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Memoirs of the Late Major-Genl. [j.g.] Le Marchant
Memoirs of the Late MajorGenl Le Marchant - j.g. Author:Denis Le Marchant General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1841 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: That high-minded nobleman praised his design in the strongest terms, and wished him the success that his abilities and perseverance deserved. These suffrages to the merit of his plan were well-timed. The Duke of York being now secure of the support of some of the most distinguished political characters in the country, came forward actively as the avowed patron of the institution, and authorized Lieutenant-Colonel Le Marchant to choose the necessary professors -- a trust he most conscientiously discharged. His first appointment was that of Mr. Isaac Dalby to themathematical chair, and the situation could not have been filled by an abler or a better man. One Mr. Isaac Dalby, F. R. S. was born in a remote part of Cornwall. His parents were too poor to defray the expenses of a village-school, and he learnt to read and write in the tin mine where he passed his childhood. Some accident led him to seek his fortune in London. He made friends of a few individuals of great talent in his own class, one of whom, a shoe-maker, had the credit of being the author of the finest parts of Mickle's " Lusiad," another was the celebrated Mr. Crabbe; and a third was that self-taught genius Mr. Thomas Simpson, the geometrician ; but he lived most with mathematical instrument makers, many of whom were profound mathematicians; and by their assistance he cultivated a natural taste which he had for science, until he acquired considerable proficiency in it. The mathematical club, held at this time in Spitalfields, by persons little above the degree of artizans, and to which no gentleman was, under any pretence, admissible, dis...« less