West, Thomas

, the ingenious author of “The History of Furness,” published in 1774, 4to, and the “Guide to the Lakes,” is supposed to have had the chief part of his education in the Roman catholic religion on the continent, where he afterwards presided as a professor in some of the branches of natural philosophy. He belonged to the society of the Jesuits at the time of their suppression, and afterwards officiated as a secular priest. He bad seen many parts of Europe, and considered what was extraordinary in them with a curious eye. Having, in the latter part of his life, much leisure-time, he frequently accompanied genteel parties on the tour of the lakes; and after he had formed the design of drawing up his guide, whi^h is said to have been suggested to him by Dr. Brownrigg (See Brownrigg), besides consulting the most esteemed authors on the subject (as Messrs. Gray, Young, Pennant, &c.) he took several journeys on purpose to examine the lakes, and to collect such information concerning them from the neighbouring gentlemen, as he thought necessary to complete the work, and make it truly deserving the title. He resided at Ulverston, where he was respected as a worthy and ingenious man; and died July 10, 1779, at the ancient seat of the Stricklands, at Sizergh, in Westmorland, in the sixty-third year of his age; and, according to his own request, was interred in the vault of the Stricklands, in Kendal church. Among Cole’s Mss. in the British | Museum is a letter from him to col. Townley, giving an account of some bodies found buried at Gogmagog hills, near Cambridge. In the “Archseologia, vol. V. is by him” An account of Antiquities discovered at Lancaster." ¹