BOYD, MARK ALEXANDER, a remarkable scholar and soldier, son of Robert Boyd of Pinkell in Ayrshire, and grandson of Robert Boyd, great chamberlain of Scotland, was born 13th January 1562. He lost his father in early life, and was educated by his uncle the learned James Boyd of Trochrig, "Tulchan," archbishop of Glasgow. His temper, however, was so violent that he soon quarrelled with his teachers, and abandoning his studies altogether, sought preferment at the court. Among the wildest spirits of that stormy period, the intolerable fierceness of his temper made it convenient for him to retire from Scotland and seek his fortune in France. He reached Paris with a small stock of money, which he soon lost in gaming. From Paris he went to Orleans, where he studied civil law under Robertus. The fame of Cujas next attracted him to Bourges. From Bourges he was driven by the plague to Lyons, and thence to Italy. On returning to France he was engaged to instruct a young nobleman, with whom, when the wars of the League broke out, he joined the Catholic party, though himself a Protestant. When the campaign terminated in 1588, he went to Toulouse and resumed his legal studies, which were speedily interrupted by an outbreak of bigotry on the part of the inhabitants, who, taking him for a Protestant, seized and threw him into prison. On his release he withdrew to Bordeaux. Till 1595 he led an unsettled life, sometimes studying, more frequently engaged in war. He found time, however, in 1592 to publish at Antwerp a volume of Latin poems, which he dedicated in a fulsome preface to James VI. He ultimately retired to his birthplace, where he died April 10, 1601. The best of his writings are the Epistolæ Heroidum, and the Hymni, which are to be found in the Deliciae Poetarum Scotorum, Amsterdam, 1637, tom. i. p. 142. The diction of his poems, though copious, is far from being classical, and his sentiments, sometimes lofty and noble, are more frequently coarse and impure. The finest of his poetical pieces is that entitled The Tears of Venus on the Death of Adonis. The MSS. of his unpublished works are preserved in the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh.2