LIVINGSTON, ROBERT R., brother of EDWARD, an eminent lawyer and politician,was b. in New York in 1746. He was one of the five tnembers of the committee charged with drawing up the declaration of independence. When the constitution of the state of New York was settled, he was appointed chief judge, a, dignity he retained till 1801. He was then sent to Paris as minister plenipotentiary to negotiate the cession of Louisiana to the United States, a duty he discharged with rare ability. Ile enabled Fulton to construct his first steamboat, and introduced in America the use of sulphate of lime as a manure, and the merino sheep, and in many other ways distinguished himself as a national benefactor. He died Mar. 26,1813.
The Livingstons, whose lives have just been recorded, belong to an American family remarkable for hereditary talent and the large number of its members who have distinl guished themselves in the United States as eminent men of letters, magistrates, lawyers, and divines. They descend lineally from the fifth lord Livingston, who TAMS intrusted with the guardianship of Mary queen of Scots, and from the Rev. John Livingston,
rninister of Ancrum, in Teviotdale, the grandson of the nobleman, one of the most distinguished of the Presbyterian divines. John Livingston was born at Kilsyth, on June 21, 1603, ps.eaclied with great success in Ireland, and was one of two commission ers sent by the Scotch kirk to Breda, in Holland, to treat with Charles II. Refusing to take the oath of allegiance, he was banished, and in 1663 went to Holland, where, as pastor of the Scotch kirk at Rotterdam, he spent the last years of his life. He was the author of several works, the best known of which is his autobiography. His son Robert was born at Ancrum in 1654, and while still a lad emigrated to America, and settled in the Dutch village of Albany, in the region of the upper Hudson. He bought from the Indians a vast tract of land on the banks of the river, embracing upwards of 160,000 acres; and this property lie had erected into the lordship and manor of Livingston.