gives a digest, with copious extracts of the literature—especially the English literature—on the subject from the early seventeenth century onward. The book has always been regarded as a standard work, and is referred to in terms of high praise by Arthur Young in his ‘Annals of Agriculture’ (vi. 506): ‘The history of wool, in England, has been admirably written by Smith, with so much accuracy that scarcely any measure relative to that commodity can be stated which has not been fully explained and considered on the most liberal and enlightened principles; not deduced from vague theories, but from the clear page of ample experience.’ More recently m'Culloch has described it as ‘one of the most carefully compiled and valuable works’ ever published with regard to the history of any branch of trade (M'Culloch, Literature of Political Economy, 1845). In addition to this work, and the ‘Answer’ to Temple's ‘Refutation’ referred to above, Smith also wrote ‘A Review of the Manufacturer's Complaint against the Wool-grower,’ 1753, dealing with certain minutiæ of his favourite subject, such as the effect of pitch and tar marks on the wool of sheep.
[Register of Trinity Hall; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Smith's Works—see especially the list of subscribers to the 1747 edition of Memoirs of Wool, from which several important facts may be gleaned. The identification of John Smith, LL.B. of Trinity Hall, with John Smith, LL.B., the author, is a conjectural one, though rendered practically certain by the facts that Professor F. Dickins, LL.D. of Trinity Hall, the master (Dr. Simpson), seven fellows, and the Library of Trinity Hall, are all entered as subscribers to the Memoirs, and that the degree of LL.B. of Cambridge was that specially in vogue among, and was practically limited to, Trinity Hall men at that period.]
SMITH, JOHN (1747–1807), antiquary and Gaelic scholar, was born in 1747 at Croft Brackley in the parish of Glenorchy in Argyllshire. He studied for the ministry at the university of St. Andrews, and was licensed by the presbytery of Kintyre on 28 April 1773. On 18 Oct. 1775 he was ordained as a minister at Tarbert, and in 1777 he was presented by John, duke of Argyll, to the parish of Kilbrandon, as assistant and successor to James Stewart. In 1781 he was translated to the highland church at Campbeltown, and in 1787 received the honorary degree of D.D. from the university of Edinburgh. He died at Campbeltown on 26 June 1807. In 1783 he married Helen M'Dougall, who died on 6 May 1843. By her he had two sons, John and Donald, and three daughters.
Smith was an accomplished Gaelic scholar, and took part in translating the scriptures into Gaelic, besides publishing Gaelic translations of Alleine's ‘Alarm to the Unconverted,’ Joseph Watts's Catechism, and other small religious works. He also revised a metrical version of the Psalms in the same tongue, which was used in the southern highlands. His other works include: 1. ‘Gaelic Antiquities,’ Edinburgh, 1780, 4to; this work contained an English translation of Gaelic poems, some of which purport to be by Ossian [q. v.]; French and Italian versions of Smith's translation were made in 1810 and 1813 respectively. 2. ‘View of the Last Judgement,’ Edinburgh, 1783, 8vo; 4th edit. London, 1847. 3. ‘Sean Dana, or Ancient Poems of Ossian, Orran, Ulann, &c.’ Edinburgh, 1787, 8vo. 4. ‘Summary View and Explanation of the Writings of the Prophets,’ Edinburgh, 1787, 12mo; ed. by Peter Hall, London, 1835, 12mo. 5. ‘Life of St. Columba, from the Latin of Cummin and Adamnan,’ Edinburgh, 1798, 4to. 6. ‘General View of the Agriculture of the county of Argyll,’ 1798, 8vo. 8. ‘An Affectionate Address to the Middling and Lower Classes on the present Alarming Crisis,’ Edinburgh, 1798, 12mo. 9. ‘Lectures on the Nature and End of the Sacred Office,’ Glasgow, 1808, 8vo. He also edited Robert Lowth's ‘Isaiah,’ London, 1791, 12mo, and wrote the article on the parish of Campbeltown for Sinclair's ‘Statistical Account.’
[Scott's Fasti Eccles. Scot. III. i. 36, 69; Edinburgh Graduates, p. 246; New Statistical Account, VII. ii. 93.]
SMITH, JOHN (1790–1824), missionary, son of a soldier killed in battle in Egypt, was born on 27 June 1790 at Rothwell, near Kettering in Northamptonshire. All his education he derived from occasional attendance at a Sunday school. At the age of fourteen he entered the service of a biscuit-maker in London named Blunden. His master dying in 1806, Davies, his successor, took him as an apprentice, and assisted him to improve his education. Under the influence of the Rev. John Stevens he became earnest in matters of religion and zealous for study. He was accepted by the London Missionary Society, and in December 1816 was ordained as successor to John Wray at Le Resouvenir, near Demerara or Georgetown, in British Guiana. He arrived at Demerara on 23 Feb. 1817, and in his first interview with the governor, Major-general John Murray, the latter threatened that if he taught any negro-slave to read he should be banished. Notwithstanding the undisguised hostility of
