Tunes of our Church by W. S.,’ London, 1643, 12mo; 2nd edit. 1652.
[Chalmers's Biographical Dict. 1816; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, iii. 227; Granger's Biogr. Hist. i. 362; Lowndes's Bibliogr. Manual, ed. Bohn, v. 2412; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. xi. 386, 3rd ser. iii. 255; Gray's Index to Hazlitt.]
SLAUGHTER, EDWARD (1655–1729), hebraist, born in Herefordshire in 1655, entered the Society of Jesus on 7 Sept. 1673, and was ordained priest on 28 March 1682, in which year he was sent to the mission of Swaffham, Norfolk. He was appointed to teach Hebrew in the college of the English jesuits at Liège about 1677; he subsequently taught mathematics there, and eventually became professor of theology. He was professed of the four vows on 2 Feb. 1690–1, and was declared rector of the college at Liège in 1701. When John Churchill, earl (and subsequently duke) of Marlborough, took the citadel and city of Liège in 1702, he paid the rector a visit, and showed him special courtesy. Slaughter afterwards became rector of the jesuit colleges at St. Omer and Ghent. He passed the last seven years of his life, sine officio, at Liège, where he died on 20 Jan. 1728–9.
His works are: 1. ‘Conclusiones ex universa theologia propugnandæ in Collegio Anglicano Societatis Jesu Leodii,’ Liège, 1696, 4to. 2. ‘Grammatica Hebraica brevi et nova methodo concinnata, qua cito, facile, solide, linguæ sanctæ rudimenta addisci possunt,’ Amsterdam, 1699, 12mo; Rome, 1705, 1760, 1823, 1834, 1851, 1861, 8vo; Paris, 1857 and 1866 (revised and corrected by J. J. L. Bargès, professor of Hebrew at the Sorbonne).
[Foley's Records, v. 595, vii. 715; De Backer's Bibl. des Écrivains de la Compagnie de Jésus, 1876, iii. 830; Oliver's Jesuit Collections, p. 192; Paquot's Hist. Littéraire des Pays-Bas, 1765, iii. 291.]
SLAUGHTER, STEPHEN (d. 1765), portrait-painter, was a native of Ireland, and worked there for a time, subsequently coming to London, where he took a good position in the profession. He succeeded the younger Walton as keeper and surveyor of the king's pictures, and held that post until his death, which took place at Kensington on 15 May 1765. Slaughter's works are fairly well painted, with a good deal of colour in the faces and heavy shadows. His portrait of Sir Hans Sloane (1736), formerly in the British Museum, is now in the National Portrait Gallery; those of the Hon. John and Lady Georgiana Spencer (1737) are at Blenheim; and that of John Hoadly, archbishop of Armagh (1744), is in the National Gallery of Ireland, which also possesses his group of five members of the Hell-Fire Club. Of Slaughter's portraits of Nathaniel Kane, lord mayor of Dublin in 1734, and General Richard St. George, mezzotints by J. Brooks and M. Ford were published in Dublin. Slaughter executed in chiaroscuro in 1733 an imitation of a pen drawing by Parmigiano, then in the possession of Dr. Hickman.
[Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting (Dallaway and Wornum); Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Cat. of National Gallery of Ireland.]
SLEATH, JOHN (1767–1847), high master of St. Paul's school, son of William and Millicent Sleath, was born probably at Osgathorpe, Leicestershire, where he was baptised on 19 June 1767 (Parish Register). He entered Rugby school in 1776, his parents being then described as of Leighton, near Kimbolton, Bedfordshire. In 1784 he went up as a Rugby exhibitioner to Lincoln College, Oxford, but in 1785 was elected to a scholarship at Wadham. He was Hody exhibitioner in 1786–7, and in 1787, before taking his degree, was appointed to an assistant-mastership at Rugby. Among his pupils there was Walter Savage Landor, who writes with affectionate remembrance of ‘the elegant and generous Doctor John Sleath at Rugby’ (Works, ed. 1876, iv. 400 n.). He graduated B.A. in 1789, M.A. in 1793, B.D. and D.D. in 1814. He was elected F.S.A. 9 March 1815, and F.R.S. 23 March 1820.
On 16 June 1814 Sleath was appointed high master of St. Paul's, and held the office till 10 Oct. 1837. The honours gained at the universities by his pupils from the school were remarkable. Dr. Jowett, master of Balliol College, Oxford, was one of his scholars, and he could claim nine fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge.
Sleath was made prebendary of Rugmere in St. Paul's Cathedral, 5 July 1822; chaplain in ordinary to the king in 1825; subdean of the Chapel Royal, St. James's, 28 June 1833; rector of Thornby, Northamptonshire, in 1841. He died 30 April 1847, and was buried in the crypt of St. Paul's. He was married, but left no family. A marble bust of him, by W. Behnes, was executed in 1841. His elder brother, W. Boultby Sleath, was headmaster of Repton school from 1800 to 1832.
[Registers of Osgathorpe Church, the Chapel Royal, St. James's, and the Royal Society; Gardiner's Registers of Wadham College, ii.
