he had buried the body. Chief-baron Alexander summed up strongly against the probability of the prisoner's story; the jury brought in a verdict of guilty; Corder was sentenced to death, and executed on the Monday following, 11 Aug. 1828. In the interval between his trial and execution Corder made a full confession of his guilt. The amount of public interest aroused by this case was almost unparalleled, there being several extraordinary incidents connected with it. It came out, for instance, that in the period between the murder and its discovery Corder had advertised for a wife, and had married a very respectable schoolmistress, who was one of forty-five respondents. Six columns, or a quarter of its entire space, was given by the ‘Times’ to the report of the trial, which extended over two days. The execution was witnessed, it was estimated, by ten thousand persons, and the rope with which the criminal was hanged is said to have been sold at the rate of a guinea per inch. Macready informed the Rev. J. M. Bellew that at a performance of ‘Macbeth’ at Drury Lane on 11 Aug., when Duncan asked ‘Is execution done on Cawdor?’ a man in the gallery exclaimed ‘Yes, sir; he was hung this morning at Bury.’ Corder's skeleton is still preserved in the Suffolk General Hospital at Bury St. Edmunds, and in the Athenæum of the same town is a history of the murder and trial, by J. Curtis (Kelly, 1828), bound in Corder's skin, which was tanned for the purpose by George Creed, surgeon to the hospital.
[Gent. Mag. August 1828; Annual Register, 1828, pp. 106 et seq.; Times, 8, 9, 10, and 12 Aug. 1828.]
CORDEROY, JEREMY (fl. 1600), divine, was the son of a Wiltshire gentleman. He was sent about 1577 to St. Alban Hall, Oxford, and after taking his degree in arts in due course continued to reside there for the purpose of studying theology. He took holy orders, and in 1590 was appointed a chaplain of Merton College, a post which he occupied for at least thirteen years and possibly longer. He was the author of two small works: ‘A Short Dialogue, wherein is proved that no Man can be Saved without Good Works,’ Oxford, 1604, 12mo, 2nd edit.; and ‘A Warning for Worldlings, or a Comfort to the Godly and a Terror to the Wicked, set forth Dialoguewise between a Scholler and a Trauailer,’ London, 1608, 12mo. In the latter, which is an argument against atheism, the ‘scholler’ would appear to be meant for Corderoy himself, and speaks of his not having been preferred to any living, since, although some had been offered to him, they were not such as he could enter into with a good conscience.
[Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss) ii. 47; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
CORDINER, CHARLES (1746?–1794), writer on antiquities, became episcopalian minister of St. Andrew's Chapel, Banff, in 1769. He was the author of ‘Antiquities and Scenery of the North of Scotland, in a series of Letters to Thomas Pennant,’ London, 1780; and ‘Remarkable Ruins and Romantic Prospects of North Britain, with Ancient Monuments and singular subjects of Natural History,’ 2 vols. London, 1788–95. This work, which is illustrated with engravings by Peter Mazell, was published in parts, but Cordiner did not live to see the publication of the last part. He died at Banff 18 Nov. 1794, aged 48, leaving a widow and eight children. James Cordiner [q. v.] was his son.
[Advertisement to Remarkable Ruins and Romantic Prospects; Scots Magazine, lvi. 735.]
CORDINER, JAMES (1775–1836), author of ‘A Description of Ceylon,’ third son of the Rev. Charles Cordiner [q. v.], episcopal minister of Banff, was born in 1775. He received the first rudiments of education at Banff, and afterwards studied at the University and King's College, Aberdeen, where in an ‘album’ or register of students now in the university library his name appears among those entering the first class in Greek (taught by Professor John Leslie) in the session 1789–1790, and in a roll of ‘Artium Magistri’ of 29 April 1793. In 1797 he was appointed to a charge at the Military Orphan Asylum, Madras, and to do duty as chaplain with the 80th foot, then at Trincomalee, where he remained about twelve months. Thence, at the desire of the governor, Hon. F. North, afterwards earl of Guildford, he proceeded to Colombo to do chaplain's duty with the 51st foot, under orders for that place. He remained in Ceylon as garrison chaplain at Colombo and principal of all the schools in the island, where he was the only church of England clergyman, up to 1804, when he returned home. On his departure he was presented by the civil and military officials at Colombo with a piece of plate of the value of 210 guineas, as a mark of their attachment and esteem.
On 26 May 1807 Cordiner was appointed by the constituent members of the congregation one of the ministers of St. Paul's Episcopal Church (or chapel as it then was called) at Aberdeen, at a stipend of 70l. a year. He appears to have come to them from London on the recommendation of the Rev. Dr. Macleod of St. Anne's, Soho. The important com-
