Lord Byron, with whom he travelled for some time.  Returning home he pub. Letters from the Levant, which had a favourable reception, and some dramas, which were less successful.  He soon, however, found his true vocation in the novel of Scottish country life, and his fame rests upon the Ayrshire Legatees (1820), The Annals of the Parish (1821), Sir Andrew Wylie (1822), The Entail (1824), and The Provost.  He was not so successful in the domain of historical romance, which he tried in Ringan Gilbaize, The Spae-wife, The Omen, etc., although these contain many striking passages.  In addition to his novels G. produced many historical and biographical works, including a Life of Wolsey (1812), Life and Studies of Benjamin West (1816), Tour of Asia, Life of Byron (1830), Lives of the Players, and an Autobiography (1834).  In addition to this copious literary output, G. was constantly forming and carrying out commercial schemes, the most important of which was the Canada Company, which, like most of his other enterprises, though conducted with great energy and ability on his part, ended in disappointment and trouble for himself.  In 1834 he returned from Canada to Greenock, broken in health and spirits, and d. there in 1839 of paralysis.  G. was a man of immense talent and energy, but would have held a higher place in literature had he concentrated these qualities upon fewer objects.  Most of his 60 books are forgotten, but some of his novels, especially perhaps The Annals of the Parish, have deservedly a secure place.  The town of Galt in Canada is named after him.

GARDINER, SAMUEL RAWSON (1829-1902).—­Historian, b. at Alresford, Hants, was ed. at Winchester and Oxf.  In 1855 he m. Isabella, dau. of Edward Irving (q.v.), the founder of the Catholic Apostolic Church, which he joined, and in which he ultimately held high office.  About the time of his leaving Oxf. he had planned his great work, The History of England from the Accession of James I. to the Restoration, and the accomplishment of this task he made the great object of his life for more than 40 years.  The first two vols. appeared in 1863 as The History of England from the Accession of James I. to the Disgrace of Chief Justice Cooke, and subsequent instalments appeared under the following titles:  Prince Charles and The Spanish Marriage (1867), England under Buckingham and Charles I. (1875), Personal Government of Charles I. (1877), The Fall of the Government of Charles I. (1881); these were in 1883-4 re-issued in a consolidated form entitled History of England from the Accession of James I. to the Outbreak of the Civil War.  The second section of the work, History of the Great Civil War, followed in three vols. pub. in 1886, 1889, and 1891 respectively, and three more