the grand jury, which do not exceed fix, exhibit a veneration for the laws of his country; a just and spirited encomium on the trial by jury, as the greatest and most invaluable right derived from them to the fubject; a detestation of crimes, combined with mercy towards the offender; occafional elucidations of the law; and the strongest feelings of humanity and benevolence. By his knowledge of the Sanscrit and Arabic, he was emi、 nently qualified to promote the adminiftration of justice in the Supreme Court, by detecting mifrepresentations of the Hindu or Mohammedan laws, and by correcting impofitions in the form of administering oaths to the followers of Brahma and Mohammed. If no other benefit had refulted from his ftudy of these languages, than the compilation of the digeft, and the translation of Menu and of two Mohammedan law-tracts, this application of his talents to promote objects of the first importance to India and Europe, would have entitled him to the acknowledgments of both countries. Of his ftudies in

general it may be obferved, that the end which he had always in view, was practical utility; that knowledge was not accumulated by him, as a fource of mere intellectual recreation, or to gratify an idle curiofity, or for the idler purpose of oftentatiously displaying his acquifitions; to render himself useful to his country and mankind, and to promote the prosperity of both, were the primary and permanent motives of his indefatigable exertions in the pursuit of knowledge.

The inflexible integrity with which he discharged the folemn duty of this ftation, will long be remembered in Calcutta, both by Europeans and natives. So cautious was he to guard the independence of his character from any poffibility of violation or imputation, that no folicitation could prevail upon him, to use his perfonal influence with the members of administration in India, to advance the private interests of friends whom he esteemed, and which he would have been happy to promote. He knew the dignity, and felt the importance, of his office: and,

convinced that none could afford him more ample scope for exerting his talents to the benefit of mankind, his ambition never extended beyond it. No circumftance occafioned his death to be more lamented by the public, than the loss of his abilities as judge, of which they had had the experience of eleven years.

When we confider the time required for the study of the law as a profeffion, and that portion of it, which was devoted by Sir William Jones to the discharge of his duties as judge and magiftrate in India, it must appear aftonishing, that he fhould have found leifure for the acquifition of his numerous attainments in science and literature, and for completing the voluminous works which have been given to the public. On this fubject I shall, I truft, be excused for using, as I may find convenient, my own language in a difcourfe which I addreffed to the Afiatic fociety a few days after his decease.

There were in truth few fciences in which he had not acquired confiderable proficiency;

in moft, his knowledge was profound. The theory of music was familiar to him, nor had he neglected to render himself acquainted with the interesting discoveries lately made in chemistry; and I have heard him affert, that his admiration of the ftructure of the human frame, induced him to attend for a season, to a courfe of anatomical lectures delivered by his friend, the celebrated Hunter. Of his skill in mathematics I am fo far qualified to speak, that he frequently perufed and folved the problems in the Principia.

His laft and favourite purfuit was the study of botany. It conftituted the principal amusement of his leisure hours. In the arrangement of Linnæus, he discovered fyftem, truth, and fcience, which never failed to captivate and engage his attention; and from the proofs which he has exhibited of his progress in botany, we may conclude, if he had lived, that he would have extended the discoveries in that fcience *. From two

Besides occasional botanical information, we have in

of the effays mentioned in the note, I shall transcribe two fhort extracts which mark his " If

judgment and delicacy of fentiment.

66

botany could be defcribed by metaphors "drawn from the fcience itself, we may juft

ly pronounce a minute acquaintance with plants, their claffes, orders, kinds, and Species, to be its flowers, which can only

produce fruit by an application of that "knowledge to the purposes of life, parti"cularly to diet by which diseases may be "avoided, and to medicine by which they may "be remedied." On the indelicacy of the

Linnæan definitions, he observes, “Hence "it is that no well-born and well-educated

1

"woman can be advised to amufe herself "with botany, as it is now explained, though

a more elegant and delightful study, or one

the works of Sir William Jones, vol. v. p. i, a little tract intitled, The Design of a Treatise on the Plants of India, p. 55; A Catalogue of 420 Indian Plants, comprehending their Sanscrit and as many of the Linnæan generic names, as could with any degree of precision be ascertained; and, p. 62, Botanical Observations on seventy select Indian Plants, which last was a posthumous publication.