Character of a Trooper.
Under favour of the Earl of Strafford he became in
time Master of Revels, and built a theatre in Dublin.
The civil war, however, which had made shipwreck
of the fortunes of his patron, seems to have also
blasted the prospects of Ogilvy, who, about the time
of its conclusion, arrived in a necessitous condition
in London, and soon after applied himself at Cam-
bridge to remedy the defects of his original education.
In the latter object he succeeded so far as to be able
to publish, in 1649, his translation of Virgil into
English verse; which was followed in 1660 by a
similar version of Homer. In 1651 he produced
the Fables of ALsop Paraphrased in Verse, in a quarto
volume, with recommendatory verses prefixed by Sir
William Davenant, and James Shirley, the dramatic
poet. Four years afterwards he published another
volume of translations from Æsop, with some fables
of his own. Ogilvy was a fertile writer of original
verses. We are fortunately saved the trouble of
making an estimate of his literary character, by
Winstanley, whose panegyric, utterly preclusive of all
rivalry, is as follows:—"John Ogilvy was one who,
from a late initiation into literature, made such pro-
gress as might well style him the prodigy of his time;
sending into the world so many large volumes; his
translations of Homer and Virgil, done to the life,
and with such excellent sculptures; and, what added
great grace to his -works, he printed them all on
special good paper and of a very good letter." Miser-
able as his translation of Homer is allowed to have
been, it was a favourite of Pope in his younger days,
and it is impossible to say to what extent we may
be indebted for the beautiful versions of the latter
writer to the early bias thus given to his taste. It
is also to be mentioned to the honour of Ogilvy, that
the elegance of the typography of his translations
was in a great measure owing to his own exertions
for the improvement of that art. The engravings,
moreover, which he caused to be executed for his
Virgil were of such superior merit for their time, as
to be afterwards employed in illustrating an edition
of the original poet, and subsequently for the decora-
tion of Dryden's translation. At the Restoration
our author was replaced in his situation of master
of the revels in Ireland, and once more erected his
theatre in the capital of that kingdom. His chief
attention, however, seems to have been now devoted
to the composition of an epic poem, entitled the
Carolics, in honour of Charles I., the manuscript of
which was lost in the great fire of London when his
house was burned down. He immediately com-
menced reprinting all his former publications, and
sold them, as he had previously done, by means of
a lottery, whereby he now raised £4210, which en-
abled him to set up a printing-office, for the purpose
of producing geographical works, he having received
the appointment of cosmographer and geographic
printer to the king. In this capacity he projected
a general atlas of the world, of which he only lived
to complete the parts descriptive of China,. Japan,