upon which Lord Auckland acted, and it is not to his discredit that, when his advice was overruled, he zealously exerted himself to give effect to the policy adopted by his official superiors. For a time much injustice was done to him, and also to Dost Mahomed, by the mutilated form in which the official correspondence regarding the first Afghan war was in the first instance presented to parliament, passages being omitted which showed that Dost Mahomed's conduct was by no means so unreasonable or unfriendly to the British as it was made to appear, and that Burnes had advocated an alliance with Dost Mahomed. Sir Henry Durand, in an article in the ‘Calcutta Review,’ describes Burnes as ‘a man hated as the treacherous cause of the invasion and occupation of the country.’ It is not improbable that this was the Afghan feeling, but it does not appear that it was shared by Dost Mahomed; nor was there anything in the facts of the case to support a charge of treachery against Burnes.
[Kaye's Lives of Indian Officers, 1869; Burnes's Travels into Bokhára, &c., 2nd edition, 1839; Marshman's History of India, vol. iii. 1867; Kaye's History of the War in Afghanistan, 3rd edition, 1874; Calcutta Review, vol. ii.]
BURNES, JAMES (1801–1862), physician-general of Bombay, a kinsman of the poet Burns, was born at Montrose, where his father, James Burnes, was provost, on 12 Feb. 1801, and after being trained for the medical profession at Edinburgh University and Guy's and St. Thomas's hospitals, London, arrived at Bombay, in company with his brother Alexander [see Burnes, Sir Alexander], in 1821. He filled various minor posts in the Indian medical service, and was successful in the open competition for the office of surgeon to the residency of Cutch. He accompanied, as a volunteer, the field force which, in 1825, expelled the Sindians who had devastated Cutch, and had forced the British brigade to retire upon Bhúj. The amírs of Sind then invited him to visit them as ‘the most skilful of physicians and their best friend, and the cementer of the bonds of amity between the two governments,’ and on his return he was complimented by the government on the zeal and ability he had displayed at Cutch and Hyderabad. His narrative of his visit to Sind, sent in as an official report to the resident at Cutch, is still the best account we possess of the country, and was a valuable contribution to the geography of India. It was republished in book form, with the title ‘Narrative of a Visit to Scinde,’ in 1830. During a visit to England on sick leave in 1834 Burnes was made an LL.D. of Glasgow University and a fellow of the Royal Society, and received the knighthood of the Guelphic order from William IV. On his return to India in 1837 he was at once appointed garrison surgeon of Bombay, afterwards secretary of the medical board, superintending surgeon, and finally physician-general. He was also a member of the board of education, and took an active interest in the diffusion of medical training among the natives. Impaired health compelled him to resign in 1849, after twenty-eight years' service; and his departure was commemorated at Bombay by the foundation of four medals to be competed for at the Grant Medical School, Bombay, the Montrose Academy, and the boys' and girls' schools at Byculla. Burnes was a zealous freemason, and held the office of grand master for Western India, in which capacity he opened a lodge for natives at Bombay in 1844. Besides his ‘Narrative’ he wrote a ‘Sketch of the History of Cutch’ (lithographed for private circulation, 1829), and a short history of the Knights Templars. On his return home he occupied himself with the affairs of his county, where he was a justice of the peace; removed to London, and died on 19 Sept. 1862. He married Esther Pryce in June 1862.
[Laurie's Memoir in Burnes's Notes on his Name and Family, Edinburgh, printed for private circulation, 1851.]
BURNESTON or BORASTON, SIMON (fl. 1338), divine, presumably a native of Burniston, near Scarborough, was a doctor of divinity of Cambridge and a member of the Dominican monastery at Oxford. The latter fact has led Tanner (Bibl. Brit. p. 143) to suspect that Burneston's ascription to Cambridge is an error. Burneston was distinguished as a preacher, and was chosen to be provincial of his order for England. His works consist of a ‘Tractatus de Mutabilitate Mundi’ (dated 1337 in a manuscript of Lincoln College, Oxford, lxxxi. f. 29, Coxe's Catal. p. 42); ‘Tractatus de Unitate et Ordine ecclesiasticæ Potestatis’ (written in the Dominican house at Oxford in 1338); ‘Opus alphabeticum de Verbis prædicabilibus, cum Concordantia quorundam Doctorum,’ which is identical with the ‘Distinctiones’ mentioned by Tanner (l.c.) as a separate work; ‘Compilatio de Ordine iudiciario,’ and some collections of sermons. Other writings attributed to Burneston, namely the ‘Themata dominicalia’ (unless these be identical with his sermons) and a treatise, ‘De postulandis Suffragiis,’ are not known to be extant.
