Scottish historical writer, the son of an
officer in the army, was born at Aberdeen on the 22nd of August 1809. After
studying at the university of his native city, he removed to Edinburgh,
where he qualified for [v.04 p.0864] the Scottish bar and practised as an
advocate; but his progress was slow, and he eked out his narrow means by
miscellaneous literary work. His _Manual of the Law of Scotland_ (1839)
brought him into notice; he joined Sir John Bowring in editing the works of
Jeremy Bentham, and for a short time was editor of the _Scotsman_, which he
committed to the cause of free trade. In 1846 he achieved high reputation
by his _Life of David Hume_, based upon extensive and unused MS. material.
In 1847 he wrote his biographies of Simon, Lord Lovat, and of Duncan
Forbes, and in 1849 prepared for Chambers's Series manuals of political and
social economy and of emigration. In the same year he lost his wife, whom
he had married in 1844, and never again mixed freely with society, though
in 1855 he married again. He devoted himself mainly to literature,
contributing largely to the _Scotsman_ and _Blackwood_, writing _Narratives
from Criminal Trials in Scotland_ (1852), _Treatise on the Law of
Bankruptcy in Scotland_ (1853), and publishing in the latter year the first
volume of his _History of Scotland_, which was completed in 1870. A new and
improved edition of the work appeared in 1873. Some of the more important
of his contributions to _Blackwood_ were embodied in two delightful
volumes, _The Book Hunter_ (1862) and _The Scot Abroad_ (1864). He had in
1854 been appointed secretary to the prison board, an office which gave him
entire pecuniary independence, and the duties of which he discharged most
assiduously, notwithstanding his literary pursuits and the pressure of
another important task assigned to him after the completion of his history,
the editorship of the _National Scottish Registers_. Two volumes were
published under his supervision. His last work, _The History of the Reign
of Queen Anne_ (1880), is very inferior to his _History of Scotland_. He
died on the 10th of August 1881. Burton was pre-eminently a jurist and
economist, and may be said to have been guided by accident into the path
which led him to celebrity. It was his great good fortune to find abundant
unused material for his _Life of Hume_, and to be the first to introduce
the principles of historical research into the history of Scotland. All
previou