John Leyden, a Scottish author, born at Denholm, Roxburghshire, Sept. 8, 1775, died in Batavia, Aug. 28, 1811. He studied at the university of Edinburgh, and was ordained in 1798; but not attaining any success in the clerical profession, he abandoned it, and applied himself to the study of medicine. In 1802 he was appointed assistant surgeon in the East India company's service, and on arriving at Madras turned his attention to the oriental languages. In 1806 he removed to Calcutta, where he was appointed professor of Hindos-tanee in Fort William college, and shortly afterward judge of the Twenty-Four Pergunnahs. In 1809 he was made a commissioner of the court of requests, and in 1810 assay master of the mint. Having accompanied Lord Minto in an expedition against the Dutch colony of Java in 1811, he there contracted a fever which proved fatal. The most important of his works are a " Historical Account of Discoveries and Travels in Africa " (enlarged and completed by Hugh Murray, 2 vols., Edinburgh, 1817), and "An Essay on the Languages and Literature of the Indo-Chinese Nations," published in vol. x. of the "Asiatic Researches." His poetical remains were published in London in 1819 by the Rev. John Morton, and a new edition of his "Poems and Ballads," with a memoir by Sir Water Scott (first published in the " Edinburgh Annual Register" for 1811), in 1858.