ained the
period between 1688 and 1763, never appeared. The first volume, however,
is complete in itself, and traces the original settlement of the
different American colonies, and the progressive changes in their
constitutions and forms of government as affected by the state of public
affairs in the parent kingdom. Independently of its value as being
compiled from original documents, it bears evidence of great research,
and has been of essential benefit to later writers. Continuing his
researches, he next gave to the world _An Estimate of the Comparative
Strength of Britain during the Present and Four Preceding Reigns_,
London, 1782, which passed through several editions. At length, in
August 1786, Chalmers, whose sufferings as a Royalist must have strongly
recommended him to the government of the day, was appointed chief clerk
to the committee of privy council on matters relating to trade, a
situation which he retained till his death in 1825, a period of nearly
forty years. As his official duties made no great demands on his time,
he had abundant leisure to devote to his favourite studies,--the
antiquities and topography of Scotland having thenceforth special
attractions for his busy pen.

Besides biographical sketches of Defoe, Sir John Davies, Allan Ramsay,
Sir David Lyndsay, Churchyard and others, prefixed to editions of their
respective works, Chalmers wrote a life of Thomas Paine, the author of
the _Rights of Man_, which he published under the assumed name of
Francis Oldys, A.M., of the University of Pennsylvania; and a life of
Ruddiman, in which considerable light is thrown on the state of
literature in Scotland during the earlier part of the last century. His
life of Mary, Queen of Scots, in two 4to vols., was first published in
1818. It is founded on a MS. left by John Whitaker, the historian of
Manchester; but Chalmers informs us that he found it necessary to
rewrite the whole. The history of that ill-fated queen occupied much of
his attention, and his last work, _A Detection of the Love-Letters
lately attributed in Hugh Campbell's work to Mary Queen of Scots_, is an
exposure of an attempt to represent as genuine some fictitious letters
said to have passed between Mary and Bothwell which had fallen into
deserved oblivion. In 1797 appeared his _Apology for the Believers in
the Shakespeare Papers which were exhibited in Norfolk Street_, followed
by other tracts on the same subject. These contributions to the
l