His striking personal appearance earned him the nickname of "Jupiter Carlyle"; and his autobiography (published 1860), though written in his closing years and not extending beyond the year 1770, is interesting as a picture of Scottish life, social and ecclesiastical, in the 18th century. Carlyle's memory recalled the Porteous Riots of 1736, and less remotely his friendship with Adam Smith, David Hume, and John Home, the dramatist, for witnessing the performance of whose tragedyDouglas he was censured in 1757.
Alexander Wedderburn, 1st Earl of Rosslyn (February 13, 1733–January 2, 1805), Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, was the eldest son of Peter Wedderburn (a lord of session as Lord Chesterhall), and was born in East Lothian.
He obtained a considerable addition to his resources (Carlyle puts the amount at £10,000) on his marriage in 1767 to Betty Anne, sole child and heiress of John Dawson of Marly in Yorkshire.
He was not only dull, but the cause of dulness in others, and even AlexanderCarlyle confesses that in conversation his illustrious countryman was stiff and pompous.
JOSEPH DACRE CARLYLE (1759-1804), British orientalist, was born in 1759 at Carlisle, where his father was a physician.
His translation from the Arabic of Yusuf ibn Taghri Birdi, the Rerum Egypticarum Annales, appeared in 1792, and in 1796 a volume of Specimens of Arabic Poetry, from the earliest times to the fall of the Caliphate, with some account of the authors.
Carlyle was appointed chaplain by Lord Elgin to the embassy at Constantinople in 1799, and prosecuted his researches in Eastern literature in a tour through Asia Minor, Palestine, Greece and Italy, collecting in his travels several valuable Greek and Syriac MSS.
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