disease due to a protozoal parasite akin to that which causes
the redwater fever of cattle.

BLACKWELL, THOMAS (1701-1757), Scottish classical scholar, was born at
Aberdeen on the 4th of August 1701. He took the degree of M.A. at the
Marischal College in 1718. He was appointed professor of Greek in 1723,
and was principal of the institution from 1748 until his death on the
8th of March 1757. In 1735 his first work, _An Inquiry into the Life and
Writings of Homer_, was published anonymously. It was reprinted in 1736,
and followed (in 1747) by _Proofs of the Enquiry into Homer's Life and
Writings_, a translation of the copious notes in foreign languages which
had previously appeared. This work, intended to explain the causes of
the superiority of Homer to all the poets who preceded or followed him,
shows considerable research, and contains many curious and interesting
details; but its want of method made Bentley say that, when he had gone
through half of it, he had forgotten the beginning, and, when he had
finished the reading of it, he had forgotten the whole. Blackwell's next
work (also published anonymously in 1748) was _Letters Concerning
Mythology_. In 1752 he took the degree of doctor of laws, and in the
following year published the first volume of _Memoirs of the Court of
Augustus_; the second volume appeared in 1755, the third in 1764
(prepared for the press, after Blackwell's death, by John Mills). This
work shows considerable originality and erudition, but is even more
unmethodical than his earlier writings and full of unnecessary
digressions. Blackwell has been called the restorer of Greek literature
in the north of Scotland; but his good qualities were somewhat spoiled
by pomposity and affectation, which exposed him to ridicule.

BLACKWOOD, WILLIAM (1776-1834), Scottish publisher, founder of the firm
of William Blackwood & Sons, was born of humble parents at Edinburgh on
the 20th of November 1776. At the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to
a firm of booksellers in Edinburgh, and he followed his calling also in
Glasgow and London for several years. Returning to Edinburgh in 1804, he
opened a shop in South Bridge Street for the sale of old, rare and
curious books. He undertook the Scottish agency for John Murray and
other London publishers, and gradually drifted into publishing on his
own account, removing in 1816 to Princes Street. On the 1st of April
1817 was issued the first number of the _Edin