, D. D. who was distantly related to the preceding, but added the e to his name, was the son of Mr. Richard Pococke,
, D. D. who was distantly related to the preceding, but added the e to his name, was
the son of Mr. Richard Pococke, sequestrator of the. church
of All-saints in Southampton, and head master of the freeschool there, by the only daughter of the rev. Mr. Isaac
Milles, minister of Highcleer in Hampshire, and was born
at Southampton in 1704. He received his scbool-learning
there, and his academical education at Corpns-Christi college, Oxford, where he took his degree of LL. B. May 5,
1731 and that of LL. D. (being then precentor of Lismore) June 28, 1733 together with Dr. Seeker, then rector of St. James’s, and afterwards archbishop of Canterbury. He began his travels into the East in 1737, and
returned in 1742, and was made precentor of Waterford
in 1744. In 1743, he published the first part of those
travels, under the title of “A Description of the East,
and of some other Countries, vol. I. Observations on
Egypt.
” In Observations on Palestine, or the Holy Land,
Syria, Mesopotamia, Cyprus, and Candia,
” which he dedicated to the earl of Chesterfield, then made lord-lieutenant of Ireland attended his lordship thither as one of his
domestic chaplains, and was soon after appointed by his
lordship archdeacon of Dublin. In March 1756, he was
promoted by the duke of Devonshire (then lord-lieutenant)
to the bishopric of Ossory, vacant by the death of Dr.
Edward Maurice. He was translated by the king’s letter
from Ossory to Elphin, in June 1765, bishop Gore of
Elphin bc'ing then promoted to Meath; but bishop Gore
finding a great sum was to be paid to his predecessor’s
executors for the house at Ardbracean, declined taking out
his patent; and therefore bishop Pococke, in July, was
translated by the duke of Northumberland directly to the
see of Meath, and died in the month of September the
same year, suddenly, of an apoplectic stroke, while he was
in the course of his visitation. An eulogium of his Description of Egypt is given in a work entitled “Pauli Ernestt
Jablonski Pantheon Ægyptiorum, Praetat. ad part, iii.
”
He penetrated no further up the Nile than to Philse, now
Gieuret Ell Hiereff; whereas Mr. Norden, in 1737, went
as far as Derri, between the two cataracts. The two travellers are supposed to have met on the Nile, in the neighbourhood of Esnay, in Jan. 1738. But the fact, as Dr.
Pococke told some of his friends, was, that being on his
return, not knowing that Mr. Norden was gone up, he
passed by him in the night, without having the pleasure of
seeing him. There was an admirable whole length of the
bishop, in a Turkish dress, painted by Liotard, in the
possession of the late Dr. Milles, dean of Exeter, his first
cousin. He was a great traveller, and visited other places
besides the East His description of a rock on the westside of Dunbar harbour in Scotland, resembling the GiantsCauseway, is in the Philos. Trans, vol. LII. art. 17; and in
Archaeologia,vol. II. p. 32, his account of some antiquities
found in Ireland. When travelling through Scotland
(where he preached several times to crowded congregations), he stopped at Dingwal, and said he was much
struck and pleased with its appearance for the situation
of it brought Jerusalem to his remembrance, and he
pointed out the hill which resembled Calvary. The same
similitude was observed by him in regard to Dartmouth
but a 4to volume of his letters, containing his travels ia
England and Scotland, was lost. He preached a sermon
in 1761 for the benefit of the Magdalen charity in London, and one in 1762 before the incorporated Society in
Dublin.