William Smellie

William Smellie (born 1740, Edinburgh, Scotland—died June 24, 1795, Edinburgh) was a Scottish compiler of the first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1768–71) and a distinguished natural historian.

The son of a master builder and stonemason, Smellie left his grammar school at age 12 to be an apprenticed printer. Because the printing shop was near the university and because Smellie was an able boy, he was allowed to attend some lectures; thus he continued to learn and to keep in touch with eminent scholars and rising contemporaries. Two years before his apprenticeship ended, he was made a corrector of the press, a responsible position combining subeditorial duties with constant contact with authors and the seeing of their work through the press. He also won for his firm the Edinburgh Philosophical Society’s prize for the most accurately printed edition of a Latin text.

Smellie became a master printer in 1765 and, at about that time, received a letter from the engraver Andrew Bell, asking him to take on responsibility for “fifteen capital sciences” and “likewise to prepare the whole work [the Encyclopædia Britannica] for the press.” For £200, Smellie took hold of the project and with “a pair of scissars,” much industry, and considerable editorial acumen produced a synthesis of current knowledge.

As early as 1760 Smellie was a founder of the Newtonian Society for mutual improvement. In 1765 he won a gold medal for a dissertation on the sexes of plants, opposing the views of the Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus. In 1780 he helped to found the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and in 1781 he became keeper and superintendent of the Edinburgh Museum of Natural History. He translated the comte de Buffon’s famous Natural History, 9 vol. (1781), wrote a distinguished work, The Philosophy of Natural History, 2 vol. (1790–99), and was made secretary of the Society of Scottish Antiquaries. But he was not solemn. His friend the poet Robert Burns wrote of him (“Crochallan”):

Crochallan came:

The old cock’d hat, the brown surtout

the same,

His grisly beard just bristling in its might

(’Twas four long nights and days to

shaving-night):

His uncomb’d, hoary locks, wild-staring,

thatch’d

A head for thought profound and clear

unmatch’d;

Yet, tho his caustic wit was biting rude,

His heart was warm, benevolent, and good.