Barbara, who married Colonel John Balfour; and Anne, who became the second wife of John, fourth lord Balmerino. Their son Arthur Elphinstone, sixth lord Balmerino [q. v.], was engaged in a biography of the archbishop, his grandfather, and had collected valuable materials for the purpose, including letters from King James and King William, the bishops of England and Ireland, and many other leading men of the time; but his death on Tower Hill in 1746 put an end to the undertaking.
Ross's publications were: 1. ‘The Certainty of Death and Judgment: a Funeral Sermon,’ Glasgow, 1673. 2. ‘A Sermon before the Privy Council,’ Glasgow, 1684. A number of his letters appear in ‘Letters of Scottish Prelates,’ edited by W. Nelson Clarke, Edinburgh, 1848.
[Burnet's Hist. of his own Time; Wodrow's History; Keith's Scottish Bishops; Lyon's St. Andrews; Grub's History; Scott's Fasti; Campbell's Balmerino; Macpherson's Monymusk.]
ROSS, DAVID (1728–1790), actor, the son of a writer to the signet in Edinburgh, who settled in London in 1722 as a solicitor of appeals, was born in London on 1 May 1728. He was educated at Westminster School, and some indiscretion committed there when he was thirteen years old lost him the affection, never regained, of his father, who, in his will, left instructions to Elizabeth Ross to pay her brother annually, on his birthday, the sum of 1s. ‘to put him in mind of his misfortune he had to be born.’ Against this will Ross appealed in 1769, and, after carrying the case to the House of Lords, obtained near 6,000l. How he lived after his father's abandonment is not known. He played Clerimont in the ‘Miser’ at Smock Alley Theatre, Dublin, on 8 May 1749, and remained there two seasons longer. Engaged with Mossop by Garrick, he made his first appearance at Drury Lane on 3 Oct. 1751 as Young Bevil in the ‘Conscious Lovers.’ The part suited him: ‘His person was pleasing, and his address easy, his manner of speaking natural, his action well adapted to the gravity as well as grace of the character. He was approved by a polite and distinguishing audience, who seemed to congratulate themselves on seeing an actor whom they imagined capable of restoring to the stage the long-lost character of the real fine gentleman’ (Davies, Life of Garrick, i. 195, ed. 1808). He sprang into immediate favour, and is said, with Mossop, to have inspired some jealousy in Garrick [see Mossop, Henry]. Castalio in the ‘Orphan,’ Carlos in the ‘Revenge,’ Shore in ‘Jane Shore,’ Dumont, Lord Townly in the ‘Provoked Husband,’ Altamont in the ‘Fair Penitent,’ Young Knowell in ‘Every Man in his Humour,’ George Barnwell in the ‘London Merchant,’ Palamede in the ‘Comical Lovers,’ Romeo, and Essex in the ‘Unhappy Favourite’ were played in the first season by Ross, who, on 31 March 1752, recited a eulogium of Shakespeare by Dryden, concluding with Milton's ‘Epitaph to the Memory of Shakespeare.’ Buckingham in ‘Henry VIII,’ Banquo, First Spirit in ‘Comus,’ Constant in the ‘Provoked Wife,’ and Charles in the ‘Nonjuror’ were given in the following season. On 10 Oct. 1753 he appeared as Oroonoko, playing subsequently Moneses in ‘Tamerlane’ and Dorimant in the ‘Man of the Mode.’ On 25 Feb. 1754 he was the original Icilius in Crisp's tragedy of ‘Virginia.’ In the season of 1754–5 he added to his repertory Carlos in ‘Love makes a Man,’ Pyrrhus in the ‘Distressed Mother,’ Hippolytus in ‘Phædra and Hippolytus,’ Osman in ‘Zara,’ Macduff, Valentine in ‘Love for Love,’ and Edgar in ‘Lear.’ On 27 Feb. 1756 he was the original Egbert in Dr. Brown's ‘Athelstan.’ He also played Plume in the ‘Recruiting Officer,’ Charles in the ‘Busy Body,’ Juba in ‘Cato,’ Jupiter in ‘Amphitryon,’ Torrismond in the ‘Spanish Friar,’ and Frankly in the ‘Suspicious Husband.’
On 3 Oct. 1757 he made, in his favourite character of Essex, his first appearance at Covent Garden. Here he remained until 1767, playing leading parts in tragedy and comedy, the most conspicuous being Othello, Diocles in the ‘Prophetess,’ Hamlet, Archer in the ‘Beaux' Stratagem,’ Alexander, Leonatus, Macheath, Sir Charles Easy in the ‘Careless Husband,’ Norval, Tancred in ‘Tancred and Sigismunda,’ Ford in ‘Merry Wives of Windsor,’ Don Felix in the ‘Wonder,’ Jaffier in ‘Venice Preserved,’ Macbeth, Tamerlane, Prince of Wales in the ‘Second Part of King Henry IV,’ King John, Lord Hardy in the ‘Funeral,’ Oakly in the ‘Jealous Wife,’ Bertram in ‘All's well that ends well,’ Loveless in ‘Love's Last Shift,’ Worthy in the ‘Relapse,’ Lear, Fainall in the ‘Way of the World,’ Mark Antony in ‘Julius Cæsar,’ Comus, Horatio in the ‘Fair Penitent,’ Cato, and Antonio in the ‘Merchant of Venice.’ Few original parts were assigned him at Covent Garden. The principal were Sifroy in Dodsley's ‘Cleona’ on 2 Dec. 1758, Lord Belmont in the ‘Double Mistake’ of Mrs. Griffith on 9 Jan. 1766, and Don Henriquez in Hull's ‘Perplexities,’ altered from the ‘Adventures of Five Hours’ of Sir Samuel Tuke, on 31 Jan. 1767. At the end of the season of 1766–7 he left Covent Garden for Edinburgh.
