HANNAY, JAMES (1827-1873), critic, novelist, and pablicist, was born at Dumfries in 1827, and came of the 1I umays of Sorbie, an ancient Galloway family. He contested the Dumfries burghs in the Conservative interest, man in Spain " were highly appreciated. Hannay's best books are Singleton Fontenoy, Satire and Satirists, Eustace Conyers, add Essays from the Quarterly Review. Satire not only shows loving appreciation of the great satirists of the past, but is itself instinct with wit and fine satiric power. The book sparkles with epigrams and apposite classical allusions, and contains admirable critical estimates of Horace (Hmnay's favourite author), Juvenal, Erasmus, Sir showed great interest in the history and fortunes of aristocratic families ; and his wonderful skill in matters of heraldry and genealogy is recognized by highly competent authorities (see Masson's Life of Milton, vol. i. p. 8). He was a ripe Latin scholar; and his style is marked by grace, vivacity, and poetical feeling. He was intimate with his leading literary contemporaries, and wrote the valuable notes to Thackeray's English Humorists.

In addition to contributions to Punch and the leading reviews, Hannay issued the following works : - Biscuits and Grog, Claret Cap, and Hearts are Trumps (1848) ; King Dobbs (1849) ; Sketches in Ultramarine ; Singleton Fonlenoy (1850); an edition of the Poe ms of Edgar Allan Poe, to which he prefixed an exquisite essay on the poet's life and genius (1852) ; Sands and Shells and Satire and Satirists (1854) ; Eustace Coulters (1855) ; Essays from the Quarterly Review (1861) ; Characters and Criticisms, consisting mainly of his contributions to the Edinburgh Courant (1865) ; A Course of English Literature (1866); and a family history entitled Three Hundred Years of a il'orman House (1867).