Forster, John

an able historian, critic and biographer, born at Newcastle, Eng., in 1812. Originally a member of the bar, he never practiced, but devoted himself to a career in literature. He conducted the London Examiner for nearly 20 years, during a great part of which period he also edited the Foreign Quarterly Review. In 1861 he was appointed by government a commi ioner of lunacy. As a historian his literary merits are of a high order, his principal works being The Statesmen of the Commonwealth of England; Biographical and Historical E ays, and Debates on the Grand Remonstrance. As a biographer he is distinguished by his Sir John Eliot: a Biography, 1590-1632; Life of Walter Savage Landor; The Life of Charles Dickens. F. was the lifelong friend of Dickens, and an executor of his will. Died in 1876.