Born in Durham, October 1800. He served as a clerk in the Colonial Office for 48 years, during which time he not only exerted considerable influence on the colonial policy of the British Empire, but also became one of the most successful literary men of his time, producing a number of verse dramas. The most admired was Philip van Artevelde (1834), a tragic play set in Flanders in the 14th century. His political work The Statesman (1836) is considered to be one of the few significant works of political literature dealing with the changing role of the government administrative branch.    (Y. Y.)