Life of Waller). He left materials for an English edition of Euclid, and his son Charles published the work in folio in 1705. He had a fine mathematical library, of which a catalogue was printed in 1695. He was fond of natural history, and Sir Thomas Browne [q. v.] sent him a great northern diver and an eagle. He kept the eagle, which came from Ireland, in the College of Physicians in Warwick Lane for two years. He retired from active life in 1691, and died on 26 Feb. 1693–4, after a gentle and easy decay. He was buried at Cranford, Middlesex, where there is a monument to him in the parish church erected by his widow.
[Munk's Coll. of Phys. i. 252; Young's Annals of the Barber-Surgeons; Sir Thomas Browne's Works, ed. Wilkin, i. 394, 400; Pepys's Diary; Venn's Register of Caius College, p. 184; Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Oldham's Poems, 1854, p. 180; Oughtred's Clavis Mathematica, ed. 1652.]
SCARDEBURG, ROBERT de (fl. 1341), judge, perhaps a nephew of Robert de Scardeburg, archdeacon of the East Riding and dean of York from 1279 to 1290, derived his name from Scarborough in the North Riding of Yorkshire. He was in a commission of assize for Guernsey, Jersey, Sark, and Alderney in 1331, and the same year was made chief justice of the common pleas in Ireland. On vacating that office in 1334 he was appointed a judge of the king's bench in England. He was in a commission of array for Yorkshire in 1339, and on 6 Sept. exchanged his seat at the king's bench for a judgeship of the common pleas. He returned to the king's bench on 3 Jan. 1341, and continued as judge there until 1344, when he was again appointed chief justice of the common pleas in Ireland, having the custody of the seals of the two benches there, with the fees appertaining. Foss points out that he must be distinguished from Robert de Scorburgh [q. v.], a baron of the exchequer in 1332.
[Foss's Judges, iii. 489–90; Dugdale's Orig. Jurid., Chron. Ser. pp. 41–2; Rot. Orig. Abbrev. ii. 57, 166; Cal. Rot. Pat. pp. 113, 117, 135, 149 (both Record Publ.).]
SCARGILL, WILLIAM PITT (1787–1836), unitarian minister and author, was born in London in 1787. Originally intended for a business life, he attracted the notice of Hugh Worthington, minister at Salters' Hall, under whose advice he studied for the ministry at Wymondley academy. For six months (March to August 1811) he was assistant to James Tayler at High Pavement Chapel, Nottingham. In 1812 he succeeded Thomas Madge as minister of Churchgate Street Chapel, Bury St. Edmunds, and held this charge for twenty years. His ministry was not successful, and he turned to literature as a means of augmenting a narrow income, contributing to periodicals, and producing original tales and sketches. He had been a liberal in politics, but displeased his congregation by becoming a writer for the tory press. Resigning his charge in 1832, he became an adherent of the established church. At the end of 1834 he published anonymously ‘The Autobiography of a Dissenting Minister,’ in which he plays the part of a candid friend to his former co-religionists. The book is often classed with the anonymous ‘Particulars of the Life of a Dissenting Minister’ [1813], by Charles Lloyd [q. v.]; but Lloyd's is a genuine autobiography, Scargill's a romance, though possibly based on his early life and education. He made a precarious living by his pen, yet his sketches are brisk and readable, with a curious vein of paradox. An essay on ‘The Blessings of Biography’ opens with the advice, ‘If you think a man to be a devil, and want to make him an angel, sit down to write a biography of him.’ He was famed as a punster. He died of brain fever at Bury St. Edmunds on 24 Jan. 1836. He married Mary Anne, daughter of Robert Cutting of Chevington, Suffolk, who survived him with two children.
He published:
- ‘An Essay on War,’ 8vo, n. d.
- ‘Essays on Various Subjects,’ 1815, 8vo.
- ‘Moral Discourses,’ 1816, 12mo.
- ‘The Sequel of “Truth,”’ a novel [1826], by Elizabeth Evanshaw, 1827, 12mo.
- ‘Truckleborough Hall,’ 1827, 12mo.
- ‘Blue-Stocking Hall,’ 1827, 12mo.
- ‘Penelope; or Love's Labour Lost,’ 1829, 16mo.
- ‘Rank and Talent,’ 1829, 12mo; reprinted [1856], 8vo.
- ‘Tales of a Briefless Barrister,’ 1829, 12mo.
- ‘Atherton: a Tale of the Last Century,’ 1831, 8vo.
- ‘The Usurer's Daughter,’ 1832, 12mo; reprinted [1853], 8vo.
- ‘The Puritan's Grave,’ 1833, 12mo.
- ‘The Autobiography of a Dissenting Minister,’ 1834, 8vo (anon.); reissued with new title-pages and prefaces as 2nd, 3rd, and 4th editions, all 1835.
- ‘Provincial Sketches,’ 1835, 12mo.
His widow edited some of his contributions to periodicals, many from the ‘Atlas’ newspaper, with the title ‘The Widow's Offering. A selection of Tales and Essays,’ 1837, 8vo, 2 vols. Of this a pirated edition appeared as ‘The English Sketchbook,’ 1856, 8vo. His widow republished the collection with title ‘Essays and Sketches,’ 2nd edit. [1857], 8vo.
