LOWE, PETER,
founder of the faculty of physicians and surgeons of Glasgow, was
born in Scotland about the middle of the sixteenth century. In his
‘Discourse on the whole Art of Chirurgery,’ published at Glasgow in
1612, in the title-page of which he styles himself Arelian Doctor in
the faculty of surgery at Paris, and chirurgeon ordinary to the king
of France and Navarre, he informs us that he had practised
twenty-two years in France and Flanders; that he had been two years
surgeon-major to the Spanish regiment at Paris; and that he
subsequently followed his royal master, Henry IV. of France, six
years in his wars. At what precise period he returned from the
Continent, and took up his residence at Glasgow, is now known; but
he mentions that in 1598, in consequence of his complaints of
ignorant persons intruding into the practice of surgery, James VI.
granted him a privilege, under the privy seal, of examining all
practitioners in surgery in the western parts of Scotland. He refers
to a former work of his own, entitled ‘The Poor Man’s Guide,’ and
speaks of an intended publication concerning the diseases of women.
He died in 1612. His works are:
The whole Course of Chirurgerie; wherein is briefly set down,
the Causes, Signes, Prognostications, and Curations of all sorts of
tumours, Wounds, Vicers, Fractures, Dislocations, and all other
Diseases, usually practised by Chirurgeons, according to the opinion
of all our ancient doctours in chirurgerie. Compiled by Peter Lowe,
Scotchman. Whereunto is annexed, the Booke of the Presages of Denyne
Hippocrates, devided into three partes; also the Protestation which
Hippocrates caused his Scholars to make. The whole collected and
translated by Peter Lowe, &c. London, 1596, 1597, 1612, 1634, 1654,
4to. This is considered to be a book of very great merit, and was
translated into a variety of languages, and printed in Fr. 1612,
Port. 1614; Gunz. 1634; Port. 1657.
An Easy, Certain, and Perfect Methode to Cure and Prevent the
Spanish Sickness, &c. Lond. 1596, 4to.
LOWE, JOHN,
sometimes called also ALEXANDER, author of the well-known song,
‘Mary’s Dream,’ to which he owes all his fame, was born in Kenmure,
in Galloway, in 1750. He was the eldest son of the gardener at
Kenmure castle, and being intended by his father to follow the
humble business of a weaver, at the age of fourteen he was put
apprentice to Robert Heron, father of the unfortunate author of that
name. Young Lowe afterwards found means to obtain a regular
academical education at the university of Edinburgh, and while
studying divinity was engaged as tutor in the family of Mr. M’Ghie
of Airds. The fate of a young surgeon of the name of Alexander
Miller, who was unfortunately lost at sea, and who had been attached
to Mary, one of Mr. M’Ghie’s daughters, was the cause of Lowe’s
writing his beautiful and affecting ballad of ‘Mary, weep no more
for me.’ Having no prospect of obtaining a church in his native
country, in 1773 Lowe embarked for America, being invited out as
tutor to the family of a brother of General Washington. He
afterwards opened an academy in Fredericksburgh, Virginia, but is
not succeeding, was at length given up. At a subsequent period he
was for some time minister of the Episcopal church of that place.
Before quitting Airds, he had interchanged vows of unalterable
constancy with a sister of Mary, which were doomed never to be kept.
He fell in love with a beautiful Virginian lady, who rejected his
suit, and united herself to another. Her sister, however, became
passionately fond of him, and he married her, as he said himself,
“from a sentiment of gratitude.” This step blasted his happiness for
ever, as his wife turned out a most worthless character. Poor Lowe,
to drown the recollection of his domestic griefs, unfortunately had
recourse to the bottle; and intemperance, poverty, and disease, soon
brought him to an untimely grave. He died in 1798, in the 48th
year of his age. Besides his ‘Mary’s Dream.’ he wrote several
pieces, among which is mentioned ‘A Morning Poem,’ but none of these
has been printed.
