re
ambitious arena of the House of Commons, being elected member for
Hastings in 1796. In 1801 he proceeded on a special mission to the Court
of Copenhagen; but the Danish Government, overawed by France and Russia,
refused to receive an English ambassador. Soon after his return he
became joint secretary of the treasury, which office he held until 1804,
when the Addington ministry resigned. In 1805, he was appointed Chief
Secretary for Ireland; in 1806, he resumed his former duties at the
treasury; and, in 1812, on the formation of the Liverpool
administration, he obtained the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer,
for which he was peculiarly fitted by the bent and information of his
mind. So far back as 1796, he had addressed a series of pamphlets to Mr.
Pitt, on the conduct of the bank directors; and in 1796 he had published
an inquiry into the state of the finances, in answer to a very popular
production, by a Mr. Morgan, on the national debt. The death of Lord
Londonderry, in 1822, led to a reconstruction of the ministry; and Mr.
Vansittart was offered a peerage and the Chancellorship of the Duchy of
Lancaster, with a seat in the cabinet, on condition that he quitted the
Exchequer. This arrangement was carried out in the month of January
following. At length, in 1828, he retired from public life, and since
that period resided in comparative retirement, at Footscray, near
Bexley, in Kent. Lord Bexley was F.R.S., D.C.L., and F.S.A.

* * * * *

JOHN PYE SMITH, D.D., F.R.S., one of the most eminent scholars and
theological writers of the time, died at Guilford, near Leeds, in
England, on the fifth of February, at the advanced age of
seventy-six--having been born at Sheffield in 1775. His father was a
bookseller, and it was intended to bring him up to the same business,
but his early displays of talent, and his love of learning induced his
father to send him to Rotherham College, where he greatly distinguished
himself, and upon the completion of his terms of study became a
classical tutor. In 1801--at the early age of twenty-five--he became
theological tutor and principal of Homerton College, the oldest of the
institutions for training ministers among the Independents. The duties
of that responsible post he filled with untiring devotedness and the
highest efficiency for the long space of fifty years. A theological
professorship is naturally combined with ministerial duties; and in two
or t