The Sun.
London, England, 1844-08-23 00:00:00

,=DEATH OF A REMARKABLE

CHARACTER.

On Saturday morning, a remarkable character, well
known to all classes of our citizens by the name of
"Dr. Syntax," but whose proper patronymic was
John Shirreff, died in the Royal Infirmary.
He had been missing from the streets for the
last six or seven weeks, indisposition having
seized him, the result of a severe cold, which,
to some extent, had also confined him to his
house during a portion of last winter. This
strange and eccentric individual, for twenty-five
years, had managed to cut a strange figure in the
metropolis, and although his peculiarities displayed
much of the monomaniac, there was a harmlessness
and innocence about him which made him a general
favourite. In early life he had been a clerk in the
City Cess- office, and it was while in this situation
that his mental aberration first manifested itself.

For the last quarter of a century he devoted his
time to frequenting all public places, more particu-
larly the University and City Churches. In the
College, by the favour of the Professors, he had a free
right of access to all the lecture-rooms, and it was his
boast he had attended more than a hundred courses of
lectures. Like all half-witted persons, he had his tale
to tell of persecution and oppression, endured at the
hands of mysterious enemies, and the same notion in-
duced the feeling that, notwithstanding his knowledge
of the medical science, these same enemies had con-
spired to deprive him of his license as an M.D., long a
favourite object of his ambition. A desire to show
them that they had not altogether crushed him,
seemed to be a ruling motive for his celebrated Sun-
day exhibitions. Dressed with the most scrupulous
care and cleanliness, in an antiquated costume of a
semi-military character, with Hessian boots, he was
to be seen every Sunday stalking through the streets
at a rapid pace, with his stick over his shoulder. His
appearance was rendered still more grotesque by his
wearing a deep green shade over his eyes with a pair
of unusually large green spectacles poised near the
extremity of his nose. He was sure to plant himself
in the principal seat of the front gallery of one of the
City Churches, where he made himself still more con-
spicuous by standing up, sometimes sketching the
portrait of the preacher while the rest of the congre-
gation were composedly attending to the sermon.
The High Church was his favourite resort for this
purpose, and happy man was he when he could con-
trive to secure his position without molestation in the
seat of royalty. On the Sunday following the Town
Council's resolution not to attend the High Church,
the Doctor coolly and consequentially took possession
of the empty seat, as he himself said, " to set the ma •
gistrates an example." He always stood during the
singing of the psalms, and he had an idea that he, and
not the precentor, led the congregation in this part of
Divine worship. He kept neither the time nor the
tune of the precentor; so that his discordant per-
formances had a painfully ludicrous character.
Several years ago, on account of the marked conspi-
cuousness of his behaviour, he was ejected from St.
George's Church, and this was an affront which he
never forgave, or ceased to enlarge upon, when re-
lating the malicious doings of his persecutors.
As a sketcher of portraits, he used also to attend
the meetings of the Town Council, the Presbytery,
the General Assembly, and the Parliament House.
Many of these sketches possessed considerable merit.
Though he never followed any occupation by which
he could gain a livelihood (with the exception of an
eighteen months' connexion with a London newspaper),
it is satisfactory to know that his wants were pro-
vided for by the united liberality of a few benevolent
citizens, who gave him liberty to purchase to a cer-
tain extent weekly. He inhabited alone a good house,
but meanly furnished, attending to all his household
concerns without any assistance. It was by dint of
no little manmuvering that he was prevailed on to
quit his own house, and he did not know that he had
been taken to the Infirmary till some days after his
-removal. His death was hastened by his dogged re-
fusal to take the medicine prescribed by his attendants,
under dread of poison, and after lingering ten days he
expired early on Saturday morning. He was, we
believe, a native of the Borders, and about sixty-nine
years of age.—Edinburgh Advertiser of Tuesday.

ALARMING AFFRAY IN BALFRON

(From the Glasgow Chronicle of Wednesday.)
On Saturday night last an outrage of a most
daring character was perpetrated in the vicinity of
Balfron, which alarmed the whole country for miles
round, and for a time placed the lives of two persons
in imminent jeopardy. It appears that there is a
road now in course of formation between Blane toll
and Gartmore, at which upwards of two hundred
Irish labourers are employed. These men are gene-
rally paid weekly; and on Saturday afternoon last,
as usual, after receiving their wages, they proceeded
to occupy most of the public-houses in Balfron,
where they continued drinking till an early hour on
Sunday morning. Of this number, two men named
McCormick—an uncle and a nephew—who were sub-
contractors on the line, both powerful athletic fellows,
went into the toll-house at Kepculloch, where they
remained fuddling until the night was far advanced.
Latterly, the toll-keeper refused, to supply them with
any more liquor, and they took their departure in
rather an excited state. After a short time, however
(the house having been locked up and secured), the
uncle and :nephew returned, and were refused ad-
mittance, when they, without any ceremony, de-
liberately smashed in the window of the toll-house,
and, having effected an entrance in this way, they at-
tacked the toll-keeper, and nearly killed him in the
presence of the police .officer of the district and a
farm servant, who were in the house, but who were
afraid to attempt rendering any assistance, in case
their own lives should be forfeited. The McCormicks
having perpetrated this outrage, made their escape.
An alarm, however, was quickly conveyed to Bal-
fron, and ultimately nine or ten special constables
were collected, who at once went in search for the
delinquents, and succeeded in tracing them to a farm-
house on Auchentroig estate, where they were ac-
customed to lodge. By this time it was after mid-
night, and very dark. (in reaching the farm-house
the constables apprehended the elder McCormick, but
the officer who accompanied the force foolishly re-
frained from putting handcuffs upon him, and, while
others of the men proceeded to search for the nephew,
the old man seized hold of the pickaxe that lay con-
venient to him, and with it aimed a deadly blow at
McLane, excise-officer in Balfron, who, it seems, had
joined the party, which took effect upon his forehead,
and stretched him nearly lifeless on the ground. On
this the force of specials took flight and ran for their
lives, and on reaching Balfron alarmed the whole dis-
trict. A party of from forty to fifty weavers and
other inhabitants then turned out and marched to the
scene of action, where they found Mr. McLane, not
dead, but severely cut on the head, and both the
McCormicks fled. Information was next dispatched to
Stirling, whence Mr. Sconce, fiscal for the county,
accompanied by officers, arrived on the Sunday, and
on being informed of the circumstances, that gentle-
man suspected that the McCormicks, wbo carried
with them from 401. to 501. of the men's wages, had
made across the country for Helensburgh, on their
way to Ireland, of which country they are natives.
Mr. Sconce, on this understanding, proceeded direct
to Greenook, where he was fortunate enough to ap-
prehend the two blackguards, with the assistance of
John Blair, the efficient criminal officer of Balfron,
on Monday last, just as they were stepping on board
the Belfast steamer. Yesterday the McCormick's
were safely lodged in Stirling gaol, to await their
trial for the offences above mentioned. We are happy
to learn that, althoUgh still in a most distressing con
dition, McLane and the tollman are considered almos'
out of danger.

LIVES OF THE SAINTS.-Mr. Newman is now
publishing a number of works under this title. We
turn to the biography of St. B rtholomew, one of the
choicest of these saints. his history begins at page 128,
and contains, in the words of his biographer, many
startling and even grotesque stories." The biographer
thus warns the reader at the very beginning of his nu.-
rative, and very properly too—" We may feel startled
and disgusted that such a figure, with an ill-smell of goat-
skins, should come betwixt the wind and our nobility, but
he is the genuine product of an age of faith ;" when St.
Bartl'emy " was born, the blessed Virgin looked upon him
with a sweet countenance," and " the figure on the
crucifix stretched out its arms to welcome this new
soldier of the cross." We are told that "by his prayers
a clear stream gushed from the hard rock." Besides
a saint, no easy business in " Catholic" estimate, he
was " a grazier, fisherman, labourer, and pilot." In the
midst of these labours, to, " a rough shirt of hair was
worn by him next his skin," and he slept "on a
pallet from which the hardiest of the world's soldiers
would have shrunk." The " seagulls and the cider-
ducks" were fond of the saint's company. One dark morn-
ing Satan, we are gravely told, got into his throat, and
nearly choked him. " For some time he was un-
able to speak, but at last he shook off the impedi-
ment and called upon Mary. Against these attacks
his only weapons were the sign of the cross and holy wa-
ter." The biographer of the saint closes with his burial
in Fame; and it is conjectured by the writer that Grace
Darling was in some way connected by succession or de-
scent with this monk of the olden time. ""The spirit of
these holy men who once lived in Fame seems still to
dwell there. It was on Bartholomew's Island that that
Christian maiden lived, who, not many years ago, ven-
tured her life to save the crew of a shipwrecked vessel."
The writer forgets it was not by beads and holy water
and crucifixes, but by hard rowing and strong-hearted
courage, that Grace Darling did service to the wrecked.
Are these the productions of illustrious Oxford ?
We rejoice to answer, they are not. They are printed
in Derby and published in London, and drawn up by
men who have unhappily associated the name of Oxford
with publications replete with the dogmas of Trent, and
they are too palpable proofs, not that the Church of
England has become Burnish, but that Messrs. Newman,
Ward, and Pusey, should be in person where they are in
prineiple and predilection, in the Church of Rome.—
Manchester Guardian.