^0l9tii._ lii^i. \ ui^'^" ' f^xuwmstei. PETER'S LETTERS TO HIS KINSFOLK. Painted by John Watson. Engraved in alto relievo by W. Lixar PETER MORRIS, M. D. I'UINTED AT THE BALLANTYNE PRESS. PETEH'S LETTERS TO HIS XIXSFOI.K, THE SDCOND EDITION. A'Cr.fMF. THF, riRST. HIS 11 I) [or; un.i.iA-.i f;i..s( k .'. (inu. r di \ nr ncii "i < A OKI I, A\ll H. D.WIl >, 1.C>\1>0\ ; AND .'<"i\ '-Ni I ; it A \ n "^(ix, (.i.A.'(;(in . Mr(((\i\. ; :.^ '^ ; 7 L, DEDICATION o TO THE RIGHT REVEREND : THE LOED BISHOP OF ST. DAVIDS. My Lord, \ I TRUST you will excuse the liberty I j take in inscribing to you a new edition of my Letters from Scotland. That none of these letters were addressed to your Lord- ship, is a circumstance for which I take great shame to myself, after the very kind manner in which you spoke to me on that Yl DEDICATION. head, tlic day I left you may I be per- mitted to add, after the long experience I have had of your Lordship's concern and attachment, in several years of profession- al attendance, and, since that was laid aside, of private intercourse and friendship. I must not attempt to deny, that there are some things in these Letters which are not exactly what I should have judged pro- per for your Lordship's eye ; but your Lordship is aware that they were written without the smallest notion of being print- ed. I hope the effect of the whole cor- respondence may be agreeable to you, and I well know the f^entle and foro-ivino; nature of your disposition. Above all, I should be highly flattered to learn that the account F have (j;iven of the State of Reliii'ion in Scotland, had interested and pleased you. The truly liberal and apostolic zeal with which your I^ordship has so long been la- bouring to serve my countrymen in their DEDICATION. Vll most important concerns, is appreciated and honoured by none more highly than, My Lord, Your Lordship's very humble, and very affectionate Servant, Peter Momiis. Pensharpe-HalLjI Aberystwith. 3 THE EPISTLE LIMINARY TO THE SECOND EDITION TO MR DAVTES, booksei-t,ek, in the stuxvnd, eoxdox. Dear Sir, The high terms in which you are plea- sed to express yourself concerning the spe- cimens of my Letters from Scotland which have fallen into your hands, are, I assure you, among the most valued testimonies of approbation which have ever come in my way. To receive applause from one's ac- quaintances, is more delightful than to re- ceive it from strangers ; but the most pre- cious of all tokens is that which proceeds from an old and dear friend. It is true, that in such case there may be, in general, EnSTI.E LTMINAllY no small suspicion of partiality, but this cannot be the case with jou, as jou say you liked the work before you were aware of the name of its author. Since that name has now been divulged through the rashness of a certain publica- tion, I do not see that any very good pur- pose could be answered by attempting to keep up the mystery in the work itself. I therefore accept of your offers with regard to the Second Edition, and permit you to send it forth into the world with the name of Peter Morris as conspicuously affixed to it as you may deem expedient. About the same time that your letter reached me, I had another letter on the same subject from my friend Mr William Blackwood, of Edinburgh. As you and he are already connected in so many ways, it strikes me that no inconvenience could at- tend your being connected together in this little matter also. I shall be happy if you find it consistent with your views to com- municate the purport of what I have said to him, with all haste ; and hope to sec the KPISTLE T.TjriNARY. XI Second Edition graced with both jour names on the title-page. When in Edinburgh I became acquaint- ed with Mr James Ballantyne, and have a strong incHnation that any httle thing of mine should be printed at his press, both from my regard for the man himself, and on account of the high report I heard of his qualifications in that way, from some of the best judges I know^ of. The First Edition being but a coarse job, and so small withal, I did not think of him, but trust there will be nothing to prevent him undertaking this, about which Mr Blackwood will be able to arrange with him very easily, being on the spot. I should think the best way would be to leave the style of printing, &c. entire- ly to l\lr l^allantyne's own discretion I am sure he will do all he can to make my book a pretty one. As for correcting of proofs, tvc, I dare say I might very safely leave that also to jNIr Ballantyne ; but I have a friend in Edinburgh, (a Mr W ,) who will find it quite an anniscment to su- perintend all that affair J and, by the way, Xll EPISTI.E T. i:\riXARY. I am a very bad hand at correcting proofs myself, tor I read them so quickly, that my eye passes over a thousand errata, for one that escapes the observation of a person more accustomed to such things. What you say about the portraits, puzzles me more than anything else ; I mean as to the propriety of introducing such things at all. It is very true, however, as you have heard, that my pencil was in request while I was in Scotland, almost as much as my pen, and that I have now a very rich port- folio of the chief worthies I met with in that northern region. In this matter, too, I am inclined to trust more to my friends' judg- ment than to my own, so I have sent you this day (per waggon) the whole lot of the sketches, leaving you to select for the en- graver such as seem most likely to improve the appearance and popularity of the work. I think, however, you should on no account omit the sketches of the iMan of Feeling, Mr Scott, Mr Jeffrey, Mr Alison, and Dr Chalmers. The others }ou may do with as you please. KPISTLE LI MIX All y. XIU I would have sent you my drawings of scenery also, but really in the present day, when so much is a-doing in that line by much abler hands, I feel shy about pushing my rude efforts upon the public. 1 have, there- fore, packed up only a very few specimens not at all for the engraver but merely as a present to Mrs Davies, which 1 beg she will accept, as also the cheese which ac- companies them, along with the best wishes and compliments of a very old acquaint- ance and admirer. You cannot do bet- ter than have the etchings executed in Edinburgh also. Nobody can be better for the purpose than Mr Lizars and, if he be too much engaged to do the whole, he can get a very excellent young artist, some of whose works 1 saw when there, to give him assistance I mean Mr Stewart, who is engraving Allan's Picture of The Robbers dividing their Spoil. By the bye, I had a note from Sir Joseph Banks a day or two ago. in which he says a great deal about a new invention of Mr Lizars, which he thinks XIV EPISTLE LIMINARY. is the greatest thing that has occurred in engraving since the time of Albert Durer. I have not seen any specimen of it, but do ask him to try some of the portraits in the new way say my ov/n for that is of least consequence.* As I am just going over to Dublin to spend a few weeks with my brother Sam, I shall not be able to hear from you again about this matter so I leave it with per- fect confidence in your hands, and those of JNIr Blackwood. 1 hear the cry for the book is great, particularly in the North ; therefore do bestir yourselves, and have Peter out before the rising of Parliament. * The portrait of" Dr Morris is done in this new style ; and luid tlie time permitted, the otliers would all have been done so likewise. It is thrown off by tlie common printing-press, as tlie reader will observe but this is only one of the distinguishing excellencies of" this new and splendid invention of INIr Lizars. I am happy that my friend"'s book has the honour of" being the first graced with a specimen ol' it , and not tlie less so that the speci- men presents a capital likeness of my f"rieiid himself. \V. \V. EPISTLE LIMINARY. XV I hope you won't allow next Autimin to go over, without coming down and paying a visit to some of your old friends in your native country and I am vain enough to hope you won't omit us if you do come. I am an idler man, now-a-days, than I could wish to be ; so do come, my dear sir ; and if my good friend, Mr Cadell, could come with you, tanto melius ; I shall do all I can to amuse you in the mornings ; and, in the evenings, you shall both have as much as you please of what, I flatter myself, is not the worst claret in the prin- cipality. Between ourselves, I have a great desire to see you, as I have some thoughts of looking over my papers, and giving you Peter's Letters from Italy and Germany, in the course of the winter. Meantime, I re- maiu; with great sincerity, Your friend, Pet K II Mo KRIS. rENSHARl'E IlAI.r.. '\ AnFRYSiwnn. ^ Wvilncsdau r'rciiiii!^. ) LI8T OF EMBELLISHMENTS. VOLUME THE FIRST. Portrait of the Author .... to face the Title. The Autlior in his Shandrydan driving to Edinburgh, Vignette on Title. Portrait of Mr Leslie to face p. 64 iNIr IVIackenzie ..... 99 jNIr Playfair 181 Mr Jameson 252 VOLUME THE SECOND. The Author and jNIr S riding towards Melrose Abbey Vignette on Titk. Portrait of Mr Clerk ..... to face p. ^^ of Mr .Jeffrey 59 Lord .Tusticc-Clerk, Macqucen of Braxfield 1 12 ]\Ir Allan 234 Mr Scott ..... 351 VOLUME THE THIRD. The Lord High Commissioner Walking in Procession to oi)en the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland Vignette on Title. Portrait of Mr Alison to face ji. 93 The Ettrick Shepherd .... 141 Mr Wilson 256 I)r Chalniors 269 The Author on Board of the UoV) Hoy Steam-Boat, bidding Karewell to his Cilasgow I'riends', Vignette, on Page 351 CONTENTS VOLUME FIRST. LETT Ell I. Arriv.il s Ecliiilniri>h , 4 Calton-Ilill 8 LETTER II. Mr \V . of \V 13 Lawii-Maiket 19 LETTER III. Sheep's-He.id 21 Edinburgh Canongate 27 Holyrood- House 2() Queen Mary 30 LETTER IV. Mr \V 31 LETTER v. Scottish Peasantry ;J9 Scottish Gentry 12 Scottish Women 14 Ladies' Dress jO VI CONTENTS. PAGE, LETTER VI. Mr J r>i LETTER VII. Visit to Mr J 62 Dinner- Party 66 LETTER VIII. Mr W ,, 73 Tories , 78 Wliigs ,... 79 Clergy 80 David Hume 81 LETTER IX. Cranioscopy , , 88 David i^Iume fJO Rousseau 92 LETTER X. Mr M 95 Mr M and Mr II 100 Mr M 103 LETTER XL Burns's Dinner 1 06 LETTER XII. Burnss Dinner 12.'5 LETTER XIII. University of Edinburgh 144 LETTER XIV. University of Edinburgli = I(i9 Dr Thomas Brown 17^^ CONTENTS. Vii PAGE. LETTER XV. Mr Play fair ISl New ObstM-v;:tory 181 David Hu-ne's Monument IS* LETTER XVL Scotti-.li Students ,, 187 LETTER XVII. English Universities , , 19s LETTER XVm. Society of Edinburgh. 206 LETTER XLX. Society of Edniburgh 2l6" Dancing 223 Hornems Waltz 227 LETTER XX. Edinburgh Houses 2."1 Edinburgh Cadies 233 Gaelic L;;nguage 237 Edinburgh Cadies 239 LETTER XXL Dr B 243 Professor J 2l() Singular Recognition 2UJ Mr James W n , 257 LETTER XXIL Speculative Society 2GI Vlll CONTENTS. LETTER XX in. Cranioscopy and Craniology 281 Madonnas 289 Hercules Farnese 290 LETTER XXIV. Edinburgh Blue-Stockings 293 A Rout 297 LETTER XXV. Edinburgh Bl ue-Stockings 307 Mrs G ofL n 'J0() LETTER XXVI. Theatre .Sll Mr Markay's Baillie Jarvie 321 Mr William Murray 32S Mrs Henry Siddons .324 LETTER XXVII. Edinburgh The Castle 326 PETER'S LETTERS TO HIS KINSFOLK. vot. I PETER'S LETTERS TO HIS KINSFOLK. LETTER I. TO THE REV. DAVID WILEIA:\IS. Oman's Hotel, Edinburgh, March .5. I ARRIVED here last night, only two hours later than my calculation at Liverpool, which was entirely owing to a small accident that befel Scrub, as I was coming down the hill to Mus- selburgh. I was so much engaged Avith the view, that I did not remark him stumble once or twice, and at last down he came, having got a pretty long nail run into his foot. I turned round to curse John, but perceived that he liad been fast 4 EDINBURGH BLACK BULL. asleep during the whole affair. However, it hap- pened luckily that there was a farrier's shop only a few yards on, and by his assistance w^e were soon in a condition to move again. JNIy chief re- gret was being obliged to make my entry into the city after night-fall, in consequence of the delay ; and yet that is no great matter neither. As for the shandrydan, I have never had the least reason to repent my bringing it with me. It is positively the very best vehicle in existence. The lightness of the gig the capacity of the chariot and the stylishness of the car it is a wonderful combination of excellencies. But I forget your old quizzing about my Hohhj. My evil genius, in the shape of an old drivel- ling turnpike-man, directed me to put up at the Black Bull, a crowded, noisy, shabby, uncom- fortable inn, frequented by all manner of stage- coaches and their contents, as my ears were well tauo'ht before mornine;. Havinfj devoured a tolerable breakfast, however, I began to feel my- self in a more genial condition than I had ex- pected, and sallied out to deliver one or two letters of introduction, and take a general view of the town, in a temper which even you might have envied. To say the truth, I know not a feelino- of more delis^htful excitation, than that EDINBURGH. 5 which attends a traveller, when he sallies out of a fine clear morning, to make his first survey of a splendid city, to which he is a stranger. I have often before experienced this charming spi- rit-stirring sensation. Even now, I remember, with a kind of solemn enthusiasm, the day when (in your company too, my dear David,) I open- ed my window at the White Horse, Fetter-lane, and beheld, for the first time, the chimneys and smoke (for there what else could I behold ?) of London. I remember the brief devoirs paid by us both to our coffee and muffins, and the spring of juvenile elasticity with which we bounded, rather than AV'alked, into the midst of the hum, hurry, and dusky magnificence of Fleet- Street. How we stared at Temple- Bar ! How our young blood boiled within us, as we passed over the very stones that had drank the drops as they oozed from the fresh-dissevered head of brave old Balmerino ! AV^ith what consciousness of reverence did we pace along the Strand retiring: now and then into a corner to consult our pocket-map and returning with a high sa- tisfaction, to feel oiu'selvcs imder the shadow of edifices, whose very names were enough for us ! How we stood ao-aze at Charing Cross ! The statue of the JMartvr at our riirht Whitehall 6 EDINBURGH. on our left Westminster Abbey, lifting itself like a cloud before us pillars and palaces all around, and the sun lighting up the whole scene with rays enriched by the deep tinges of the atmosphere through which they passed. I do not pretend to compare my own feel- ings now-a-days with those of that happy time neither have I any intention of representing Edinburgh as a place calculated to produce the same sublime impressions, which every English- man must experience when he first finds himself in London. The imagination of a Southern does not connect with this northern city so many glorious recollections of antiquity, nor is there any thing to be compared wdth the feeling of mo- ral reverence, accorded by even the dullest of mankind, to the actual seat and centre of the wisest and greatest fj;overnment in the world. Without at all referring to these things, the gi- gantic bulk and population of London, are, of themselves, more than sufficient to make it the most impressive of all earthly cities. In no place is one so sensible, at once, to the littleness and the greatness of his nature how insignifi- cant the being that forms a scarcely distin- guishable speck in that huge sweep of congrega- ted existence yet how noble the si)irit which EDINBURGH. 7 has called together that mass which rules and guides and animates them all which so adorns their combination, and teaches the structures of art almost to rival the vastness of Nature. How awfid is the idea which the poet has expressed, when he speaks of " all that mighty heart !" And yet there is no lack of food for enthusiasm even here. Here is the capital of an ancient, independent, and heroic nation, abounding in buildings ennobled by the memory of illus- trious inhabitants in the old times, and illus- trious deeds of good and of evil ; and in others, which hereafter will be reverenced by posterity, for the sake of those that inhabit them now. Above all, here is all the sublimity of situation and scenery mountains near and afar off rocks and glens and the sea itself, almost within hear- ing of its waves. I was prepared to feel much ; and yet you will not wonder when I tell you, that I felt more than I was prepared for. You know well, that my mother was a Scotchwo- man, and therefore, you will comprehend that I viewed the whole with some little of the pride of her nation. I arrived, at least, without pre- judices against that which I should see, and was ready to open myself to such impressions as might come. 8 EDINBURGH. I know no city, where the lofty feelings, gene- rated by the ideas of antiquity, and the multi- tude of human beings, are so much swelled and improved by the admixture of those other lofty, perhaps yet loftier feelings, which arise from the contemplation of free and spacious nature herself Edinburgh, even were its population as great as that of London, could never be merely a city. Here there must always be present the idea of the comparative littleness of all human works. Here the proudest of palaces must be content to catch the shadows of mountains ; and the grandest of fortresses to appear like the dwell- ings of pigmies, perched on the very bulwarks of creation. Everywhere all around you have rocks frowning OA'er rocks in imperial elevation, and descending, among the smoke and dust of a city, into dark depths, such as nature alone can excavate. The builders of the old city, too, appear as if they had made nature the model of their architecture. Seen through the lowering mist which almost perpetually envelopes them, the huge masses of these erections, so high, so rugged in their outlines, so heaped together, and conglomerated and wedged into each other, are not easily to be distinguished from the yet larger and bolder forms of cliff and ravine, among which CALTON HILL, 9 their foundations have been pitched. There is a certain gloomy indistinctness in the formation of these fantastic piles, which leaves the eye, that would scrutinize and penetrate them, un- satisfied and dim with gazing. In company with the first friend I saw, (of whom more anon.) I proceeded at once to take a look of this superb city from a height, placed just over the point where the old and new parts of the town meet. These two quarters of the city, or rather these two neighbouring but dis- tinct cities, are separated by a deep green valley, which once contained a lake, and which is now crossed at one place by a huge earthen mound, and at another by a magnificent bridge of three arches. This valley runs off towards the ^estuary of the Forth, w^iich lies about a mile and a half from the city, and between the city and the sea there rises on each side of it a hill to the south that called Arthur's Seat to the north the lower and yet sufficiently commanding eminence on which I now stood the Calton Hill. This hill, which rises about 350 feet above the level of the sea, is, in fact, notliing more than a huge pile of rocks covered with a thin coating of soil, and, for the most part, with a bea\itiful verdure. It has lately been circled 10 CALTON HII.I,. all round with spacious gravelled walks, so that one reaches the summit without the least fa- tigue. It seems as if you had not quitted the streets, so easy is the ascent ; and yet where did streets or city ever afford such a prospect ! The view changes every moment as you proceed ; yet what grandeur of unity in the general and ultimate impression ! At first, you see only the skirts of the New Town, with apparently few pub- lic edifices, to diversify the grand imiformity of their outlines ; then you have a rich plain, with green fields, groves, and villas, gradually losing itself in the sea-port town of Edinburgh, Leith. Leith covers, for a brief space, the margin of that magnificent Frith, which recedes upwards among an amphitheatre of mountains, and opens downward into the ocean, broken everywhere by green and woody isles, excepting where the bare brown rock of the Bass lifts itself above the waters midway to the sea. As you move round, the Frith disappears, and you have Ar- thur's Seat in your front. In the valley be- tween lies Holyrood, ruined desolate but ma- jestic in its desolation. From thence the Old Town stretches its dark shadow up, in a line to the summit of the Castle rock a roval re- sidence at either extremity and all between EDINBURGH. 11 an indistinguishable mass of black tower-like structures the concentrated " walled city," v/hich has stood more sieges than I can tell of. Here we paused for a time, enjoying the ma- jestic gloom of this most picturesque of cities. A thick blue smoke hung low upon the houses, and their outlines reposed behind on ridges of purple clouds ; the smoke, and the clouds, and the murky air, giving yet more extravagant bulk and altitude to those huge strange dwell- ings, and increasing the power of contrast which met our view, when a few paces more brought us once again upon the New Town the airy bridge the bright green vale below and be- yond it and, skirting the line of the vale on either side, the rough crags of the Castle rock, and the broad glare of Prince's Street, that most superb of terraces all beaming in the open yel- low light of the sun steeples and towers, and cupolas scattered bright beneath our feet and, far as the eye could reach, the wliole pomp and richness of distant commotion the heart of the city. Such was my first view of Edinburgh. I de- scended again into her streets in a sort of stupor of atlmiration. 12 EDINBURGH. Excuse my troubling you with all this, now that I have written it ; but do not be alarmed with any fear, lest I should propose to treat you with much more of the same kind of diet. I have no intention to send you a description of the cities and scenery of Scotland. I refer you semel et simul to Sir John Carr and our dear countryman JNIr Pennant. I have always been " a fisher of men ;" and here also, I promise you, I mean to stick to my vocation. But enough for the present. Your's sincerely, P. M. P. S. You will observe by the date of my letter, I have already left the Black Bull. I write from one of the most comfortable hotels I ever was in, and have already ascertained the excellence of the port. 13 LETTEU II. TO THE SAME. Oman's^ March G. Deah David, Do you recollect W of Trinity ? I sus- pect not ; but you have heard of him a thousand times. And yet you may have met him at my rooms, or Xortli's ; for I think he determined, after you began to reside. At all events, you remember to have heard me describe his strano-e eccentric character his dissolute behaviour du- ring the first years of his residence his extrava- gant zeal of study afterwards last of all, the ab- surdity of his sudden elopement, without a de- o-ree, after havino; astonished the examinino; mas- ters by the splendid commencement of his exa- mination. The man is half-mad in some things ; and that is the key of the whole mystery. W and I were great friends during the 14 MR W . first terms I spent at Jesus. Pie bad gone to school at Harrow with my brother Samuel, and called on me the very day I entered. What a life was oiu-s in that thoughtless prime of our days ! Wc spent all the mornings after lecture in utter lounging eating ice at Jubb's flirt- ing with INliss Butler bathing in the Char- well, and so forth. And then, after dinner, we used to have our fruit and wine carried into the garden, (I mean at Trinity,) and there we sat, three or four of us, sipping away for a couple of hoiu's, under the dark refreshing shade of those old bcechen bowers. Evensong- was no sooner over, than ^ve would down to the Isis, and man one, or sometimes two of Mother Hall's boats, and so run races against each other, or some of our friends, to Iflfiey or Sandford. What lots of bread and butter we used to devoiu' at tea, and what delight we felt in rowing back in the cool misty evening sometimes the moon up long ere we reached Christ Church meadows again. A light supper cheese-and-bread and lettuces and a joyous bowl of Bishop these were the regular conclusion. I would give half I am worth to live one week of it over again. At that time, AV and I, Tom Vere (of Corpus,) and one Mli w . 15 or two more, were never separate above three or four hours in the day. I was on my way to deliver a letter of intro- duction to a young barrister of this place, when, in turning the corner of a street, my old friend, Will W , passed close at my elbow. I knew him in a moment, although he is greatly changed, and called after him. He turned round witii a fierce air, as if loth to be disturbed, (for he was evidently up to tiie chin in meditation ;) but, on recognizing liis ancient acquaintance, nothing could be more hearty than the kindness of his countenance. After a few hurried interrogations on both sides, diversified by scarcely any re- spouses on either, I took his arm and l)e*';an to explahi to him the purposes of my visit to a city in -\vhich he had so little expectation of see- ing me. He accompanied me immediately to the Calton Hill, of which I spoke in my last, and where, as he assured me, he spends at least one horn- every day when in Edinburgh. On coming down he carried me to the Hotel where I now am : and, having seen my baggage and horses fairly established, and walked a good deal about the town, we proceeded to his house, a\ liere I remained for the rest of tlie dav. I a;vsure 16 MR W . you this rencounter has afforded me the highest pleasure, and I doubt not it will be of infinite use to me, moreover for W is, perhaps, of all men, the very person I should have selected to act as my Cicerone in Scotland. Indeed, I wonder at myself for not having made more ac- curate enquiries about him before I set out ; but I had somehow got a confused idea in my head that he was resident in France or Germany, and really had never thought of him in relation to my ow^n schemes of visiting his country. He has already introduced me to several very pleasant fellows here. But before I describe his compa- nions, I must endeavour to give you some little notion of himself. After leaving Oxford vmder the strange cir- cumstances you have often heard me speak of, AV proceeded to the North, where he spent- several years in severe study, not a whit dis- couraged in his views, or shaken from his attach- ments, by the singular catastrophe to w^hich the constitutional and irresistible panic of a mo- ment had exposed him. He changed, however, but indeed it was scarcely possible for him to do otherwise, the course and tenor of his usual pur- suits ; passing for a time from the classics, with MU w . 17 the greater part of whom he had formed a pretty accurate acquaintance, and flinging himself over liead and ears into the very heart of Gothic an- tiquities, and the history, poetry, and romance of the middle ages. These he has quitted by fits and starts, and spent the intervals of their neglect in making himself far better skilled than is common in the modern literature of foreign countries, as well as of England ; but ever since, and Lip to this moment, they form the staple of his occupation the daily bread of his mind. lie lives almost continually in the days gone by, and feels himself, as he says, almost a stranger among matters which might be supposed to be nearer to him. And yet he is any thing but a stranger to the world he actually lives in ; al- though indeed he does perhaps regard not a few both of its men and its things, with some- what of the coldness of an unconcerned visitor. In short, for tlicre is no need to disguise the fact to you, he has nursed himself into such a fer- vent veneration for the thoughts and feelings of the more ancient times of iiis country and of ours, (for as to that matter he is no bigot,) that he cannot v/itness without a deep mixture of bile, the adoration paid by those around him to thoughts, feelings, and persons, for whom he en- voi. . I. B 18 ]Mii w . tertains, if not absolute, at the least no inconsi- derable comparative contempt. I have said that he is not a bigot, in regard to any old ideas of difference between his own country and ours. This I attribute in a great measure, certainly, to the course of study he has so devoutly pur- sued, and which could not have failed, in making him acquainted with tlie ancient condition of both countries, to reveal to him far more points of agreement than disam-eement between them. But a part of his liberality must also, I should think, be ascribed to the influence of his educa- tion in England, more particularly in Oxford ; his long residence in that noble city having fill- ed the finest part of his mind with reverent ideas, concerning both the old and the present gran- deur of England, such as can never be eradicated, nor even weakened, by any after experience of his life. Such, I suspect, from his conversation, to be the truth of the case ; and yet it is only from odd hints and suggestions, that I have made shift to gather so much, for, of all men living, he is the least chargeable with the sin of disser- tation, and I never heard him in my life give more than one sentence to the expression of any opinion he entertains. Having now succeeded to the family estate, MR \V . 19 whieli is a very ancient, and a tolerably produc- tive one, V\^ feels himself perfectly at liberty to pursue whatever mode of life is most agree- able to his fancy. He has travelled a good deal on the continent of Europe, and even penetrated into Asia ISlinor and Egypt, as far up as the Pyramids. These journies, however, could only have been undertaken for the purpose of grati- fying some very ardent curiosity, in regard to a few particular points connected with his former devotedness to classical learning ; and he now declares, that, unless he should be tempted to visit Spain for the sake of her cathedrals, he will never again leave the white cliffs behind him. He makes an annual or biennial trip to Lon- don ; but, with this exception, he is always to be found either at his old castle in Berwickshire, or here in Edinburgh, where he has a very snug house, although by no means in a fashionable part of the town. Erom a feeling of respect for liis ancestors, he refuses to ([uit the old family- residence, which is no other than a lodging up five ])air of stairs, in one of those huge aerial edifices of the Old Town edifices which some- times contain beneath a single roof a population, layer above layer, household above household, more numerous than that of many a street hi 20 MR ^v . many a tity south of the " ideal line." Here W still sits in the same enormously stuffed and prodigiously backed elbow-chair, and still reposes beneath the same antediluvian testers which served his grandfather, his great grandfa- ther, and all his generations back, for aught I know, to the days of Queen JMary ; it being on many occasions his most chosen boast, that the degradation which affects, in other houses, the blood of the race, has touched in his house no- thing but their furniture, and has not totally de- stroved even that. W ushered me into this remarkable habi- tation of his, not only without the least symp- tom of shame for its apparent obscurity, and the equally apparciit filth of its approach, but with a certain air of proud and haughty satisfaction, as if he w^ould have been ashamed to have con- ducted me to one of the newer, more commo- dious, and more elegant houses we had seen in the New Town. " The times are changed," says he, " since my grandfather, the Lord of Session, used to see fill the ladies of quality in Edinburgh in this old-fashioned hahitaculum. I desire to see none of them here now. I have a tailor for my neighbour immediately below me a cobler a tallow-chandler a dancing-master Mil \V . SI a jxrocer and a cowfeeder, are all betVv'een me and the street ; and above, God knows what store of washerwomen French teachers auc- tioneers midwivcs seamstresses and students of divinity, are between me and the chimney- top. But no matter. I have some claret, which is not too old to be tasteable ; and I shall make an endeavour to give you, at least, as good com- mons as you were used to at the Bachelor's table of Trinity.' I had no reason to complain of his fare, al- thouf>h I confess, v/hen the covers were first re- n.ioved, I was not without some apprehensions, that it might prove as JMethuselamitish as his dv/elling. Whether that might, or might not be, the provender was excellent. It consisted, pr'imo, of broth made from a sheep's head, with a co])ious infusion of parsley, and other condi- ments, v*iiich I found more than palatable, espe- cially alter, at my host's request, I added a spoon- ful or tvo of Burgess to it. Si'cioido, came the aforementioned sheep's head in propria per.soua the hair having been taken off, not by the knife, but by the hot-iron, and the skin retaining from this operation, not only an inky hue, wliich would astoimd an Exmoorian, but a deli(.'ioiis, oily, fragrant g'W'^to, worthy of ilQ MR W , being transferred, weauties and this is enough to atone ibr every thing. In the state- 30 EDIXBUllGH HOLYllOODHOL'SE. room also, the attendant pointed out a cypher, which she said was Mary's, but W told me, that, in fact, that room had been last fitted up for CliarlesI ,and that the cypher was composed of his initials, and those of his Queen Henrietta JNIaria. Here, then, is the bed in which INIary slept with Darnlcy the closet wliere Ilizzio was murdered the ante- chamber in which Knox insulted his sovereign, and made it his boast that he " cared little for the pleasant face of a gentlewoman." There are some portraits, and one exquisite one of JNIary htrself I mean an exquisitely beautiful portrait of some exquisite beauty for as to the real features of the lovely Queen, he must be a more skilful antiquarian than I pretend to be, who could venture any guess with res])ect to them. Even her eyes are represented of many different colours ; but this I only take as an evidence, that tliey were of that most delicious of all hues, if hue it may be called, that is as changeful as the cameleon the hazel. I think it is IMackenzie that raves somewhere so delightfully about those softest, and yet most queen-like of eyes. They have not indeed the dazzling sparkle of the Jew- ish or Italian black, neither have they the ves- tal calmness of the blue but they are the only eyes in the world that have the v/atery swim- EDINBURGH HOLYllOODHOUSE. 31 ming lustre of conscious weakness and when they can change this for the fire of command, and flash annihilation from their contracting lids, what eyes can be compared to them, or what eyes could be so fitting for Mary ? The portrait is very beautiful indeed, but it is only a miniature, and by no means satisfies my imaginntion so much as that in the picture gallery of the Bodleian. There is nothing I should like better than to ascertain the real his- tory of tliat painting. It is so softly executed, that, at first sight, one would suppose it to be done in water colours, and to be covered with a glass. But it is in oils, and on a very old piece of oak (for I once took it down to examine it). It strikes me, that tliey used to tell some story about its having been painted by a nun before ^Mary left France; but I suspect the tradition of its history is very vague and uncertain. I think, however, the ])icture carries nuich more of the air of rea- Hty about it than any I have seen. AV^hat lux- urious pensiveness in the lips ! what irresistible melting radiance in the eyes the eye-lids how beautifully oval ; the eye-lashes how-long, liow tender I there was nobody ever invented the like except Correggio But I forget that I am not talking to \V , who ^vould fain, ii 10 32 EDINBURGH HOLYROODHOUSE. he could, make not only a beauty, but a saint of her. There is also a fine portrait of Charles I. one of the many, many masterly Vandykes. The king is in a riding habit ; he has the same in- describable look of majesty and melancholy which makes it impossible for any man to look upon it without wondering by what process of brutalizing, even a Cromwell or a Ih'adshaw should ever have learned to regard the origi- nal without the reverence of humility. How could any common mortal feel otherwise than abashed in the presence of that " grey discrown- ed head ? ' And Charles kept his court here too for a time, and Laud preached, and Rothes flat- tered, and the Presbyterians themselves looked smoothly on all the pageants of his state. What a different kind of journey he lived to make hither, and what a different kind of return to his AVhitehall ! Some spacious, but uncomfortable looking apartments in the nevrer part of the quadrangle, were occupied by the Bourbon princes during their stay liere. I saw the Priedieu used by INIonsieur, and many other little relics of their Ca- tholic devotion ; but in truth, I neither felt, nor pretended to feel, either curiosity or interest about EDINBURGH HOLYROODHOUSE. 33 tracing the footsteps of these gentlemen. I have seen these younger sprigs of the lily, and with all my respect for the good old king himself, I wish the lily were rid of a few of its incum- brances. I shall write very soon again, and I hope in a more amusing way. Your's ever, P. M. P. S. I forgot to mention the only inhabi- tants of this Palace, or rather of its precincts, are gentlemen, who find it convenient to take ad- vantage of the sanctuary, still afforded by the royalty of the soil. All around the Palace it- self, and its most melancholy garden, there are a variety of little miserable patchwork dwellings, inhabited by a considerable population of gen- try, who prefer a residence here to one in a jail. They have abundance of room here within their limits, for the whole of Arthur's Scat is, I be- lieve, considered as part of the royal domain. However, they emerge into the town of a Sun- day ; and I am told some of them contrive to cut a very fashionable figure in the streets, while the catch- poles, in obedience to the command- ment, " rest from working." VOL. I. c 84. LETTER IV. TO THE SAME. March 20. I BELIEVE, that had I given myself up entire- ly to the direction of my friend W , I should have known, up to this hour, very little about any part of Edinburgh more modern than the Canongate, and perhaps heard as little about any worthies she has produced since the murder of Archbishop Sharpe. He seemed to consider it a matter of course, that, morning after morning, the whole of my time ought to be spent in exa- mining the structure of those gloomy tenements in wynds and closes, which had, in the old time, been honoured with the residence of the haughty Scottish barons, or the French ambassadors and generals, their constant visitors. In vain did I assure him, that houses of exactly the same sort were to be seen in abundance in the city of Lon- don, and that even I myself had been wearied of counting the ffnf?;s--(/('-/i,\ carved on every roof Jill W -. 35 and chimney-piece of a green-grocer's habitation in INIincing-lane. Of such food, in his estima- tion, there could be no satiety ; every land had its coat-of-arms, and every quartering called up to his memory the whole history of some unfor- timate amour, or still more unfortunate marriage in so much that, had I taken accurate notes of all his conversation, I am persuaded I might, before this time, have been in a condition to fill more sheets than you might be likely to peruse, with all the mysteries of the causes celehres^ or, to speak more plainly, of the Scandalous Chro- nicle of Scotland. What horrors of barbarism what scenes of murder, rape, incest seem to have been the staple commodities of week-day life among these ferocious nobles ! But, in good truth, I did not come to Scotland to learn such things as these ; and although a little sprinkling of them might be very well in its way, I soon found it expedient to give my good friend a slight hint, that I wished he could contrive to afford me somethhig else for the main woof ot my meditations He begins to understand my drift, and will, I think, learn to accommo- date himself to my humovn*, pas-a-pas. Notwithstanding all his devotion to the past. 36 ]MR w . indeed, he is far from being an unconcerned or inept observer of more modern things and I have already said as much. He is quite au faif, I have found, in regard to the history and per- formances of all the leading characters of the present day in Scotland ; but, unless when ques- tions are put to him, he seems, with a very few exceptions, to make a point of never alluding to their existence. It would appear as if he was not over anxious to remember that such people are ; but when the conversation actually turns on them and their merits, he expresses himself apparently in no uncandid manner concerning the least and in a tone of genuine admiration concerning the greatest of them. But I despair of making you comprehend the vagaries of such an oriorinal. I wish you had a few minutes' use of the ma- gical mirror, if it were only that you might en- joy one view of him, as he sits wrapped up in his huge blue velvet robc-dc-chambrc, with a night-cap of the same, dashing execrations by the dozen u])on the whigs, the presbytcrians, and the Kdinburgh reviev. crs ; for his splenetic imagination jumbles them all together disjecta membra poetae in one chaos of abomination. MR w . 37 Could one enter into his premises of prejudice, one might perhaps find less difficulty in joining in his sweeping sentences of conclusion. He considers whiggery as having been the ruin of the independence of his country, and as form- ing, at this moment, the principal engine for de- grading the character of his countrymen. I own I am rather at a loss to discover what lie means by " whiggery," (for he never deigns to give a definition ;) and all I know of the matter is, that it is something for which he equally vituperates JMr Halkston of llathillet, and JNJr Francis Jeffrey, two persons, between whom, I suspect, few other people would find many circumstances of resemblance, and each of whom, I am quite sure, would disdain, with all his might, the idea of being coupled with the other. ^Vhat you or I might be apt to desig- nate by the same term, would, I am certain, co- incide in very few points with any notion he may happen to affix to it. But, perchance, we may be able to get a little more light as we go on. In the mean time, W has gone into the country for a few days, upon some of his county politics. I wished to have gone with him, but had caught a vile cold, and did not care 38 MR W for aggravating it. I shall have more leisure to write during his absence ; so expect a long let- ter next time. P.M. 39 LETTEU v. TO LADY JOHNES. DexVR Aunt, You ask me to speak more particularly con- cerning the external aspect and manners of the people among whom I am sojourning. I wish it were as easy for me to satisfy your curiosity on some other points mentioned in your last let- ter, as on this. The Scots are certainly rather a hard-favoured race than otherwise ; but I think their looks are very far from meriting the sort of common-place sarcasms their southern neighbours are used to treat them with. Indeed, no one who has seen a Scots regiment, as I should suppose you must have done, can possibly be of opinion that they are at all an ugly nation ; although it is very likely he may be inclined to prefer the general a[))K>arance of some other nation or nations to 40 SCOTTISH PEASANTRY. theirs. For my part, I am not without suspicion, that a little longer residence among them might teach me to become an absolute admirer of their physiognomies ; at least, I am sensible, that the slight repugnance I felt for them at first, has already very considerably given way. What the Scottish physiognomists are used to talk of, with the highest satisfaction, is the air of superior intelligence stamped on the faces of their countrymen of the lower orders of so- ciety ; and indeed there is no question, a Scot- tish peasant, with his long dry visage, his sharp prominent cheekbones, his grey twinkling eyes, and peaked chin, would seem a very Argus, if set up close beside the sleek and ponderous chub- biness of a Gloucestershire farmer to say no- thing of the smarter and ruddier oiliness of some of our own country folks. As to the matter of mere acuteness, however, I think I have seen faces in Yorkshire, at least a match for any thing to be found further to the north. But the mere shrewdness of the Scotch peasant's face, is only one part of its expression ; it has other things, I should in:iagine, even more peculiarly character- istic. The best place to study their faces in is the kirk; it is there that tlie sharpness of tlicir disceriniient SCOTTISH PEASANTRY. 41 is most vehemently expressed in every line for they are all critics of the sermon, and even of the prayers ; but it is there also that this sharp- ness of feature is most frequently seen to melt away before emotions of a nobler order, which are no less peculiarly, though far less perminent- ly theirs. It is to me a very interesting thing to witness the struggle that seems to be perpe- tually going on between the sarcastic and reveren- tial elements of their diposition how bitterly they seem to rejoice in their own strength, when they espy, or think they espy, some chink in the armour of their preacher's reasoning; and then with what sudden humility they appear to bow themselves into the dust, before some single solitary gleam of warm affectionate eloquence the only weapon tiiey have no power to resist. If I mistake not, it is in this mixture of sheer speculative and active hard-headedness, with the capacity of so much lofty enthusiasm concerning things intangible, that we must seek for the true differential quality of the Scottish peasants. I shall have abundant occasion to return to this liereafter. The gentlemen of this part of the country have assuredly bv no means the same advan- 42 SCOTTISH GENTRY. tages over those of the south, which the Scotch peasants have over the English. I know not al- together to what these advantages enjoyed by the lower orders may be owing ; their better edu- cation is of course the first and most obvious source their more sterile soil and, consequent- ly, their less luxurious life, may be others almost as efficient. Above all, the picturesque aspect of their ever various landscapes, cannot fail to exert a powerful influence on the opening mind of their youth. But in some of these things, at least, the peasantry of particular districts in Eng- land share abundantly, and I think there are some pretty extensive tracts on the continent where the Avhole of these circumstances, or very nearly so, are found acting together, without producing any such similarity of effect as might have been expected, I suspect that we must go further back if vre would ai'rive at any satis- factory solution Of this too hereafter. The gentry, hov/cver, have no pretensions to a more intelligent exterior than their neighbours of the south. The truth is, that certain indica- tions of worldly quicksightedness, \vhich please on the llice, and in the air of a peasant, produce quite a dilFcrcnt effect when exhibited in the SCOTTISH GENTRY. 43 case of a person of superior rank. One rather wishes to see these things kept under in the ap- pearance of a person of education, than suspects their non-existence in the totality of his charac- ter. Without wanting their due proportion of the national enthusiasm, the Scottish gentry seem to shew much fewer symptoms of it than those below them ; and this is a sufficiently natural re- sult of their sense of their own comparative im- portance. It is a result, notwithstanding, which tends to make any thing but a favourable im- pression on the mind of a stranger. High and low, they are, for the most part, a race of tall, well-formed people ; active of limb, and powerful of muscle ; leaner by far than the English; (for here a very fat man is stared at, and one of such bulk as is met with at every corner in T>ondon, must, it would seem, lay his account with a little quizzing from all his friends on tlie subject of his obesity.) In their gait and gestures, tl:cy have neither the vivacity of tlie Frenchman, nor the noble gravity of the Spa- niard, nor the stable heavv vi^'our of the Euixlish- man ; but a certain grotesque mixture of elasti- city and scdatencss, vdiich is sufficient to ])rovc llieir desc'ont iVom a luirdv and wavlike set of Diaraiidcrs. iho rflcctN of wliosc v//.%'////7V' exist- 44 SCOTTISH WOMEN. ence have not yet been washed out by any great influx of idleness or luxury ; and, at the same time, under favour, to remind one with what zeal these progenitors exerted all their energies, in behalf of the most taciturn species of fanati- cism that was ever made subservient to the pur- poses of ghostly ambition. When a man visits France, whether he be a believer or a despiser of the doctrine of the Spurzheims, he must look long around him before he can find any face which he could imagine to be the property of one lineally sprung from the loins of the Bay- ards and the Duguesclins, or, if you will, of the Harlays, and the Du Thous. But here the de- terioration of the species, if such there be, has scarcely begun to tell upon their physiognomies ; and you meet, at every stej:), persons who have that about them which would prevent you from being at all astonished, if you should be told im- mediately afterwards, that they coidd trace them- selves, without difficulty, to the Burleighs and the Claverhouses, I had almost said, the Bell- the-Cats, and the Kirkpatricks. I have not, as yet, seen a great deal of the wo- men. Those, even of the peasantry, seem, when young, to be comely and well-complexioned ; but it is a great mistake tt) suppose that they SCOTTISH WOMEN. 45 are fairer than with us. And yet the testimony of travellers cannot be entirely despised ; and if their report is in any degree a correct one, light hair, and light eyes, were almost universal at no very remote period. This is a circum- stance that has often appeared to me to be very inadequately accounted for, I mean the great and remarkable change that has taken place in the complexions not only of the Scotch, but of the English, and indeed of all the Gothic nations of Europe. When the Romans first became ac- quainted ^vith the (Tcrmans and the Britons, there can be no question that both the gentle- men and the ladies of those nations had yellow locks and blue eyes ; and you have heard, no doubt, that the Koman belles, stimulated, it is to be suspected, l)y the stories of their campaign- ing husbands and lovers, endeavoured, by a thou- sand tricks of the toilette, to muster charms as nearly as they could in the same taste. You well know, that the ]\[essalinas and Poppajas used to cut off the finest black curls in the world, to make room for false tetcs manufactured from the hair of the poor girls of the Sicambri and the Eatavi, while others strove to produce the same sort of effect by means of hair-powder made of gold-dust, and washes, of more cunning chemis- -[() SCOTTISH WOMEN. try than I would undertake to describe. Even in far later times, so late as Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, Erasmus and Paul Henztner repre- sent the ladies of England as being, with very few exceptions, blondes ; and such, if voyagers of less illustrious reputation " may be in aught believed," not much above a hundred years ago, were the far greater portion of the beaux and belles of Scotland. *' Sandy-haired" is still one of the standing epithets applied to the ideal Scot, by all inex- perienced persons, who introduce any descrip- tion of him into novels or satires witness Churchill, and a thousand of less note ; and I confess, that I was myself prepared to find the case much more as they have represented it, than I really have done. Ey looking around me at home, and remembering what the old writers had said of ourselves, I might have learned to be more sus2:)icious of their accuracy ; but the truth is, I had never taken the pains to think much about the matter. In fact, they are now as far from being a light-haired people as we arc. I amused myself (God forgive me) with counting the number of fair heads last Sunday in a very crowded church, and, I assure you, thev did not amount to one in fiftv. There are SCOTTISH wo:\iEN. 47 far more people here with locks of all but Is- raelitish blackness, than of any shade that could with propriety be called either white, yellow, or red ; and the general hues are exactly the same variations of brown, between Bistre and Burnt Sienna, which we are accustomed to in the south. I was at a large party yesterday evening the first sight I have had of the gay world here and had an opportunity of viewing, at my leisure, all the fashionable belles of the town. You always accuse me of being too undistin- guishing an admirer ; but, I am sure, even you would have allowed that there w^as no want of beauty. It is many years since I have been fa- miliar with the heau-monde of London, but I do not believe I ever, in any one evening there, saw a greater number of fine women, and of very different kinds too. I had heard before I went that I shoidd see jNIiss * * * * *, the same ce- lebrated star of whom you ha^e so often heard Sir Thomas speak, and who, indeed, cannot shew herself anywhere, even in this unromantic age, without leaving an uncfFaceable impression on all that behold her. I confess the description the knight used to give of her appeared to me to be a little liii>li-liown : but ' seeing' is belie- 48 SCOTTISH WOMEN. ving" the world has assuredly only one ****. I looked round a room crowded with lovely women, but my eye was fixed in a moment ; and I never thought of askinp' which was she. The first view I had was a profile. I had no suspicion that nature could still form counte- nances upon that heavenly model. The fore- head, high and clear, descends almost without a curve into the nose, and that again drops into the mouth with such bold defined elegance of lineament, as I should scarcely have believed to be copied from living beauty, had I met with it in some masterpiece of sculpture. The lips have such a delicate precision of form, and such an expression of divine simplicity in their smile, that one could almost believe they had never admitted any grosser diet than ambrosia ; but the full oval sweep of the cheek and chin, and the mode in which these are carried down into the neck, are, perhaps, the most truly antique parts of the whole. And then such hair such long luxurious tresses of radiant brown, braided with such serene grace upon that meek fore- head ! If you have seen Canova's testa cV He- lena, you may form some notion of those most exquisite curls. The colour of her eyes I could not ascertain : I suspect they are dark grey, or SCOTTISH WOMEN. 49 liazel ; but the redundant richness of her eye- lashes gives them all that glossy splendour which oriental beauties borrow from their Sirme. Eut, indeed, colour is a small matter in eyes enchased so deeply beneath such majestic brows. I think Lucretius himself would have admitted, that the spirit must be immortal on which so glorious a tenement has been bestowed ! With this divine exception, I must do the men the justice to say, that the most beautiful women in the room v/ere all matrons. Had she been absent, there were two or three of these on whom all my enthusiasm might well have been expended ; and one, JNlrs **^ **-:^, whose graceful majesty was such, that when I met her next evening in a smaller assembly, I almost began to susj^ect myself of having been too exclusive in my deification. But 1 have already said more than I should have ventured on to almost any other of your sex a great deal more than 1 should have dared to write, far less s[)eak to my cousin, to whom 1 beg you will present the Immble duty of Her slave, cVc. c^C. r. M. vol.. 1. 1) 50 LADTKS' DBESS. P. S. By way of pleasing Jane, you may tell her that I do not think the Scottish ladies are at all good dressers. They are very gorgeous I never saw such a display of crimson velvet, and ostrich feathers, and diamond necklaces, except once at a birth- day. But the fashions have ^ long cold journey before they reach.Kdinburgh, - and I think they do not regain the sa;ne easy hit - which they have before they begin their travels. They are apt to overdo every thing, particularly that vik^st and most umiatural of all fashions, the saddle or I know not v;hat you call it whicji is at present permitted to destroy so much of the back, and indeed, to give so much mean- ness to the whole air. They say the scrophula brought in the high sliirt-collars of the men and the Spectator gives some equally intelligible account of the fardingalc. Pray, what hunch- backed countess was she that had wit enough to bring the saddle into vogue ? I think all the three fashions are equally abominable, and tlie two of tliem that still remain should be A^oted out by the clcini-skiimcd aiid straight-backed, who, I hope, are still the major ])art of the com- munity. But, lie sator ullra crcp'idam * * * P. M ^ LETTER VT. TO THE llEV. DAVID WILLIAMS. Dear David, Although my sole piir])osc, or nearly so, in Qoniinfj^ to Scotland, was to see and converse with the illustrious men who live here, I have been in l^klinburgh for a fortnight, and can scarce- ly say that I have as yet seen even the faces of most of them. AVhat with lounoino- about in the mornings with W , and claret in the evening, and routs and balls at night, I fear I am fast getting into a very unprofitable life. The only very great man here, to whom I had letters of introduction, was S , and he hap- pened to go out of town for a few weeks, I be- lieve the very day after my arrival. I forward- ed my letter to him in the country, however, and lie lias in^itcd me to pay him a visit there, at the castle he lias ju^t built u])on the banks of 52 ^IR .T . the Tweed. He has been so attentive, more- over, as to send me letters for JNIr M the M-du of Feeling, JMr J , IMr P , and several other men of note, on both sides of the question ; so that I shall now see as much as I please of all the Dons. I shall take the op- portunity of W 's absence, to call upon all these gentlemen ; for, excepting Mr S and jNlr j^l , he has no acquaintance with any of them. I believe, indeed, there is little love lost betv ee.'i bim and them and I wish to see things Avith my own eyes. Of all the celebrated characters of this place, I rather understand that J is tlie one whom travellers are commonly most in a hurry to see not sure!} , that the world, in general, has any such deei) atui abiding feeling of admiration for Ilia], or iiny such longiiig to satisfy their eyes witii gazing on his featiu'es, as they have with rei;ard to such a nicUi as S . or even St 1 ; bat I think the interest felt with respect to him is of a more vivacious and eager kind, and they rush with all speed to gratify it exactly as men give immediate vent to their ])ettv passions, who have no difllculty, or rather, indeed, who have a sort of ])lcasure, in nursiiig silently, and conceal- ing long, those of a more serious and graA e im- MR J . 53 portance. A few years ago, I should perhaps have been more inclined to be a sharer in this violent sort of impatience ; but even now I ap- proached the residence of J with any feelings assuredly rather than those of indiffer- ence. He was within when I called, and in a second I found myself in the presence of this bugbear of authors. He received me so kindly, (although, from the appearance of his room, he seemed to be immersed in occupation,) and asked so many questions, and said and looked so much, in so short a time, that I had some difficulty in col- lecting my inquisitorial powers to examine the person of the man. I know not how, there is a kind of atmosphere of activity about him ; and. my eyes caiight so much of the prevailing s})irit, that tliey darted for some minutes from object to object, and refused, for the first time, to settle themselves even u])on the features of a mini of genius to them, of all human things, the most potent attractions. I find that the common prints give a very in- adequate notion of his appearance The artists of this day are such a set of cowardlv tciiows, that they never dare to give the truth as it is in 54 jiK J . nature ; and the consequence is, after all, that they rather take from, than add to, the impres- siveness oi' the faces they would flatter. AVhat a small matter is smoothness of skin, or even regu- larity of feature, in the countenance that Nature has formed to be the index of a powerful intel- lect ? Perhaps I am too much of a connoisseur to be a fair judge of such matters ; but I am very sure, that the mere handsomeness of a great man is one of the last things abont him that fixes my attention. I do not wish, neither, to deny, that, when I first saw Goethe, the sublime simplicity of his Homeric beauty the awful pile of fore- head the large deep eyes, with their melancholy lightnings the whole countenance, so radiant with divinity, Avould have lost much of its power, had it not been, at the same time, the finest spe- cimen of humanity I had ever beheld ; neither woidd I conceal the immeasureable softness of delight which mingled Avith my reverence, when I detected, as if by intuition, in the midst of the whole artists of St lAike's, the Hyperion curls, and calm majestic lineaments, which could be nobody's but Canova's. ihit although l)eauty never exists in vain, there is nothina" more cer- MR J . .^'t tain lli.'Ui tliat its absence is scarcely perceived by tiiose who are capable of discoverino- and en- joy ing the marks of things more precious than beauty. Could all our countrymen of the pre- sent time, of very great reputation for talents or genius, be brought together into a single room, their physiognomies would, I doubt not, form as impressive a groupe as can ^vell be imagined ; but, among the whole, there w^ould scarcely be more than one face which any sculptor might be au^bitious of imitating on marble. J \s countenance could not stand such a test. To catch the minutest elements of its eloquent pov.er. would, I think, be a hard er.ougli task for any painter, and indeed, as I have already told V'ou, it lias T^irovcd too hard a task for such as have yet attempted it. It is a face which any man would prjis Vv'ith- out observation in a crovrd, because It is small and swarthy, aiid entirely devoid of lofty or com- manding outlines and besides, his stature is so low, that he might walk close under your chin or mine without ever catching tlie eye even for a moment. However, h.e is scarcelv sliorter llian C*am])bell ; aiul :Oii!e inclies taller than 'l\)m IMoore, or the bile 31onk Lewis. 1 re- member Lord Clarendon somewhere takes no- 56 MR J . tice, that in his age, (the prime manhood of English intellect, as Coleridge calls it,) a very large pro})ortion oF the remaikable men were very short in stature. Such, if my memory serves me, were Hales, and Chillingworth, and Sifhiey Godolphin, and Lord Falkland himself, who ui-]ed., 1 think, to say, that it Vv'as a great ingredient into his friendship for I\Ir Godol- phin, that he was pleased to be in his company^ where he was the properer man. In our owni time, we have more than one striking instance of the " Mens viciffna in corpore parvo ;" Buo- iiaparte himself for one ; and by the way, he is the only little man I ever saw, who seemed to be unconscious, or careless, or disdainful of the circumstance. Almost all other persons of that description appear to labour under a continual and distressing feeling that nature has done them iri^justice, and not a few of them strive to make up for her defects, by holding their heads as high as possible, and even giving an uncomfort- able elevation or projection to the chin, all which lias a very mean effect upon their air and atti- tude, and is particularly hurtful to the features of tiic face, moreover, because it tends to re- verse the iirrangement of Nature, and to throw all those parts into light which she has meant to ^rpt .T . 57 be in slindc. It is exuv'tly the same sort of thing that we all remark on the stage, M'here the ab- surd manner in wliieli the lamps are placed, nn- der the feet of the performers, has snch a de- structive effect, that fe-.v actors, except those of the Kemble blood, apj)ear to have any better than snub noses. Nov/, Napoleon has not the least of tliis trick ; but, on tlu? contrary, carries bis head almost constantly in a stoo})ing posture, and so preserves and even increases the natural effect of his grand formation about tije eye- brows, and the beautiful classical cut of his mouth and chin though, to be sure, his fea- tures are so fine that nothing could take much from their power. But, to come back to our own small men, J has a (jood deal of this unhappy manner, and so loses much of what his features, such as they are, might be made to convey. 1 have heard many persons say, that the first sight of Mr J disappointed them, and jar- red with all the ideas they had previously form- ed of his genius and character. Perhaps the very first glance of this celebrated person produced something of the same effect upon my own mind ; but a mimite or two of contemplation sufficed to restore me to tlie whole of my faith 58 Mil J . in pliysiognoiny. Peo])le may dispulc as mucli as they please about particular features, and their effect, hut I have been all my life a stu- dent of " tlie human face divine," and I have never yet met with any countenance which did not perfectly harmonize, so far as 1 could have opportunity of ascertaining, with the intellectual conformation and habits of the man that bore it. l^ut T must not alknv myself to be seduced into a disquisition I shall rather try my hand at a portrait. jMr J , then, as I have said, is a very short, and very active-looking man, with an ap- pearance of extraordinary ^ivacity in all his mo- tions and gestures. His face is one which can- not be luidcrstood at a single look perhaps it requires, as it certainly invites, a long and an- xious scrutiny before it lays itself open to the gazer. The features are neitlier handsome, nor even very defined in their outlines ; and yet tlic effect of the w^hole is as striking as any arrange- ment either of more noble or more marked fea- tures, which ever came under my view. The forehead is very singularly shaped, describing in its bend from side to side a larger segment of a circle than is at all common ; compressed below the temples almost as nnich as Sterne's ; and MR J . 50 thro^ving out sinuses above the eyes, of an ex- tremely bold and compact structure. The hair is XQvy black and wiry, standing in ragged brist- ly clumps out from the upper ])art of his head, but lying close and firm lower down, especially about the ears. Altogether it is pictures(|ue, and adds to the effect of the visaoe. The nioutli is the most expressive part of his face, as I be- lieve it is of every face. The lips are very firm, but they tremble and vibrate, even when brought close together, in such a way as to give the idea of an intense, never-ceasing phiy of mind. There is a delicate kind of sneer almost always upon them, which has not the least appearance of ill- temper about it, but seems to belong entirely to the speculative imderstanding of the man. I have said, that tlie mouth is tlie most expressive part of his face and, in one sense, this is the truth, for it is certainly the scat of all its rapid and transitory expression. But what speaking thiniis are his eves ! They disdain to be aoitated with those lesser emotions which pass over the lips ; they reserve their fierce and dark energies for matters of more moment ; once kindled with the heat of any passion, how they beam, Hash upon Hash I The scintillation of a star is 60 ]\rR J . not more fervid. Perhaps, notwithstanding of this, tlieir repose is even more worthy of atten- tion. AVith the capacity of emitting such a flood of radiance, they seem to take a pleasure in banishing every ray from their black, inscru- table, glazed, tarn-like circles. I think their prevailing language is, after all, rather a melan- choly tlian a merry one it is, at least, very full of n^flection. Such is a faint outline of this countenance, the features of which (to say no- thing at all of their expression,) have, as yet, baffled every attempt of the portrait-painters ; and which, indeed, bids very fair, in my opinion, to leave no image behind it either on canvass or on copper. A sharp, and, at the same time, very deep-toned voice a very bad pronunciation, but accompanied with very little of the Scotch accent a light and careless manner, exchanged now and then for an infinite variety of more earnest expression and address this is as much as I could carry a^vay from my first visit to " the wee rcekit dcil," as the Inferno of Altesi- dora has happily called him. I have since seen a great deal more of him, and have a great deal more to tell you, but my paper is done. P. M. Mn J . 61 P. S. I am to (line with J to-morrow at his country house, about three miles from Edin- l)uroli, and shall give you a full account of the pnrty in my next. G2 LETTER VIT, TO THE SAME. Beau Datid, Since I came to this town the weather has in general been of a very unpleasant kind. When you look out from the windows of your apart- ment, nothing can be finer than the appearance every thing presents. The air is as clear as am- ber overhead, and the sun shines with so much pov/er, that in these splendid streets, the division of the bright from the shadowy part, reminds one of the richest effects of a Cuyp, or a Sachtleevcn. Eut when you come out, in the full trust inspi- red by this brilliant serenity of aspect, you find yourself woefully disappointed. The action of the sun ;ind air upon the nerves, is indeed de- VISIT TO M\\ J . C)2 light fully stimulant ; but the whole charm is destroyed belbre you have time to enjoy it, by some odious squall of wind which cuts you to tlie teeth and what is worse, comes loaded with a vvhole cloud of flying dust and gravel, which is sure to leave its traces behind it, on still more delicate parts of your physiognomy. As for myself, I am often oblif^cd to walk ^vith a hand- kerchief held before my eyes and in spite of all my precautions, I have been several times in such a state, that I have absolutely rubbed mvself blind. The whole of this arises from the want of watering the streets a thing which might surely be accomplished without the least difiiculty, by a subscription among the inhabi- tants. If this evil be so severe at present, what nuist it be in the dog-days ? and yet the people submit to it all cpuetly in streets, below every- one of which, they know water is flov\'ino- in ])i|)es, ready to be scattered (((/ /'thlinui, and at an expense not worthy of being mentioned. " O ! rcL'ca.s homhuuii nie/N'r.s !'' ^'esterday, liowevcr, tliere Vv'as an umisual degree of ([uietncss in the state of the atmos- ])lk're. A sligiit shower, v^'hicli fell in tiie njorn- iii:', liail laid 'i'le mest olfcnsiw* i);!rl of the dust. 64 without giving tlie legist appearance of clamp to the roads and I drove to C k, Mr J 's villa, molio gusfosamente the expectation of tlie manifold luxuries I hoped to enjoy there the prospective delights both of palate and in- tellect being heightened and improved by the preliminary gratification I tasted, while the shandrydan rolled along between the refreshed green of the meadows and corn-fields. His house is an old tiirreted mansion, much patched in the uhole mass of its structure, and, I believe, much increased in its accommodations since he entered upon possession of it. The situation is extremely beautiful. There are very icw trees immediately about the house ; but the windows open upon the side of a charming hid, which, in all its extent, as far as the eye can reach, is wooded most luxuriantly to the very summit. There cannot be a more delicious rest for the eyes, than such an Arcadian height in this bright and budding time of the year ; but, indeed, where, or at what time, can a fine wood be look- ed upon without delight ? Between the wood and the house, there is a good garden, and some fields, in the cultivation of which INIr J seems to take much pleasure ; for I had no I'jjorr.ssuKs r and l . ()] sooner arrived, tliaii he insisted upon carrying me over his ditches and hedges to show me his metliod of farming ; and, indeed, talked of Swe- dish turnip, and Fiorin grass, and red-blossomed potatoes, in a style that would have done no dis- honour to your friend Curwen himself I had come, thanks to my rustic ignorance, exactly at the hour appointed for dinner, (five o'clock,) so that I had three parts of an hour of the great man entirely to myself during the whole of which space he continued to talk about rural af- fairs, and to trot me up one field and down an- other, till I was weary, without {credite jjosferi !) making one single allusion to law, politics, or literature. AVe were joined towards six o'clock by Pro- fessors P and L , and one or two young advocates, who had walked out with them. Then came 11 iNI , whom you remember at 15allio], a relation and intimate friend of J 's lie and the celebrated orator Alison officiate together in one of the Episcopalian chapels in Edinburoh. Althoui>:h we never knew each other at Oxford, yet we immediately recognized each other's old High-.Street faces, and began to claim a sort of acquaintance on that score. >oi.. 1. r. 62 C K. LEAPINC;. as all Oxonian contemporaries, I believe, are ac- customed to do, when they meet at a distance from their alma mate?\ There were several other gentlemen, mostly of grave years, so that I was not a little astonished, when somebody proposed a trial of strength in leaping. Nor was my asto- nishment at all diminished, when INIr P be- gan to throw off his coat and waistcoat, and to prepare himself for taking his part in the contest. When he did so much, I could have no apology, so I also stripped ; and, indeed, the whole party did the same, except J alone, who was dressed in a short green jacket, with scarcely any skirts, and, therefore, seemed to consider himself as already sufficiently " accinctus ludo." I used to be a good leaper in my day wit- ness the thousands of times I have beat you in the Port-Meadow, and elsewhere but I cut a very poor figure among these sinewy Caledo- nians. With the exception of L , they all jumped wonderfully ; and J w^as quite mi- raculous, considering his brevity of stride. But the greatest wonder of the whole was Mr P . He also is a short man, and he cannot be less than seventy, yet he took his stand with the as- surance of an athletic, and positively beat every one of us the very best of us, at least half a AIR V . 63 heel's breadth. I was quite thunderstruck, ne- ver having heard the least hint of his being so great a geometrician in this sense of the word. I Avas, however, I must own, agreeablij surprised by sudi a specimen of buoyant spirit and mus- cular strength in so venerable an old gentleman, and could not forbear from complimenting him on his revival of the ancient peripatetic ideas, about the necessity of cultivating the external as well as the internal energies, and of mixing the activity of the practical with that of the con- templative life. He took what I said with great suavity ; and, indeed, I have never seen a better specimen of that easy hilarity and good humour, which sits with so much gracefulness on an ho- noured old age. I wish I could give you a no- tion of his face. It is not marked by any very striking features ; but the unison of mildness of disposition, and strength of intellect in the ex- pression, is too remarkable to be unnoticed even by a casual observer. His habits of profound thought have drawn some deep lines about his mouth, and given him a custom of holding his lips very closely shut, otherwise I suspect the whole countenance would have been nothing more than an amiable one ; although the light eyes have certainly at times something very 64 J\IR L . piercing in their glance, even through his spec- tacles. The forehead is very finely developed singularly broad across the temples, as, according to Spurzheim, all mathematical foreheads must be ; but the beauty in that quarter is rather of an ad clerum character, or, as Pindar hath it, TTPcc to srot.t I, however, who really, in good earnest, begin to believe a little of the system, could not help re- marking this circumstance ; and more particu- larly so, because I found JNIr L 's skull to possess many of the same features above all, that of the breadth between the temples. This other great mathematician is a much younger man than P ; but his hair is already be- ginning to be grey. He is a very fat heavy fi- gure of a man, without much more appearance of strength than of activity ; and yet, although a bad leaper, by no means a slothful-looking per- son neither. He has very large eyes, in shape not unlike Coleridge's, but without the least of the same mysterious depth of expression. Alto- gether, his face is one which, at first sight, you would pronounce to be merely a coarse one ; ]\ms J . 65 but in which, once informed to whom it belongs, you are at no loss to discover a thousand marks of vigorous intellect and fancy too. Of this last quality, indeed, his eyes are at all times full to overflowing. In the midst of the sombre gravity of his usual look, there are always little flashes of enthusiasm breaking through the cloud, and, I think, adorning it ; and, in this respect, he forms a striking contrast to the calm, tranquil uniformity of ]Mr P 's physiognomy and deportment. In thinking of this afterwards, I could not help recollecting a great many passages of richly -coloured writing in his scientific Essays in the Edinburgh Review, which I remember struck me at the time I first read them, as being rather misplaced. But this, perhaps, may be merely the effect of the sterile way of writing employed by ahnost all the philosophers of these late times, to which we have now become so nuich accustomed, that we with difficulty ap- prove of any thing in a warmer taste, introduced into such kinds of disquisition. They managed these tilings better in (yreece. I>y and bye, we were summoned to the drawing-room, where we fomul several Lidies with Mrs J . She, you know, is an Ame- rican, and .1 went across the Atlantic for '\-j'JXiro f'w-:v 6gy Mli M . Yesterday morning I received a note from him, in which he apologized for not having im- mediately returned my call. He was extremely busy, he said, all the morning, but hoped I would come and dine with him in an unceremo- nious manner, the first day I found myself dis- engaged. I had half promised to dine at a ta- vern with one or two young gentlemen, friends of AY ; but my curiosity was such, that I forthwith excused myself in that quarter, and accepted INIr JNI 's invitation for the same day on which it reached me. I assure you, that I should not have grudged my journey to Scot- land, although I had laid up nothing to bring back with me, excepting the recollection of this one day. As I walked in the direction of his house, with the certainty that a few minutes would bring me into his company, I was conscious of an almost superstitious feeling a mysterious V;ind of expectation something like what I can conceive to have been felt by the Armenian, when the deep green curtain hung before him, the uplifting of which, he was assured, would open to him a view into departed years, and })lace before his eyes the actual bodily presence of his long buried ancestor. I had read his works :mr m . 97 when yet in the years of my infancy. The beau- tiful visions of his pathetic imagination had stamped a soft and delicious, but deep and inde- lible impression on my mind, long before I had heard the very name of criticism ; perhaps be- fore any of the hterature of the present age ex- isted certainly long, very long, before I ever dreamt of its existence. The very names of the heroes and heroines of his delightful stories, sounded in my ears like the echoes of some old romantic melodv, too simple, and too beautiful, to have been framed in these degenerate over- scientific days. Harley La lloche IVIontal- ban Julia de Iloubigne what graceful mel- low music is in the well-remembered cadences the " TTxhai'XY ovciJi.y.T oyiif'uy !" And I w"as in truth to see " in the flesh" the hoary magician, whose vrand had called those etherial Ci'cations into everlasting being. A year before, I sliould have entrrtaincd almost as much hope of sitting at the s;u)io tabic with Goldsmith, or Sterne, or Addison, or any of tliose mild spirits so far removed from our nature " ct wj Cporoi ijuv/."' For the first time in n v life, I could not help being ashamed of my youth, and feeling, as if it were presumption in me to approach, in the 98 yu\ M . garb of modern days, the last living relics of that venerable school. The appearance of the fine old man had no tendency to dissipate the feelings I have just at- tempted to describe. I found him in his library, surrounded with a very large collection of books few of them apparently new ones seated in a high-backed easy chair -the wood- work carved very richly in the ancient French taste, and co- vered with black hair-cloth. On his head he wore a low cap of black velvet, like those which we see in almost all the pictures of Pope. But there needed none of these accessories to carry back the imagination. It is impossible that I should paint to you the full image of that face. The only one I ever saw which bore any resem- blance to its character, was that of Warren Hast- ings you well remember the effect it pro- duced, when he appeared among all that magni- ficent assemblage, to take his degree at the in- stallation of Lord Grenville. In the counte- nance of ]\I , there is the same clear tran- sparency of skin, the same freshness of com- plexion, in the midst of all the extenuation of old age. The wrinkles, too, are set close to each other, line upon line ; not deep and bold, and rugged, like those of most old men, but MR ivr . 99 equal and undivided over the whole surface, as if no touch but that of Time had been there, and as if even He had traced the vestiges of his do- minion with a sure indeed, but with a delicate and reverential finger. The lineaments have all the appearance of having been beautifully shaped, but the want of his teeth has thrown them out of their natural relation to each other. 'J'he eyes alone have bid defiance to the approach of the adversary. Beneath bleached and hoary brows, and surrounded with innumerable wrinkles, they are still as tenderly, as brightly blue, as full of all the various eloquence and fire of passion, as they could have been in the most vivacious of his days, when they were lighted up with that purest and loftiest of all earthly flames, the first secret triumph of conscious and conceiving ge- nius. By and by, i\Ir ]\I withdrew into his closet, and having there thrown off his slippers, and exchanged his cap for a brov\'n wig, he conducted me to the drawing-room. His family were already assembled to receive us Iiis wife, just as I should have wished to ])icture lier, a graceful old lady, with much of the remains of beauty, clotlied in an open gown of black silk, with dee]) flounces, and having a high ca]), witli 100 >II{ M AND MR R . the lace meeting below the chin his eldest son, a man rather above my own standing, who is said to inherit much of the genius of his father, (although he has chosen to devote it to very dif- ferent purposes being very eminent among the advocates of the present time) and some young- er children. The only visitor, besides myself, was an old friend, and, indeed, contemporary of M ^ a jMr II , who was, in his time, at the head of the profession of the law in Scot- land ; but who has now lived for many years in retirement. I have never seen a finer specimen, both in appearance and manners, of the true gen- tleman of the last age. In his youth, he must have been a perfect model of manly beauty ; and, indeed, no painter could select a more ex- quisite subject for his art even now. His hair combed back from his forehead and highly pow- dered, his long queue, his lace-ruffles, his suit of snufF-coloured cloth, cut in the old liberal way, with long flaps to his waistcoat, his high-lieeled shoes and rich steel-buckles every thing was perfectly in unison with the fashion of his age. The stately and measured decorum of his polite- ness was such, as could not well be displayed by any man dressed in our free-and-easy style ; but iii liiiii it did ]]c,i m-cducc the I e:ist effect of stiff- MU M AND Mil R . 101 ness or coldness. It was a delightful thing to see these two old men, who had rendered them- selves eminent in two so different walks of exertion, meeting together in the quiet evening of their days, to enjoy in the company of each other every luxury which intellectual communi- cation can afford, heightened by the yet richer luxury of talking over the feelings of times, to which thev almost alone are not strangers. They are both perfectly men of the world, so that there was not the least tinge of profes- sional pedantry in their conversation. As for IVIr jNI , indeed, literature was never any- thing more than an amusement to him, however great the figure he has made in it, and the spe- cies of literature in which he excelled was, in its very essence, connected Avith any ideas rather than those of secluded and artist-like abstraction. There was nothing to be seen which could have enabled a stranger to tell which was the great lawyer, and which the great novellist. I con- fess, indeed, I was a little astonished to find, from iNIr ]M 's mode of conversation, how very little his habits had ever been those of a mere literary man. He talked for at least half an hour, and, I promise you, very kno'wingly, about flies for nnixlinix : and told me. with aircat o'ood 102 MR ^r . humour, that he still mounts his poney in au- tumn, and takes the field against the grouse with a long fowling-piece slung from his back, and a pointer- bitch, to the full as venerable among her species as her affectionate master is among his. The lively vivacity with which he talked over various little minute circumstances of his last campaign in the moors, and the almost boyish keenness with which he seemed to be looking forward to the time of trouting all this might have been looked upon as rather frivolous, and out of place, in another of his years ; but, for my part, I could not help being filled both with deliglit and admiration, by so uncommon a display of elasticity in the springs of his tempe- rament. He gave us an excellent bottle of ^luscat-de- Rives-altes during diimcr, and I must say I am inclined very much to approve of that old-fa- shioned delicacy. We had no lack of Chateau- la-Ilose afterwards, and neither of the old gentle- men seemed to have the slightest objection to its ins])iration. A truly charming air of sober hila- rity was diffused over their features, and thev began to give little sketches of the old times, in which perhaps their hilarity might not always bo so sober, in a way that carried me baciv de- MU M . 103 rightfully to the very heart of " High-jinks." According to the picture they gave, the style of social intercourse in this city, in their younger days, seems, indeed, to have been wonderfully easy and captivating. At that time, you must know, not one stone of the New Town, in which they, and all the fashionable inhabitants of Edin- burgh now reside, had been erected. The whole of the genteel population lived crowded together in those tall citadels of the Old Town, from one of which my friend W still refuses to be dis- lodged. Their houses were small, but abundant- ly neat and comfortable, and the labour Vv^hich it cost to ascend to one of them was sure to be re- paid at all hours by a hearty welcome from its possessor. The style of visiting, altogether, was as different as possible from the ceremonious sort of fashion now in vogue. They did not deal in six weeks' invitations and formal dimiers ; but they formed, at a few hours' notice, little snug supper-parties, which, without costing any com- parative expence, afforded opportunities a thou- sand-fold for all manner of friendly communica- tion between the sexes. As for the gentlemen, they never thought of committing any excess, except in taverns, and at night ; and Mr 11 mentioned, that, almost within his own recollec- 104. :mii :m . tioii, it had been made matter of very serious acraTavation in the offence of a o-entleman of rank, tried before the Court of Justiciary, that he had allowed his company to get drunk in his liouse before it was dark, even in the month of July. At that time, the only liquor was claret, and this they sent for just as they wanted it- huge pewter jugs, or, as they called them, sfoups of claret, being just as commonly to be seen tra- velling the streets of i'vdinburgh in all directions then, as the muos of Mieux and Barclay are in those of Jjondon note. Of course, I made allow- ance for the privilege of age ; but T have no doubt there was abundance of good wit, and, what is better, good-humom* among them, no less than of good claret. If I were to take the evening I spent in listening to its history, as a fair specimen of tlie " Auld Time," (and after all, why should I not ?) I should almost be inclined to reverse the w^ords of the J^aureate, and to say. " of all places, and all times of earth, Did fate grant choice of time and place to men. Wise choice might be their Scotland, and their then." 1 assure you, hoAvever, that I returned to my liotel in no disposition to (junriel either with MR M . 105 time or place, or " any other creature" a bottle of excellent wine under my belt, and my mind richly dieted with one of the true Nodes Cm- nccque. Ever your's, P. M. P. S. I had forgotten to mention, that both M and his friend are staunch Tories ; but I don't deny, that this might have some effect in increasing my love for them. 106 LETTEll XI. TO THE SAME. I HEARD it mentioned at Mr M 's, that a triennial dinner, in honour of Robert Burns, was about to take place ; and thinking it would be a good opportunity for me to see a larger number of the Scots literati than I had yet met with collected together, I resolved, if possible, to make one of the party. I found, on enquiring, that in consequence of the vast multitude of persons who wished to be present, the original plan of the dinner had been necessarily depart- ed from, and the company were to assemble, not in a tavern, for no tavern in Edinburgh could accommodate them, but in the Assembly-Rooms in George- Street, Even so, I was told, there was likely to be a deficiency rather than a super- fluity of room ; and, indeed, when I went to buy my ticket, I found no more remained to be sold. But I procured one afterwards through nURNS's DINXE1{. 107 jVIi' ]\[ ; and W arriving I'rom the conn- try tlie same day, I went to the place in com- pany with him. He is hand in glove with half of the stewards, and had no difficnlty in getting himself smnggled in. I send yon a copy of the Edinburgh Weekly Journal, which contains the best newspaper account of the affair I have met with, but shall proceed to favour you with a few of my own observations in addition. Those who are accustomed to talk and think of the Scotch as a cold phlegmatic people, would have been convinced of their mistake by a sin- gle glance at the scene which met my eyes when I entered. I have never witnessed a more tri- imiphant display of national enthusiasm, and had never expected to witness any display with- in many thousand degrees of it, under any thing less than the instantaneous impulse of some glo- rious victory. The room is a very large one, and I had already seen it lighted up in all the splendour of a ball ; but neither its size nor its splendour had then made anything more than a very common-place impression on my mind. But now what a sight was here ! A hall of most majestic proportions its walls, and hang- ings, and canopies of crimson, giving a ma- gical richness of effect to the innumerable chan- 108 BURNS'S DINNER. deliers with which its high roof appeared to be starred and glowing the air overhead alive with the breath of lutes and trumpets below, the w^iole mighty area paved with human faces, (for the crowd was such that nothing of the tables could at first be seen,) the highest, and the wisest, and the best of a nation assembled together and all for wliat ? to do honour to the memory of one low-born peasant. What a lofty tribute to the true nobility of Nature ! What a glorious vindication of the born majesty of Genius ! With difficulty we procured seats at the lower extremity of the Hall, at the table where Cap- tain A of the Navy presided as croupier a fine manly-looking fellow, with a world of cor- dial jollity in his face. W chose to sit at this table, as he afterwards told me, because, in the course of a long experience, he had found the fare of a public dinner uniformly much bet- ter in the immediate neighbourhood of the crou- pier or president ; and indeed, whatever might be the case elsewhere, the fare w here we sat was most excellent. We had turbot in perfection a haunch of prime venison the red-deer I believe and every thing, in short, which could have been selected to make a private dinner delicious. 1 flUKNS'S DINNER 109 The port and sherry allowed by the traiteur were by no means to be sneezed at ; but W had determined to make himself as happy as possible, and his servant produced a bottle of hock, and another of the sparkler during dinner. Afterwards, we exchanged our port for very tole- rable claret, and we had filberts and olives at will ; which being the case, entre noust no man could complain of his dessert. The chair was occupied by JNIr iSl , an ad* vocate of considerable note ; a pleasant gentle- manlike person, so far as I could judge, (for he was quite at the other end of the room from us,) and close around him were gathered a great number of the leading members of the same profession. Among the rest J . An uni- versal feeling of regret appeared to fill the com- pany, on account of the absence of INIr S , who was expected to have taken his place at the right hand of the president, and would have come to town for the purpose, had he not been prevented by a severe attack of illness. In dif- ferent parts of the room, a variety of distin- guished individuals, of whom I had often heard, were successively pointed out to me by W ; but it was some time before I could collect my senses, sufficiently to take any very accurate in- VOI.. I. II 110 BUR^'S"S DINNER. spection of their physiognomies. Wherever I looked, I saw faces ennobled by all the eloquence of a pure and lofty enthusiasm. It was evident, that all had the right feeling ; and at such a mo- ment it appeared to me a comparatively small matter which of them had the celebrity even of genius. After dinner^ the president rose and proposed The Memory of the Poet. The speech with which he prefaced the toast was delivered with all the ease of a practised speaker, and was by no means devoid of traces of proper feeling. But, I con- fess, on the whole, its effect was to me rather a disappointing one. The enthusiasm felt by the company was such, that nothing could have been pitched in a key too high for them ; and the im- pression of iNIr JNl 's address had certainly, in their state of feeling at the moment, more of a chilling than an elevating effect. I thought him peculiarly unhappy in the choice of a {q\\ poetical quotations with which he diversified his speech that from Swifts Rhapsody, in par- ticular, was extremely unfortunate. AV^hat good effect could be produced on such an occasion a.s this, by repeating such lines as those about " Not beggar's brat on bulk begot, Not bas;tar(] of a pofllar Scot, nUUNs's DIXN^KU. 1 I 1 Not boy brought up to cleaning shoes. The spawn of Bridewell or the stew3, Not infants dropped, the spurious pledges Of gypsies littering under hedges Are so disqualified by fate To rise in church, or law, or state, As he whom Phoebus, in his ire. Has blasted with poetic fire," &c. Nor were the fine verses of Milton much more appropriate to the occasion, although their own grandeur would probably have prevented them from being at all disagreeable in the hearing, had Mr M 's recollection been such as to enable him to recite them with facility. What- ever may be the case with the most of those, whose lips " Phoebus tips with fire," poor Burns was assuredly not one who neglected, for the sake of the Muses, " To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair." But it would be quite silly to trouble you with such minutiic as these ; the true defect lay in selecting, to preside in such an assembly upon such an occasion, any other than a man of great reputation and rank in literature. Had such a 112 BURNS'S DINNER. person been selected, and had he, as it might have happened, committed the very same faults which Mr M did commit, the impression of his general character would still have been suiR- cient to prevent the company from regarding, otherwise than with a favourable eye, even the defects of one in whom they woidd have been eager and proud to recognize the intellectual kinsman of their great poet. But, in the first place, it is not easy to understand why a man should be chosen to direct and guide the enthu- siasm of a meeting in honour of Robert Burns, merely because he himself enjoys a tolerable de- gree of reputation as a Scottish barrister ; and, in the second place, every point in which such a person so chosen fails in the discharge of his du- ties, has the effect of making men recur to this original difficulty, with an increasing and a most unpleasant pertinacity. There was, perhaps, an injudicious degree of courage in ISIr M 's attempt ; but " eventus docuitr It is a much easier thing, however, to say who should not, than who should have presided on this occasion. It seems that, among others, Mr J had been talked of; but he had the ffood sense to reject the proposal without hesitation. And with what face, indeed, could he, the au> BURNS'S DINNER. 118 thor of the longest, and most deliberate, and most elaborate attack that e^er assailed the character of Burns an attack of which, with all my tole- rance for J 's failings, I cannot help think- ing the whole spirit and tone are radically and essentially abominable with what face could he have presumed to occupy the first place in an assembly of men, whose sole bond of union could be nothing else than that feeling of deep, tender, and reverential admiration for poor Burns's me- mory, his own want of which had been so deci- dedly, or rather so ostentatiously held forth ? Many people can see some excuse and I my- self can imagine some explanation of the irreve- rent way, in which IVIr J has accustomed himself to treat his own great poetical contem- poraries. But I know not, neither can I ima- gine, upon what principle a man of his fine un- derstanding, and fine feeling too, should have esteemed himself justifiable in concentrating the whole pitiless vigour of his satire upon the me- mory of one, whose failings, whatever they might be, were entitled to so much compassion as those of llobert Burns in exhausting his quiver of poisoned shafts in piercing and lacera- ting the resting-place of one, whose living name must always be among the dearest and most sa- 114 BU11NS*S DINNKR. cred possessions of his countrymen. I cannot help thinking, that J ^ displayed in that at- tack a very lamentable defect, not merely of nationality of feeling, but of humanity of feel- ing. If the pride of being the countryman of Burns was not enough to make J a lenient observer of his errors, there were abundance of other considerations of a yet higher kind, which should not have come vainly to the aid of that honourable pride. Alas ! how easy a thing is it for us, who have been educated in the atmos- ])here of ease who have " been clothed in fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day'* how easy a thing is it for such as we are, to despise and deride the power of temptations, that might be enough, and more than enough, to unhinge all the resolutions, and darken all the destinies of one, who had been accustomed, in good ear- nest, to dr'inh the ivatcr ()/ bittern es.s', and eat his bread in the sweat of his brow ! It is an easy thing for those, who have comfortable homes, and congenial occupations, to rail against the dissipated habits of a poor wandering poet, com- pelled to waste his best days in degrading drud- geries, and night after night to find himself sur- rounded in his ov.ii narrow dwelliiiijc bv all the (Ie))rcssing and contracting srpialors of peiuuT. BL'RNs's dinxj:r. 115 The rule of judging as we would be judged, although an excellent one, surely, in the main, must be taken, I think, with a great sequela of exceptions. It is the besetting temptation of many natures, and honest natures too, to " Compound for sins they are inclined to. By damning those they have no mind to." And perha})s few sins are more '' damned" upon this principle than those of the bottle. You might as well attempt to make a deaf man compre- hend the excellencies of Txlozart, as to convince some ])cople that it is a venial thing to be fond of an extra olass of claret. jManv even of those who take great pleasure in society, can never be brought to understand anIiv people should get tipsy when they meet together round a table. The delight which they experience in company, is purely rational derived from nothing but the animated and invigorated collision of con- tending and sporting intellects. They have wit and \\ isdom for their share, and thev have little reason to com])lain ; but what do they know about the full, heart}', glorious swing of jollity ? How can they ever sympathise with the misty fclicitv of a man singing " Jt i.-^ Uir iviooH I ken her lunni !' 116 BURNS'S DINNER. I think no man should be allowed to say any- thing about Burns, who has not joined in this chorus, although timber-tuned, and sat till day- light although married. The first healths (after some of mere forma- lity,) were those of the mother of Burns for she, it seems, is still alive, in extreme old age ; his widow, the " Jean," of his poetry and his sons. A gentleman who proposed one of these toasts, mentioned a little anecdote, which gave infinite delight to all present, and which will do so to you. After the last of these triennial meetings, a pension of L.5() ^jjc heen vera jyroud^ gentle- men" (s[iid he,) " to he a Sc()i,s poet and I was 'never me proud o't a,s I am just noor I believe there Avas no one there who did not sympathize heartily with this most honest pride. For my part, I began to be quite in love with the Et- trick Shepherd. In process of time, the less jovial members of the company began to effect their retreat, and W and I, espying some vacant places at the table where IMr AV- n and tlie Ettrick Shepherd were seated, wxre induced to shift our situation, for the sake of being nearer these cele- brated characters. I w^as placed wdthin a few feet of li , and introduced to AV n across the table, and soon found, from the way in which the l)ottle circulated in this quarter, that both of them inherited in perfection the old feud of 15urns against the " aqiice potore^r As to the bottle, indeed, I should exclude II ; for he, long before I came into his neighbourhood, had finished the bottle of port allowed by our traiteur, and was dee]) in a Imge jug of whisky toddy in the manufacture of which he is sup-^ posed to excel almost as much as Burns did 132 BURNS'S DINNER. and ill its consumption too, although happily in rather a more moderate degree. After this time, I suspect the prescribed order of toasts began to be sadly neglected, for long speeches were uttered from remote corners, no- body knew by whom or about what ; song after song was volunteered; and, all the cold restraints of sobriety being gradually thawed by the sun of festive cheer, " Wit walked the rounds^ and music filled the air." The inimitable " Jolly Beggars" of the poet, which has lately been set to music, was got up in high style, the songs being exquisitely sung by jNlessrs Swift, Templeton, and Lees, and the recitative read with much effect by INIr B . But even this entertainment, with all its inherent variety, was too regular lor the taste of the assem- bly. The chairman himself broke in upon it the first, by proposing a very appropriate toast, which I shall attempt to naturalize in Cardiganshire ; this again called up a very old gentleman, who conceived that some compliment had been in- tended for a club of which he is president ; in short, compliments and toasts became so inter- laced and interlarded, that nobody coidd think of taking up the thread of " The Jolly Beggars'' IJUIINS S DINNER. 133 again. By tlio way, this inimitable Cantata is not to be found in Currie's edition, and I sus- peet you are a stranger ev^en to its name ; and yet, liad liurns left nothing more than this behind him, I think he would still have left enough to justify all the honour in wiiieh his genius is held. There does not exist, in any one piece throughout the whole range of English poe- try, such a collection of true, fresh, and charac- tei'istic lyrics. Here we have nothing, indeed, that is very high, but we have much that is very tender. What can be better in its way, than the fine song of the Highland Widow, " wha had in mony a well been douked ?" " A Highland lad my love was born, The Lowland laws he held in scorn ; But he still was faithful to his clan, jNIy gallant braw John Highlandman. With his philabeg and tartan plaid, And good claymore down by his side. The ladies' hearts he did trepan, 3Jy gallant braw John Highlandman. >'^i>'g, /'r(iir Joint IliishlandinaHy S///is, /lo, )ii// brdw John UiishhuuJwan, There's not a lad in a the Uni' JVdx niidrh. I'or )iiij John IJigldandnian." And tiuit tine Penseroso close, " But oh ! they catch'd him at the last, And bound luni in a dungeon fast ; 134 LURNS'S DINNER. My curse upon them every one. They've hang'd my bravv John Highlandman. And nowj a widow, I must mourn Departed joys that ne'er return ; No comfort but a hearty can, When I think on John Highlandman." The Little Fiddler, who (in vain, alas !) offers his services to console her, is conceived in the most happy taste, " A pigmy scraper w'l his fiddle, AVha used at trysts and fairs to driddle. Her strapping Hmb and gausy middle, (He reached nae In'gher,) Had holed his heartie like a riddle, And blawn't on fire. JJ'i' /land oil hduncli, and upward ee, lie crooned his gamut, one, tiro, three, Tlicn in an Arioso kcij. The )vec Apollo Set off with allegretto glee. His giga solo." But the finest part of the whole, is the old Scottish Soldier's ditty. Indeed, I think there is no question, that half of the best ballads Campbell has written, are the legitimate pro- geny of some of these lines. 1. " I am a son of Mars, wlio have been in many wars, And shew my cuts and scars wlierevcr 1 come ; BURNS'S DINNKR. 135 This here was for a wench, and that other in a trench, \\'hcn welcoming the French at the sound of the drum. 3Iv j)i\nticcship I passed where my leader breathed his last, \\'hcii tlie l)lood\' die was cast on the heights of Abram ; I served out my trade when the gallant game was play'd, And tlic More low was laid at the sound of the drum. 2. " I lastly was with Curtis among the Hoating batt'ries. And there I left' for witness an arm and a limb ; Yet let ni}" country need me, with Elliot to head me, I'd clatter on my stumps at the sound of the drum. What though with hoary locks, I must stand the winter shocks, 15eneath t!ie woods and rocks oftentimes for a home ! When the t'other bag I sell, and the t'other bottle tell, I could meet a troop of hell at the sound of the drum." What different ideas of low life one forms even from reading tlie works of men who paint it ad- mirably. Had Crabbe, for instance, undertaken to represent tlie carousal of a troop of Beggars in a hedge alelioiise, how unlike would his pro- duction have been to this Cantata ? He would have jxiinted their rags and their dirt with the accuracy of a person who is not used to see rags and dirt very often ; he would have seized the light careless swing of their easy code of moral- ity, with the penetration of one who has long been a ]Master-.Vnatomist of the manners and the hearts of men. But I doubt very nuicli, whether any one could enter into the true spirit 136 BUKNS'S DINNER. of such a meeting, who had not been, at some period of his hfe, a partaker m j)ropnd })erson(i, and ahiiost par cum imnhiis, in the rude merri- ment of its constituents. I have no doubt that Burns sat for his own picture in the Bard of the Cantata, and had often enough in some such scene as Poosie Kansie's " Risings rejoicing Between his twii Deborahs, Looked romid liiiri;, and found them Impatient for his chorus." It is by such familiarity alone that the secret and essence of that charm, which no groupe of human companions entirely wants, can be fixed and preserved even by the greatest of poets ]\Ir Crabbe would have described the Beggars hke a firm though humane Justice of the Peace poor Robert Burns did not think himself entitled to assvmie any such airs of superiority. The con- sequence is, that Ave would have understood and pitied the one groupe, but that we sympathize even with the joys of the other. \^q Avould have thrown a few sliillings to IMr Crabbe's INIen- dicants, but we arc more tiian half inclined to sit down and drink tliem ourselves alono' with the " orra duds" of those oi" Burns. EURNS'n DINNEli. 137 I myself will you believe it ? was one of those who insisted upon disturbing the perform- ance of this glorious Cantata with my own dis- sonant voice. In plain truth, I was so happy, that I could not keep silence, and such was the buoyancy of my enthusiasm, that nothing could please me but singing a Scottish song. I be- lieve, after all, 1 got through it pretty well ; at least, I did well enough to delio-ht my nei and surely it is not necessary to say anything in praise of their manifold general attainments but I honestly tell you, that I have not yet con- versed with any one, who seemed to me ever to have gone through anything like a complete course, cither of Greek poetry, or Greek history. As for Cxreek philosophy, beyond Xenophon's ]\remorabilia, the Phaedon, and Aristotle's Poet- 166 UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH, ick, I have never heard any alhision made to the existence of any books connected with that sub- ject ; and I am convinced, that a man who had read through Plato or Aristotle, or even who was entitled to say that he had any tolerable ac- quaintance with the works of either of these great authors, would be scarcely more of a w' on- der at Otaheite than in Edinburgh. But this indeed it is extremely unnecessary to explain to to you, who have read and admired so much of the works of Dugald Stewart ; for nothing can be more clear to the eyes of the initiated, than that this great and enlightened man has been throughout contented to derive his ideas of the Greek philosophy from very secondary sources. When he dies, there will not, most assuredly, be found among his books, as there was among those of David Hume, an interleaved copy of Duvall's Aristotle. And if such be Im igno- rance, (which, I doubt not, he himself would be candid enoui^h to acknowledore without hesita- tion,) what may we not suppose to be the Cim- merian obscurity which hangs over his worship- pers and disciples ? Without the genius, which often suirn-ests to him much of what kindred ^e- nius had suggested to the philosophers of anti- quity, and which still more often enables him to UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. 167 pass, by different steps, to the same point at which these had arrived, the pupils of this illiis- trions man are destitute of the only qualities which could have procured any pardon for the errors of their master. The darkness is with them " total eclipse." I have wandered, you will say, even more widely than is my custom. But you must keep in recollection the terms on which I agreed to write to you during this my great northern tour. As for the subject from which I have wandered, viz. the Greek and Latin IMuses of the University of Edinburgh, I assure you I feel very easy under the idea of having treated these ladies with slender courtesy. Their repvitation is extremely low, and I verily believe they de- serve no better. They are of the very worst and most contemptible of all kinds of coquettes ; for they give a little to every body, and much to no one. The Professors of the two languages here are both, however, very respectable men in their way ; that is, they would both of them do admi- rable things, if they had any call upon their am- bition. JNIr C , the Professor of Latin, or, as their style is, of humanitij, is a very great reader of all kinds of books, and, what is rather 9 168 univehsity of Edinburgh. singular in one fond of excursive reading, is a very diligent and delighted student of the higher mathematics. I went to hear his prelection the other day, and after the boys were sent away, began to ask him a few questions about the sys- tem adopted in their tuition, but in vain. He insisted upon talking of fluxions, and fluxions only ; and, as I know nothing of fluxions, I was glad to break up the conference. With him, if a pun may be allowed, '' labiiur et laheiur, in omne volubilis aevum." Mr D , the Professor of Greek, has pub- lished several little things in the Cambridge Classical Hesearches, and is certainly very much above the common run of scholars. I observe by the way, that in one of his Latin title-pages, he subjoins to his name a set of English initials. * P. M. IGI) LETTER XV. TO THC SAME. After INIr C and JNIr D are supposed to have given their pupils as much Latin and Greek as people of sense ought to be troubled with, they are transferred to the Professor of Lo- gic, and recorded in the books of the University, as students of philosophy. The style used by their new professor would, however, convey to a strauijcr a very erroneous notion of the duties m reality allotted to him. Logic, according to our acceptation of the word, is one of the least and last of the things which he is supposed to teach. His true business is to inform the minds of his pupils with some first faint ideas of the Scotch systems of metaphysics and morals to explain to them the rudiments of the great voca- bulary of Reid and Stewart, and fit them, in 170 UNIVERSITY OF EDINBUKGH. some measure, for plunging next year into the midst of all the light and all the darkness scat- tered over the favourite science of this country, by the Professor of Moral Philosophy, Dr T B . I could not find leisure for attending the pree- lections of all the Edinburgh professors ; but I was resolved to hear, at least, one discourse of the last mentioned celebrated person. So I went one morning in good time, and took my place in a convenient corner of that class-room, to which the rising metaphysicians of the north resort with so much eagerness. Before the professor arrived, I amused myself with surveying the well-cover- ed rows of benches with which the area of the large room was occupied. I thought I could distinguish the various descriptions of specula- tive young men come thither from the different quarters of Scotland, fresh from the first zealous study of Hume, Berkeley, and Locke, and quite sceptical whether the timber upon whicli they sat had any real existence, or whether there was such a thing as heat in the grate which was bla- zing before them. On one side might be seen, perhaps, a Pyrrhonist from Inverness-shire, deep- ly marked with the small-pox, and ruminating upon our not seeing double with two eyes. The UNIVERSITY OF EDlXUUUGll. 171 gaunt and sinewy frame of this meditative moun- taineer his hard legs set wide asunder, as if to take full advantage of their more usual integu- ment, the philabeg his features, bearing so many marks of the imperfect civilization and nomadic existence of his progenitors all together could not fail to strike me as rather out of place in such a situation as this. On the other side might be remarked one, who seemed to be an embryo clergyman, waiting anxiously for some new lights, which he expected the coming lec- ture would throw upon the great system of Cause and Effect, and feelmg rather qualmish after having read that morning Hume's Scepti- cal Solution of Sceptical Doubts. Nearer the professor's table was probably a crack member of some crack debating-club, with a grin of in- corrigible self-complacency shining through his assumed frown of profound reflection looking, as the French say, as grave as a pot-de-chambre and longing, above all things, for seven o'clock in the evening, when he hoped himself to assume a conspicuous position behind a green table, with a couple of candles upon it, and fully refute the objections of his honourable and eloquent friend who spoke last. A little farther to the right might be observed a fine, healthy, well-thriven 172 UNIVERSITY or KDINBURGH. lad from Haddington- shire, but without the slightest trace of metaphysics in his countenance one who would have thought himself much better employed in shooting crows on Leith sands, and in whom the distinction between Sen- sation and Volition excited nothing but chagrhi and disgust. Throughout the whole of this motley assem- blage, there was a prodigious mending of pens, and folding of paper, every one, as it appeared, having arrived with the determination to carry away the Dicta Magistri, not in his head only, but in his note-book. Some, after having com- pleted their preparations for the business of this day, seemed to be conning over the monuments of their yesterday's exertion, and getting as firm a grapple as possible of the last links of the chain, whereof a new series was about to be expanded before them. There was a very care-worn kind of hollo wness in many of their eyes, as if they had been rather over-worked in the business of staring upon stenography ; and not a few of their noses were pinched and sharpened, as it were, with the habitual throes and agonies of extreme hesitation. As the hour began to strike, there arose a simultaneous clamour of coughing and spitting, and blowing of noses, as if all were pre- UNIVEUSITY OF EDINBURGH. 173 pared for listening long to tlic lecturer, without disturbing him oi' their neighbours ; and such was the infectiousness of their zeal, that I caught myself fidgetting upon my scat, and clearing out for action like the rest. At last, in cain-e the professor, with a pleasant smile upon his face, a^Tayed in a black Geneva cloak, over a snuff- eoloured coat and buff waistcoat. He mounted to his elbow-clmir, and laid his papers on the desk before him, and in a moment all was still as the Tomb of the Capulets ever}^ eye filled with earnestness, and every pen filled with ink. Doctor B- has a pliys-iognomy very expres- sive of mildness and quiet contemplativeness ; but when he got fairly into the middle of his subject, his features kindled amazingly, and he went through some very subtle and abstruse disquisitions, with great keenness and animation. I have seen few persons who pursued the intel- lectual chace with so nuich ardour; but, as I ob- served before, it did not ap])car as if all his pu- pils were sufliciently well mounted or equipped to be able to keep up with him. His eJocution is distinct and elegant, and in those parts of his subiect which admitted of bcino; tastefullv ban vlled, there was a flow of beautiful lano;uai''e. as VOL. ;. 4r 174 UNnTERSITY OF EDINBURGH. finely delivered as it was finely conceived. It is very much his practice to introduce quotations from the poets, which not only afford the best illustrations of his own speculations, but are, at the same time, valuable, as furnishing a pleasing I'elaxation to the mind of the hearer in the midst of the toils of abstract thought. The variety of delightful images which he thus brings before the view, refreshes the mental eye, and enables it to preserve its power of examination much longer than it could do, were it condemned to experience no relief from the dry mazes of ab- stract disquisition. Dr B , in this respect, imitates with great wisdom and success, the ex- ample of Harris, whose intimate knowledge of Shakespeare has done more good to his books, and afforded more delight to his readers, than perhaps any one of all his manifold accomplish- ments. Nay, I might have quoted the still higher example of the Stagy rite himself, who produces an effect equally delightful by his per- petual citations from Homer, or, as he calls him, O TlomTYti;. The immediate predecessor of Dr E , in this important chair, was no less a person than T)ugald Stewart ; and it was easy to observe, in the midst of many lesser deviations, that the gc- UNIVErvSITY or EDINBURGH. 17.'> neral system of this great man's philosophy is adhered to by his successor, and that he is, in truth, one of his intellectual children. I have seen JMr S once since I came to Edinburgh, but it was in a very hasty manner, so that I shall not attempt to describe him to you at present. I intend, before I leave Scotland, to pass very near the place of his residence, (for he now very seldom leaves the country,) and shall perliaps find an opportunity to become better acquaint- ed with him. Of the style of philosophizing adopted by him and his successor, I need not say any thing to you, who are so much better ac- quainted with the works of both than I am. I may just venture to hint, however, that their mode of studying the human mind, is perhaps better adapted for throwing light upon the intel- lectual faculties, and upon the association of ideas, than upon human nature in general. There can be no doubt that the mind is, like phv sical nature, a theatre of causes and effects ; but it appears extremely doubtful whether the same mechanical mode of observation, which enables us to understand the qualities of mate- rial objects, and the effects which they are capa- ble of producing on each other, will be equally successful in elucidatineems, indeed, quite improbable, that the affec- tions ever can be made an object of science, or that their qualities and relations can ever be pro- perly expressed in abstract propositions. Poetry and eloquence are alone capable of exemplifying them ; and one may gatlicr more true knowledge of all that most vakiable, and perhaps most di- vine part of our nature, by studying one of Mi AVordsworth's small pieces, such as jMicliael, tlie |3rothers, or the Idiot Boy or follov.iiig the UNIVr.RSITY op EDINBURGH. 177 broken catches of multituclinous feelings, in the speeches of one such character as JNIadge Wild- fire, than by a whole life-time spent in studying and imitating the style of observation exempli- fied by ]Mr Stewart. In regard to intellectual operations, it may be said, that a knowledge of their laws confers power, because it teaches method in conducting them. In regard to the laws of association, it may also be said, that knowledge is power, be- cause it enables us to continue the succession of our ideas. But it appears very questionable, whether the empire of science can be extended much farther in this quarter. The power which is conferred by knowledge, is always of a merely calculating and mechanical sort, and consists in nothing higher than the adaptation of means to ends and to suppose that man's moral being can ever be subjected to, or swayed by, a power so nuich lower than itself, is almost as revolting as the theory which refers all ideas and emotions to the past impressions upon the senses. In studying the nature of the human affec- tions, one object should be, to obtain repose and satisfaction for the moral feelings, by discrimina- ting between good and evil. Knowledge is no- thing in a scientific point of view, imless it can 178 UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. bo accumulated and transferred from individual to individual, and unless it be as valid in one person's hands as in those of another ; but this could never be the case with regard to a know- ledy help of drt\-nis. can breed such feat_aiid.av.e \r t", often, wIwmi we look 180 UNIVERSITY ar Edinburgh, Into our Minds into the Mind of Man^ My hauntj and the main region of my song." After such words as these, I durst not ven- ture upon anything of a lowlier kind. Farewell, P. INT 181 LETTER XV, TO THE SAME. * * Next day I went to h ear Professor P 's lecture. I found him already engaged in ad- dressing his class when I entered, but took my seat close by the door, so quietly as not to at- tract any notice from him. It was a very pleas- ing thing to see this fine old Archimedes with his reposed demeanour (such as I have already described it to you) standing beside his table covered with models, which he was makino; use of in some demonstrations relative to mechani- cal forces. There is something in the certainty and precision of the exact sciences, which com- municates a stillness to the mind, and which, by calling in our thoughts from their own giddy 182 NEW OBSERVATORY. and often harassing rounds, harmonizes our na- ture with the serenity of intellectual pleasure. The influence of such studies is very well exem- plified in the deportment of this professor. In lecturing, he expresses himself in an easy and leisurely manner, highly agreeable to the listen- er, although he docs not seem to study conti- nuity or flow of diction, and although his de- livery is sometimes a good deal impeded by he- sitation with regard to the words he is to em- ploy. I have already described his features to you ; but perhaps their effect was finer while he was engaged in this way, than I had before been prepared to find. I think one may trace in hh physiognomy a great deal of that fine intellec- tual taste, which dictated the illustrations of the Huttonian Theory. I waited to pay my respects to the professor, after the dismission of his class, and he invited nic to walk with him to the New Observatory upon the Calton Hill. This building, which is not yet completed, owes its existence entirely to the liberality of a few private lovers of astrono- my, and promises to form a beautiful and lasting monument of their taste. Mr P himself };'id the foundation-stone of it last year, and al- ready it presents to the eye, what is, in my NEW OCSERVATORY. 183 humble judgment, the finest arehitectunil out- Hne in the whole of this city. The building is not a large one ; but its situation is such, as to render that a matter of comparatively trivial moment. Its fine portico, with a single range of Doric pillars supporting a graceful pediment, shaped exactly like that of tlie Parthenon and over that again, its dome lifting itself lightly and airily in the clear moimtain sky and the situation itself, on the brink of that mamiificent eminence, which I have already described to you, just w^here it looks towards the sea alto- gether remind one of the best days of Grecian art and Grecian science, wheh the mariner knew Athens afar off from the Mgean, by the chaste splendour of pillars and temples that crowned the original rock of Theseus. If a few elms and plantains could be made to grow to their full di- mensions around this risino; structure, the effect would be the nearest thing in the world to that of the glorious scene, which Plato has painted so divinely at the opening of his llepublic. After surveying the new building both with- out and within at great length, we quitted the summit of the hill, and began our descent. About half way dowm, there is a church-yard, wliich I had not before remarked particularly. 18-1' DAVID H[:311':"S MONU.MENT. and v.'liicli, indeed, as jNIr P mentioned, ha^? of lute been mncli abridged in its dimensions, by the improvements tliat have taken place ii? this quarter of the city. He proposed that we fihoidd enter the biuying-ground, in order to see the place -where David Hume is laid. There are fevv' things in which I take a more true delight, than in visiting the graves of the truly illustrious dead, and I therefore embraced the proposal with eagerness. The philosopher reposes on the \ery margin of the rock, and above him his friends have erected a round tower, which, al- though in itself not very large, derives, like the Observatory on the other side, an infinite advan- tage from the nature of the grouiid on which it is placed, and is, in fact, one of the chief land- marks in every view of the city. In its form it is quite simple, and the flat roof and single urn in front give it a very classical effect. Already lichens and ferns and w^all-flowers begin to creep over the surface, and a solitary willow-bush drops its long slender leaves over the edge of the roof, and breaks the outline in the air with a desolate softness. There is no inscription, except the avojxU David Hume ; and this is just as it ought to be. One cannot turn from them, and the DAVID HUME'S MONU.AIEXT. 185 thoughts to which they of necessity give birtli, to the more humble names that cover the more humble tombs below and around, without ex])c- riencino' a stranoe revulsion of ideas. The sim- pie citizen, that went through the world in a course of plain and quiet existence, getting chil- dren, and accumulating money to provide i'or them, occupies a near section of the same sod which covers the dust of Him, who left no ])ro- geny behind him, except that of his intellect, and whose name must survive, in that progeny* so long as INIan retains any portion of the infir- mity, or of the nobility of his nature. The poor man, the peasant, or the mechanic, whose labo- rious days provided him scantily with meat and raiment, and abundantly with sound sleep ho also has mingled his ashes with Him, whose body had very little share either in his wants or his wishes whose spirit alone was restless and sleep- less, the ]*rince of Doubters. The }>oor honieU partner of some such lowly liver, the ^vife and the mother and the widow, whose existence u'as devoted to soothing and sharing the asperities of adversity who lived, and thought, and brcatli- ed ill the affections alone, and, perhaps, yet lives -ornewherc in the affections of her children, or hci" cliildren's children she too, whose only lu-pe 186 DAVID HUME'S MONUMENT. and confidence were derived from the expecta- tion of another life she sleeps close beside one who walked upon the earth, not to feel, but to speculate, and was content to descend into her bosom, with scarcely one ray of hope beyond the dark and enduring sleep of nothingness. " Tliese grassy heaps lie amicably close. Said \, like surges heaving in the wind. Upon the surface of a mountain's pool." Death, like misery, " makes us acquainted with strange bed-fellows." But surely never was a scene of strange juxta-position more pregnant with lessons of thoughtfuhiess than this. i\dieu, P. INI. 187 LETTER X\ L TO THE SAME. A PERSON whose eyes had been accustomed only to such places as the schools of Oxford, or Sir Christopher Pegge's lecture-room, would cer- tainly be very much struck with the prhnd facie mean condition of the majority of the students assembled at the pnrlections of these Edinburgh professors. Here and there one sees some small scattered remnant of the great flock of Dandies, trying to keep each other's high collars and stays in countenance, in a corner of the classroom ; but these only heighten, by the contrast of their })resence, the general effect of the slovenly and dirty mass which on every side surrounds thciu with its contaminating atmosphere ; and upon the ^vhole, nothing can be more distinct and vi- sible, than that the greater part of the compan} are persons whose situation in life, had they 188 SCOTTISH STUDENTS. been born in England, must have left them no chance of being able to share the advantages of our academical education. I could not help taking notice of this circum- stance the other day to my friend W ; who not only admitted the justice of my observation, but went on to utter his comments on the fact I had observed, in a tone of ojjinion and senti- ment, for which, I must confess, my own pri- vate reflections had by no means prepared me. So far from proceeding, as I had supposed every Scotchman in like circumstances would do, to point out the advantages which might be ex- pected to arise, and which, in Scotland itself, had already, in fact, arisen, out of a so liberal and extensive diffusion of the higher species of edu- cation, my friend seemed to have no hesitation in condemning the whole system as being not iriendly, but eminently hostile, to the true in- terests both of Science in general, and of his vountry, A\'ithout at all understanding him in the lite- ral sense of his words, I think it is possible that the result of his reflections may have really led him to doubt, ^\hether the system which takes in so much mny not be somewhat weak- VH^I and debased tiv.oagh the very extension of SCOTTISH STUDENTS. 189 Its surface. I can easily believe that he may be a little doubtful whether the obvious and dis- tinct advantages which must spring out of such a system, may not be counterbalanced, upon the whole, by the disadvantages which I should suppose must be equally inseparable from the mode of carrying it into practical effect ; in other words, whetlicr the result of good may not be less considerable in the great issue than that of evil, both to tlie individuals themselves, and to the communitv, of whose a'cneral charac- ter so much must directly and indirectly be de- pendent upon theirs. For myself, I say even so much with great hesitation, concerning a sub- ject of which I cannot imagine myself to have had time or opportunity for any adequate exa- mination ; and of which, even had I possessed more of time and opportunity than I have done, I am still suspicious that my own early preju- dices might render it impossible I should form a fair and impartial judgment. Tlie oxpcnces of University education, in the first place, amount in Scotland to no more than a very inconsiderable fraction of what tliey aie in England. With us, we all know, a father of a family seldom thinks of sending his son to vol.. I. X 190 SCOTTISH STUDENTS. college, unless he can afford to give him an al- lowance of some 300 per annum, or thereabouts^ It is, no doubt, quite possible, to have apartments in a college, to attend prayers in chapel, and eat commons in hall, and to arrive, after four years' residence, at the stvlo and dionitv of a Bachelor of Arts, without having disposal of so large an income. But, taking young n-.cn as they are, and as they always have been, it is needless to expect, that any one of them will easily submit to lie under any broad and distinct mark of in- feriority to his fellous ; and therefore it is, that we in common parlance speak of it as being im- possible to live at Oxford or Cambridge, on less expensive terms than those 1 have mentioned. So lonrr as our church retains her r.rivileo-es and possessions, (wh.ich, thank God, I see no likeli- hood of her losing.) the benefices she has in her gift will always be enough to create a regular demand for a veiy larcre number of OTaduates born in the liigner classes of society so large a number, indeed, that even they alone Avould be able to give th.e icne in any University, and any College in EnglaiKl. An' 1 \\ hiJe th is is so, young men of generous dispositions, who cannot affBrd to keep up with the Umc thns given, would much rather be excused from entering upon a course SCOTTISH STUDENTS. 191 _oflifo, vliich must bring their incapacity of do- ino- so contiiiunliy bclorc the eyes of other peo- ple, and of themselves. It would take a long time, ir.oreovcr, to satisfy the great inajority of English latiiers of families, even in the more ele- vated walks of society, that a University edu- cation is a matter of so very great importance as to warrant them in running the risk of injuring the feelings and comfort of their children, by compellino- them to submit to residina* in col- lege on inadequate means. I believe it is well, that, in England, Character is generally regarded as a far more important thing than mere Intel- lect : and I consider the aversion I have just de- scribed, as one very honourable manifestation cS this way of thinking. In Scotland, feelings of an equally honourable kind have led to a very opposite way of think- ing and acting. The poverty of the colleges themselves, or at least of most of them, has pre- vented the adontion of anv such reoular and formal style of academical existence, as that which prevails in other countries, and most of all in our own. Instead of being possessed of large and ancient landed estates, and extensive rights of patronage in the church, and elsewhere, and so of forming in itself a very great and formi- 193 SCOTTISH STUDENTS. dable corporate body in the state, as the Univer- sity of Oxford or Cambridge does with us ; the University of Edinburgh, for example, is a very recent and contracted institution, which pos- sesses scarcely any property or patronage of any kind beyond the money paid annually in fees by pupils to their professors, and the necessary in- fluence which the high character of some of these individual professors must at times give to their favour and recommendation. The want of public or corporate splendour has taken away all occasion or pretence for large expenditure in private among the members of the University ; and both the corporation, and tb.e individuals, have long since learned to consider their honour as not in the least degree affected by the absence of all those external " shews and forms," which, with us, long habit has rendered such essential parts of every academical exercise and prospect. The barriers which prevent English parents and English sons from thinking of academical educa- tion, are thus entirely removed. Any young man who can afford to wear a decent coat, and live in a garret upon porridge or herrings, may, if he pleases, come to Edinburgh, and pass through his academical career, just as creditably as is re- quired or expected, I am assured, that the great SCOTTISH STUDENTS. IQS majority of the students here, have seldom more than L.30 or L.40 i)er annum, and that very- many most respectable students contrive to do with little more than half so much money. Whatever mav be thouo-ht of the results of this plan, there is no possibility that any man of good feeling should refuse his warmest admira- tion to the zeal both of the children and the pa- rents by whose exertions it is carried into effect. The author of the Scotch novels has several times alluded, in a verv movinj^ wav, to the hard- ships to whicii a poor man's family in Scotland will submit, for the sake of aiTording to one of its members even tliose scanty means which a Scottish University education demands. You must remember the touches of pathos which he has tlu'own over the otherwise ludicrous enough exertions made in tliis way by the parents of the redoui)table Dominie Sampson ; and thoseof Reu- ben liutler, in the last Tales of ?Jy I^andlord, are represented in mucli the same kind. I have seen a little book of 3Iemoirs, lately written, and very well written, by a soldier of the 7Tst regi- ment, in v.hich there occurs a still more affect- ing, because a real pictr.re, of circumstances ex- act!}- .similar. I question wliether there can be imagined n faicr di play of the quiet heroism of 194 SCOTTISH STUDENTS. affection and principle, than is afforlcd in the long and resolute struggle wbiich tlie poor pa- rents maintain the pinching pcnnry and self- denial to which they voluntarily submit, in or- der that their child may be ciiablcd to pro- cure advantao'cs of which them.sclvcs are desti- tute, and which, v*hcn obtained, cannot fail to give him thoughts and ideas such as must, in spite of nature, draw some line of separation be- tween him and them. There cannot be a nobler instance of the neglect of self a more striking exemplification of the sublimity of the affections, ISor can the conduct of the son himself be re- garded as much less admirable. The solitary and secluded life to which lie devotes so many youthful years the hard battle which he, too, must maintain against poverty, without any near voice of love to whisper courage into his bosom the grief v/hich he must feci wlien com- pelled to ask tliat which he well knows v. ill be f\-eely, but w':ic:h, he too mncli i'ciiYi^, will be painfully given ; -all these sorrows of noverty, united with those manv sorro-;v3 and de>M'evs:ons which the merely intcHectLud part of a young student's cx]^':cucq linist alwavs be sii/Kcient to create the doubts and fc;.rs v.liich must at times overcloud and darkeii tlic briiihtest inteh SCOTTISH STUDEXTS, 195 Icct that ever expanded before the influence of exertion the watching and tossing of over-ex - citcment tiie self-reproach of languor the tightening of the heart-strings and the blank wanderings of the brain these things are enough to complete the gloomy fore-ground of a picture which would in.ieod require radiance in the distance to give it any measure of capti- vation. And yet these things are not more, un- less books and men alike deceive \is, than are ac- tually operating at this moment in the persons of a very great proportion of the young men whom I have seen at work in the class-rooms of B and P . Truly, I think there was too much ofliglUiicss in the remarks I made to you, a few davs ago, concerning the first impres- sions of their external appearance and demea- nour. The worst view of the subject, however, still remains to be given. To what end does all this exertion this n.oble and heroic exertion, lead ? That is a question which nothing can hinder from crossing uh every now and then, in the midst of all our most enthusiastic admiration. It is one which it is perhaps a wrong thing to attempt answering in any way; and I much feur it is one v.hich will not admit of hcins. an 196 SCOTTISH STUDENTS. swered in a satisflictory manner, either by you or by me. There are few splendid rewards of worldly honour held up before the eyes of the Scottish student. The same circumstances which enable him to aspire, enable hundreds and thousands to do as much as he does ; and the hope of obtain- ing any of the few prizes which do exist, is di- vided among so many, that no man would ven- ture to count his own individual chance as vror- thy of much consideration. The style of educa- tion and exertion to which he submits, are admi- rably fitted for sharpening and quickening the keenness of liis understanding, but do not much tend to fill his mind Vvith a store of thoughts, feelings, and images, on which it might repose itself, and in which he miglit possess for ever the means of a quiet and contemplative happiness. He is made a keen doubter, and a keen disputer ; and in both of these qualities there is no doubt he will at first have pleasure. But in neither is he furnished with the elements of such pleasure as may endure witli him, and increase with him throughout a laborious, and, above all, it may be, a solitary life. He is not provided with such an armoury of recollections as that which the scholar (pro|/crly so called) presents against the pressure of corporeal and mental evils. SCOTTISH STUDENTS. 197 Without much prospect, then, of any great increase of worldly goods, and without procuring to himself" any very valuable stronghold of peace- ful meditation, the Scottish student submits to a life of such penury and difficulty, as would al- most be sufficient to counterbalance the pos- session even of the advantages which he has not. At the end of his academical career, he probably finds himself either a biuxlen upon his relations, or providing for himself by the discharge of some duties, which might have been as well dis- charged without so expensive a preparation. Is it worth while to bear so much, in order to have a chance of gaining so little ? As IMr INIacleod says in iMiss Edge^vorth's novel, " It may be doubted ;" and 3'et perhaps it cannot be doubted without somewhat of a sin against the higlier parts of our nature. But such sins we all com- mit often enough, both consciously and uncon- sciously. P. >L 198 LETTER XVIL TO THE SAME, I REGAiiD, then, the academical institutions of England and Scotland, as tilings specifically distinct, both in their structure and in their ef- fects. The Universities, here, educate, in propor- tion to the size and wealth of the two countries, twenty times a larger lunnber than ours in Eng- land educate. They educate these persons in a very different way, and for totally diiferent pur- poses in reality at least, if not in profession. They diliiise over every part of the kingdom, and over many parts of the neighbouiing king- doms, a n:i!j;];t}' p(;pu]ation of men, who have re- ceived a k:n;l a,n:l nieasme of edu.cation which tits t;u>m '"-r thking a keen and active manage- ment in ih:' iifl'iirs of ordinary li;e. Eut they seldom send H)ilh n;?n vIk) are so thorourddv a'-complislied in. any one branch of iearning, uv ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES. 199 to be likely to possess, through that alone, the means of attaining to eminence; and, what is worse, the course of the studies which have been pursued under their direction, lias been so irre- U'ular and multifarious, that it is a '-reat chance whether anyone branch t)f occup;iti()n may have made such a powerful and commanding impres- sion on the imiii-ination of the student, as mi(>;ht induce him afterwards to ])errect and complete for himself what the I'niversity can only be said to have begun. In England, the object of tb.e Tmiversities is not, at present, at all of this kind. In order t prepare men for discharging tlie duties of ordi- nary life, or even for discharging tlie duties of professions requiring more education than is quite common in any country, it is not thought necessary that the University should ever be re- sorted to. Those great and venerable institu- tions have both existed from the verv commence- ment of the Kiiglish mo!i;;r(']iv, and have been gr ;duallv stren;:;tiU;ne{l and cnric^^'i'd into their nrese:^t c(nK''t^-)n. bv "he !:ictv and the munifi- cence (^rnianv s;:cces'd^'e geiK'i'ations o!""ki!i<;;s and nobler. Tiit-'V are iVcnnented i)v tho^e onb' v:]\o may be called np;)n at son^e iliture period to dis- charu'e the most sacred and most elevated duties 200 ENGLISH UNITEllSITIES. of Englisli citizenship; and the magnificence of the establishments themselves carries down a portion of its spirit into the humblest individual wlio connects himself with them. The student is lodged in a palace ; and when he walks abroad^ his eyes are fed on every side with the most splen- did assemblages of architectural pomp and ma- jesty Vv'hich our island can display, lie dines in a hall whose lofty contpurtments are occupied with the portraitures of illustrious men, who of old underwent the same discipline in which he is now engaged, amidst the same appropriate and impressive accompaniments of scene and obser- vance. He studies in his closet the same books which have, for a thousand years, formed the foundation of the intellectual character of Eng- lishmen. In the same chapel wherein the great and good men of England were wont to assemble, he listens, every evening and every morning, to the same sublime music and sublimer words, by which their devotion was kindled, and their faith sustained. He walks under the shadow of the same elms, ])]antains, and sycamores, beneath ^vhose branches tlic thoughtful steps of ISTew- ton, or llacon, lyocke, and Milton, have sounded. These old onks, which can no longer give shade or ^-hcUcr, but which still present their bare and ENIJIISH UNIVKUSITIKS. 'JOi gnarled limbs to the elements around hun they were the conteniporaries of Alfred, Here the memories of kings and heroes, and saints and mfj'tyrs, are mingled for ever with those of poets and philosophers ; and the Spirit of t!ie Plaee walks visible, sliedding all around one calm and lofty infhienee, alike refreshing to the affections and to the intellect an influence which blends together, in indissoluble union, all the finest elements of patriotism, and loyalty, and religion. That the practical usefulness of these institu- tions would be in any respect improved by any considerable change in their course of studies, I am far from believing ; even 'were I certain that it would be so, I should still be very far from wishing to see sucii a cliange adopted. I am sa- tisfied abundantly that they should continue as they are; and, not liaving mueh faitii in the new doctrine of the ])crfectibility of Inunan nature, I doubt whether, let them be altered as tiiey might, the men of their prodaetioii would be much al- tered for the better. I do not think that at our time of day in national existence, it is at all wise or desirable to beii'in learning- new fashions. The world is not in its infancy : ^Vnd where is the nation the world has produced, which ean present 202 ENGLISH univehsities. a more glorious array of great and holy names than ours ? To mc this is a sufFicicnt proof, that vve have not all the while been stLimbling in the dark, without the rays of the true lamp to en- lighten us in our ]3rogress. Tiie steady and en- durino; radiance of our national Past, cannot be the mere delusion of our self love ; for even the .voice of our enemies is for ever lifted up in its praise. What future times may judge of the Pre- sent, and what our national Future maybe, it is a little out of our power to c'ecide. But I, for my part, have no fear that they who peruse in distant years the records of this age, will re- proach us with having been a degenerate people. Neither do I expect that at any future period the national character can be greatly changed, without, at the same time, being greatly dege- nerate. Even in regard to many of those peculiarities of our system, which are the most easy and the most favoured m.arks of the wit cf its enemies, I am persuaded that a conipliance with what at first sight seems to be the most liberal spirit, would, in tb.e end, be found productive of any thing but f(M'tunate eiTects. It is very easy, for example, to stigmatize the rules which exclude, from more or less of our privileges, all who are ENGTJSH UNIVERSITIES. 203 not members of our national church, with the names of bigotry, intolerance, and superstition. It should be remeinbered, however, that these regulations were the v^'ork of men, whom even our bitterest revilers would not dare to insult witli such language ; and till wc see some good reason to be ashamed of them, Vv^e may be par- doned, at least, if we refuse to be entirely ashamed of their work. If it be fitting that we should have a Xational Church, I think it is equally fitting that the church should have the Xational Universities, These do not profess to monopolize all the means of instruction ; the number of great names, in alldcpartments, which have grown up without their sphere of protec- tion, would be more than enough to give such pretensions the lie, vrerc tliCy so audacious as to set tlicm forth. ]>iit they profess to educate a certriin number of persons, of a certain class, in certain set of jjrincipies, whicli liave been con- nectcd with tliat class tlnMughout all the best vears of ou.r history and winch, through the persons of tliat class in former times, have be- come identified with our national existence, and must everywhere be recognized as entering large- ly and powerfully into the formation of our na- tional character. In a vrord, they are designed 204 ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES. to keep up the race of English gentlemen, im- bued with those thoughts and feelings, with that illumination and that belief, which, as exempli- fied both in the words and in the actions of pre- ceding years, have rendered the name which they bear second to none, perhaps superior to any, which the world has ever witnessed. Instead then of joining in Avith that senseless spirit of railing, wherewith Scotchmen are too often accustomed to talk of the English, and Englishmen of the Scottish Universities, I please myself in thinking that the two institutions have different objects, and that they are both excellent in their different ways. That each system might borrow somethinir with advantao'e from the other, is very possible, but I respect both of them too much to be fond of hasty and rash experiments. In o'ar great empire we have need of many kinds of men ; it is necessary that we should possess within our own bounds, the means of giving to each kind that sort of prepanition whicli uiay best fit them for the life to which they are des- tined. So there be no v/ant of unity in the ge- neral character and feeling of tl'e whole nation, considered as acting together, the more ways the intellect of the nation has, in which to shoot it- i;elf out and display its eiiorgios, the better will ENGIJSir UNIVERSITIES. 205 it be : the greater the variety of walks of ex- ertion and species of success, the greater the variety of stimulus applied; and the greater that spirit of universal activity, without which minds become stagnant like fish-pools, the greater is our hope of long and proudly preserving our high place in the estimation of the world. I sliall return to the Universities in my next. P. M, VOL. t 20(i LETTER XVITI. TO I.ADY j'OHNES. Dear Aunt, If you meet with Mr David Williams of Yris, he will tell you that I send him a long let- ter every other day, filled with histories of din- ner-parties, and sketches of the Edinburgh lite- rati ; and yet, such is my diligence in my voca- tion of tourist, I am laying up stores of anec- dotes about the northern beau-monde, and ma- king drawings in crayon of the northern beau- ties, which, I flatter myself, will be enough to amuse your ladyship half the autumn, after I return to you. There is a very old rule, to do like the Romans when you are in Rome ; and the only merit I lay claim to on the present oc- casion, resolves itself into a rigid observance of this sage precept. It is the fashion here for every man to lead two or three different kinds 1 SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. 207 of lives all at once, and I have made shift to do somewhat like my neighbours. In London, a lawyer is a lawyer, and he is nothing more ; for going to the ];>lay or the House of Commons, now and then, can scarcely be considered as any serious interruption of his professional habits and existence. In London, in like manner, a; gay man is nothing but a gay man ; for, how- ever he may attempt to disguise the matter, whatever he does out of the world of gaiety is intended only to increase his consequence in it. But here I am living in a city, which thrives both by law and by gaieties, and would you believe it ? a very great share of the practice of both of these mysteries lies in the very same hands. It is this, so far as I can judge, which constitutes w-hat the logicians would call the differential quality of the society of Edinburgh. It is, at this time of the year at least, a kind of melange of London, Bath, and Cheltenham ; and I am inclined to think, that, upon due examina- tion, you would find it to be in several particu- lars a more agreeable place than any of these. In many other particulars, I think any rational per- son would pronounce it, without difficulty, to be more absurd than any of them. The removal of the residence of the sovereiiin 208 SOCIF.TY OF EDINBURGH. has had the eftect of rendering the great nobility of Scotland very indifferent about the capital. There is scarcely one of the Premiere Noblesse, I am told, that retains even the appearance of supporting a house in Edinburgh ; and by far the greater part of them are quite as ignorant of it, as of any other provincial town in the island. The Scotch courts of law, however, are all esta- blished in this place, and this has been sufficient to enable Edinburgh to keep the first rank among the cities of Scotland, which, but for them, it seems extremely unlikely she should have been able to accomplish. For the more the commercial towns thrive, the more business is created for this legal one ; and the lawyers of Edinburgh may be said to levy a kind of custom upon every bail of goods that is manufactured in this part of the island, and a no less regular ex- cise upon every article of merchandize that is brought into it from abroad. In this way, (to such wonderful exactness has the matter been brought,) it may be said, that every great mer- chant in Glasgow pays large salaries to some two or three members of the law in Edinburgh, who conduct the numerous litigations, that arise out of a flourishing business, with great civility ; and, with greater civility still, the more nimierous li- SOCIETY OF KDINUURGH. 20<) tigatioiis vvhi(;h attend the untwisting and disse- vering of the Gordian knot of mercantile diffi- culties and embarrassments. And so, indeed, there is scarcely much exaggeration in the com- mon saying, that every house which a man, not a lawyer, builds out of Edinburgh, enables a man, who is a lawyer, to build another equally comfortable in Edinburgh. A very small share of the profits set apart for the nourishment of this profession falls into the hands of the first branch of it the Barristers. These are still, in general, although not so uni- formly as in former times, younger sons of good families, who have their fortunes to make, but who have been brought up in a way more calcu- lated to make them adepts in spending than in getting. The greater part of them, moreover, seldom have any o})portunity of realizing much money, were they inclined to do so ; for, with the exception of some six or eight, who mono- polize the ^vhole of the large fees, and the far greater share of the small ones, the most of the advocates may think themselves extremely for- tunate, if, after passing eight or ten years at the bar, they are able to make as nuich by their profession as may suffice for the supporl of a fa- 210 SOCIETY or EDINBURGH. mily, in the most quiet and moderate style of living. A vast number of those who come to the bar have no chance, almost no hope, of get- ting into any tolerable practice ; but as there are a great number of offices of various degrees of honour and emolument, which can only be filled by members of the Faculty of Advocates, they are contented to wear the gown year after year, in the expectation of at last being able to step into the possession of one of these births, by means of some connections of blood, or marriage, or patronage. One should at first sight say, that this must be rather a heartless kind of drudgery ; but, such as it is, it is submitted to by a very great number of well-educated and accomplished gentlemen, who not only keep each other in countenance wath the rest of the world, but, what is much better, render this mode of life highly agreeable in itself These persons constitute the chief community of loungers and talkers in Edin- burgh ; and such is the natural effect of their own family connections, and the conventional kind of respect accorded to the name of their pro- fession, that their influence may be considered as extending over almost the whole of the northern part of the island. They make the nearest ap- SOCIETY or EDINJBUKUH. 211 proach, of any class of men now existing, to the modes of Templar-life described by Addison and Steele ; for, as to the Temple wits and critics of our day, you know they are now sadly " shorn of their beams," and are, indeed, regarded by the ruling powers of the West-end the ht Ir nKu of Albemarle-street, ^-c. as forming little better than a sort of upper form of the Cockney- school. The chief wealth of the profession, however, if not the chief honour, is lodged with the attor- nies, or, as they are here called, the Writers. Of these there is such an abundance in this city, that I cannot for my life understand by what means they all contrive to live ; and those of them with whom I have become acquainted, I do assure you live well. They are sub-divided into vari- ous classes, of which the highest is that of the Writers or Clerks to the Signet, so called be- cause they alone have the privilege of drawing particular kinds of deeds, to which the king's signet is affixed. Even of these there are many hundreds in actual practice at this moment, and many of them have realized large fortunes, and retired from business to enjoy the ofium cum dig- nifate. It may be said, that almost every foot of land in Scotland pays something to the Wri- 212 SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH^ ters to the Signet ; for there is scarcely an estate in Scotland, the proprietor of which does not en- trust the management of the whole of his affairs to one of their order. The connection which ex- ists between them and the landed interest is thus of the most intimate nature. The country gen- tlemen of Scotland, from whatever causes, are generally very much in dv^bt. Their writers, or, as they call them, their agents or doers, are of necessity acquainted with the many secrets which men in debt must have ; they are themselves the bankers and creditors of their clients. In short, when a gentleman changes his man ofbu- smess, his whole affairs must undergo a complete revolution and convulsion ; and in Scotland, it is a much easier thing to get rid of one's wife, than of one's doer. These advocates and rich writers may be con- sidered as forming the nucleus of the society of Edinburgh. Their connections of birth and bu- siness bind them so closely with the landed gen- try, that these last come to Edinburgh princi- pally in order to be in their neighbourhood ; these again draw with them a part of the minor noblesse, and the whole of the idle military men wlio can alford it. Of Lite years also, the gentry St)C;IKTV OF KDINIIUJIGII. 21.'} of sonic of the northern English counties have begun to come hither, in preference to going to York as they used to do ; and out of all this med- ley of materials, the actual mass of the society of Edinburirh is formed. I mean the winter socie- ty of Edinburgh ; for, in the summer months that is from April till Christmas the town is commonly deserted by all, except those who have ties of real business to connect them with it. Xay, during a considerable portion of that time, it loses, as I am informed, the greater part even of its eminent lawyers, and has quite as green and desolate an appearance, as the fashion- able squares in London have about the falling of the leaf. The medley of people, thus brought together for a few months every year to inhabit a few streets in this' city, cannot afford to split their forces very minutely, so as to form many differ- ent spheres of society, according to their opinions of their relative rank and importance. It is now admitted everywhere, that no party is worth the going to, unless it be a crowded one ; now, it is not possible to form a party here that shall be at once select and crowded. The dough and the leaven must go together to make up the loaf. 214 SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. and the wives of lords and lairds, and advocates, and writers, must be contented to club their forces, if they are to produce any thing that de- serves the honourable name of a squeexe. Now and then, indeed, a person of the very highest importance, may by great exertion succeed in forming one exception to this rule. But the rule is in general a safe one ; and the Edinburgh parties are in the main mixed parties I do not luean that they are mixed in a way that renders them at all disagreeable, even to those who have been accustomed to the style of society in much greater capitals, but that they are mixed in a way of which no example is to be found in the parties of London, or indeed of any European capital, except the Paris of the present time. People visit each other in Edinburgh with all the appearance of cordial familiarity, who, if they lived in London, would imagine their dif- ference of rank to form an impassable barrier against such intercourse. Now, although the effect may not amount to any thing absolute- ly unpleasant, there is no question that this admission of persons not educated in the true circles, must be seen and felt upon the general aspect of the society of P^dinburgh, and that, up- SOCIETY OF ED1NJ3URGH. 215 on the whole, this society is, in consequence of their admission, less elegant than might other- wise have been expected in the capital of such a country as Scotland. * * * # Your's very affectionately, P. M. 216 LETTER XIX. TO THE SAME. Dear Aunt, However composed and arranged, tlie routs and balls of this place are, during their season, piled upon each other with quite as much bustle and pomp as those even of London. Every night, some half a dozen ladies are at home, and every thing that is in the wheel of fashion, is carried round, and thrown out in due course at the door of each of them. There is at least one regular ball every evening, and besides this, half of the routs are in their waning hours trans- formed into carpet-dances, wherein quadrilles are performed in a very penseroso method to the music of the piano-forte. LTpon the whole, how- ever, I am inclined to be of opinion, that even those who most assiduously frequent these mis- cellaneous assemblages are soon sickened, if they SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. 217 durst but confess the triitli, of the eternal repe- tition of tlie same identical crowd displaying its noise and pressure under so many different roofs. Far be it from me to suspect, that there are not some faces, of wliicli no eye can grow weary ; but, in spite of all their loveliness, I am certainly of opinion, that the impression made by the belles of Edinburgh would be more powerful, were it less frequently reiterated. Among the hundred young ladies, whose faces arc exhibited in these parties, a very small proportion, of course, can have any claims to that higher kind of beau- ty, which, like the beauty of painting or sculp- ture, must be gazed on for months or years be- fore the whole of its charm is understood and felt as it ought to be. To see every evening, for months in succession, the same merely pretty, or merely pleasing faces, is at the best a fatiguing business. One must soon become as familiar with the contour of every cheek, and the sweep of every ringlet, as one is with the beauties or defects of one's own near relatives. And if it be true, that defects in this way come to be less disagreeable, it is no less true, per contra, that beauties come to have less of the natural power of their fascination. 218 SOCIETY OF KDINBURGH. The effects of this unceasing flood of gaiety, then, are not perhaps so very favourable as might be expected to the great object of all gaieties the entrapping of the unfortunate lords of the creation. But this is not the worst of the mat- ter. I am really very free from any very puri- tanical notions, in regard to the pleasures of hu- man life ; but I do sincerely, and in honest ear- nestness doubt, whether any good is gained to the respectable citizens of this town, by having their wives and daughters immersed, for so con- siderable a portion of the year, in a perpetual round of amusements, so fatiguing to their bo- dies and their minds, and so destructive, I should fear, of much of that quiet and innocent love of home and simple pleasures, in which the true charm of the female character ought to consist, and in which its only true charm does at this moment consist in the opinion of all men of sense and feeling. It is a very pretty thing, no doubt, to see a young lady dressed with Parisian flowers and Parisian gauzes, and silk slippers and an In- dian fan, and the whole kc. of fashionable ar- ray : But I question whether this be, after all, the style in which a young man of any understand- ing sees a young lady with most danger to his peace. It is very well that people in the more SOC lETY OV I'.DIXBURGH. 219 quiet walks of life should not be ignorant of what goes on among those that are pleased to style them- selves their betters : But, I do think that this is rather too entire and honajide an initiation into a train of existence, which is, luckily, as incon- sistent with the permanent happiness, as it is with the permanent duties, of those w^ho cannot afford all their lives to be mere fine ladies. For myself, after living so quietly in Car- digan, I have been on the whole much pleased with the full and leisurely view I have noAV had even of this out-skirt of the beau-monde, I do not think matters have undergone any improve- ment since I last peeped into its precincts. The ladies are imdoubtedly by no means so well- dressed as they "vvere a ?e\v years ago, before these short waists and enormous fetes of flowers and ringlets w^ere introduced from Paris. There is, perhaps, no one line in the w^hole of the female form, in which there lies so much gracefulness as in the outline of the back. Xow, that was seen as it ought to be a few years ago ; but now, every woman in Britain looks as if her clothes were hung about her neck by a peg. And then the truly Spartan exposure of the leg, which seems now to be in fashion, is, in my judgment, the most unwise thing in the w^hole world; for any 220 SOCIETY or EDIXBURGir. person can tell well enough from the shape of the foot and ancle, whether the limb be or be not hand- some ; and what more would the ladies have ? IMoreover, the fashion has not been allowed to ob- tain its ascendency Avithout evident detriment to the interests of the majority, for I have never yet been in any place where there were not more limbs that would gain by being concealed, than by being exposed. ]kit, in truth, even those who have the shape of a Diana, may be assured that they are not, in the main, gainers by attract- ing too much attention to some of their beauties. I wonder that they do not recollect and ])rofit by the exquisite descri})tion of the Bride, in Sir John Suckling's poem of the Wedding; " Her feet benciUh her petticoat. Like little mice .-^tole in and out, As if tliey fear'd the h'fj-ht." As for those, who, with bad shapes, make an use- less display of their legs. I must ^vhich liave. and, of course. SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH. 221 those who are sensible enough to perceive, that their heads could not stand the test of sculpture, may be very easily pardoned for believing, that their expressiveness might still render them ad- mirable studies for a painter. But as to limbs, I really am quite at a loss to conceive how any person should labour under the least difficulty in ascertaining, in the most exact way, whether handsomeness may, or may not, be predicated concerning an}^ given pair of legs or arms in ex- istence. Their beauty is entirely that of Form, and by looking over a few books of prints, or a few plaster-of Paris casts, the dullest eye in the world may learn, in the course of a single fore- noon, to be almost as good a critic in calves and ancles as Canova himself Yet nothing can be more evident, than that the great majority of young ladies are most entirely devoid of any ideas concerning the beauty of Form, cither in themselves, or in others ; they never trike the trouble to examine any such matters minutely, but satisfy tlien] selves with judging by the ge- neral air and result. In regard to other people, this may do very well ; but it is a very bad plan "with respect to themselves. Even you, my dear lady Johnes, are a perfect tyro in this branch of knowledge. I remember^ VOL. I. p 222 fciOClETY OF EDINBURGH. only the last time I saw you, you were praising with all your might the legs of Colonel B , those flimsy worthless things, that look as if they were bandaged with linen rollers from the heel to the knee. I beg you would look at the Apollo Belvidere, the Fighting Gladiator, and the Farnesc Hercules. There arc only three liandsome kinds of legs in the work), and in these, you have a specimen of each of the three I speak of gentlemen. As for your own sex, the Venus is the only true model of female form in existence, and yet such is your culpable igno- rance of yourselves, that I devoutly believe she would be pronounced a very clumsy person, were she to come into the Aberystwith ball- room. You may say what you will, but I still assert, and I v,'ill prove it if you please, by pen and ])encil, that, with one ])air of exceptions, the best legs in Cardigan are Mrs V 's. As for JMiss J D 's, I think they are frightful * * * * * J. t A great part of this letter is omitted in tlie Second Edi- tion, ill consequence of the displeasure its publication gave to certain individuals in Cardiganshire. I hope 1 need not say how iTiuch I was iirieved, when I learned in what way sonic of the passages hud been regarded by several ladies, who have DANCING. 223 It is a great mistake under which the Scotch people he, in supposing themselves to be excel- lent dancers ; and yet one hears the mistake re- ^r> ing, begins to take with the soil, and the girls can already go throngh most of its manoeuvres without having recourse to their fans. But their beaux continue certainly to perform these new- fangled evolutions, in a way tliat would move the utmost spleen of a Parisian butcher. What big, lazy, clumsy fellows one sees lumbering cautiously, on toes that should not be called light and fantastic, but rather heavy and syllogistic. It seems that there goes a vast deal of ratiocina- tion to decide upon the moves of their game. The automaton does not play chess with such an airof lugubrious gravity. Of a surety, Terpsichore was never before worshipped by such a solemn set of devotees. One of our own gloomy Welsh Jumpers, could he be suddenly transported among some se/,^' that I have seen, would un- doubtedly imagine himself to be in a saltatory prayer-meeting ; and yet these good people, put them fairly into a reel, can frisk it about with all possible demonstrations of hilarity. They pre- fer the quadrille, I imagine, upon something of the same principle which leads a maid-servant to spend her two shillings on a tragedy rather than on a comedy. I could not help in my own mind likening these dolorous pas seuls performed in rotation by cnch of the quadrillers, and then sue- 226 DANCING. ceeded by the more clamorous display of sadness ill their cliaine Angloise, Sip. to the account whicli JMiss Edgeworth gives us of the Irish lyke ivaJce, wherein each of the cousins chaunts a stave of lamentation, solo^ and then the whole ge- neration of them join in the screaming treble of the choral ulululuhl hu ! " Why did you leave the potatoes ?" " What ailed thee, Pat, with the butter-milk !" &:c. &c. &c. The wali:i has been even more unfortunate than the quadrille ; it is still entirely an exotic in the North. Nor, in truth, am I much inclined to find fault with the prejudices which have checked the progress of this fascinating dance among the disciples of John Knox and Andrew IMelville. I really am of opinion, that it might have been as well, had we of the South been equally shy of the importation. As for myself, I assure you, that ever since I spent a week at Lady L 's, and saw those great fat girls of her's waltzing every night with that odious Dr B , I cannot endure the very name of the thing. 15y the way, I met the other day with a very nice poem, entitled, " "Waltz an Apostrophic Hymn, by Francis Horn em, Esq. ;" and as I think you have never hoiine:m's wai.tz. 52:7 .seen it, I shall transcribe a few lines for your amiusement. " Borne on the breath of Hyperborean gales, From Hamburgh's port (while Hamburgh yet had Mail-'' Ere yet unlucky Fame compelletl to creep To snowy Gottenburgh was chilled to sleep ; Or^ starting from her slumbers, deigned arise, Heligoland ! to stock thy mart with lies ; Willie unburnt Moscow yet had news to send, Nor owed her fiery exit to a friend. She came Waltz came- and with her certain sets Of true despatches, and as true Gazettes ; Then flamed of Austerlitz the blest despatch. Which Moniteur nor Morning Post can match ; And almost crushed beneath the glorious news. Ten plays and forty tales of Kotzebue's ; One envoy's letters, six composers' airs, And loads from Frankfort and from Leipsig fairs : Meincr's four volumes upon womankind, Like Lapland witches to ensure a wind ; Brunk's heaviest tome for ballast, and, to back it. Of Heyne, such as should not sink the packet, " Fraught with this cargo and her ftiirest freight, Delightful Waltz, on tiptoe for a mate. The welcome vessel reached the genial strand, And round her flocked the daughters of the land. Nut lovelorn Quixote when his Sancho thought The knight's fandango friskier than it ought; Not soft Herodias, when, with winning tread, Her nimble feet danced off anotlier's hcad^ 228 HORNEM'S WALT^r. Not Cleopatra on her galley's deck, Disphiyctl so much of leg, or more of neck, Than thou, ambrosial Waltz, when first the moon Beheld thee twirling to a Saxon tune ! '' To you ye husbands often years ! whose brows Ache with the annual tributes of a spouse ; To you, of nine years less who only bear The budding sprouts of those that you shall wear. With added ornaments around them rolled, Of native brass, or law-awarded gold ; To you ye matrons, ever on the watch To mar a son's, or make a daughter's match ; To you ye children of whom chance accords, Alivays the ladies' and sometimes their lords' ; To you ye single gentlemen ! who seek Torments for life, or pleasures for a week ; As Love or Hymen your endeavours guide. To gain your own, or snatch another's bride : To one and all the lovely stranger came, And every ball-room echoes with her name. " Endearing Waltz to thy more melting tune Bow Irish jig and ancient rigadoon ; Scotch reels avaunt ! and country dance forego Your future claims to each fantastic toe ; Waltz Waltz alone both arms and legs demands, Liberal of i'ect and lavish of her hands; Hands which may freely range in public sight, Where ne'er before but pray ' put out the light.' INIetliinks the glare of yonder chandelier Shines much too far or I am much too near ; And true, though strange Waltz whispers this remark, * My slippery steps are safest in the dark.' But here tlie Muse with due decorum halts. And lends iier longest petticoat to ' Waltz.' iiornem's WAT-TZ. 229 '' Observant travellers ! of every time, Yc quartos ! published upon every clime ; O say;, sliali dull liomaika's heavy round, Fandango's wriggle, or Bolero's bound ; Can Egypt's Almas tantalizing groupe Columbia's caperers to the warlike whoop Can aught from cold Kamschatka to Cape Horn, With Waltz compare, or after Waltz be borne ? Ah no ! from Morier's pages up to Gait's, Each tourist pens a paragraph for ' Waltz.' '' Shades of those belles^ whose reign began of yore, With (leorge the Third's and ended long before ; Thougli in your daughters' daughters yet you thrive, Burst from your lead, and be yourselves alive ! Back to the ball-room speed your spectred host, Fools' paradise is dull to that you lost ; No treacherous powder bids Conjecture quake, No stifl'-starched stays make meddling fingers ache ; (Transferred to those ambiguous things that ape Goats in their visage, women in their shape ;) No damsel faints when rather closely pressed. But n)ore caressing seems when most caressed; Superfluous hartshorn and reviving salts. Both banished by the sovereign cordial ' Waltz.' Tliough gentle Genlis, in her strife witli Stacl, Would e'en proscribe thee from a Paris ball ; Thee Fashion hails from Countesses to Queens, And maids and valets waltz behind the scenes ; Wide and more wide thy vvitching circle sjireads, And turns if nothing else at least our heads ; With thee e'en clumsy cits attempt to bounce, And cockneys practise what they can't pronounce 230 hornem's waltz. Gods ! how the glorious theme my strain exalts, And rhyme finds partner rhyme in praise of ' Waltz.' " And now, my dear aunt, I have surely writ- ten to you, at the least, with most dutiful ful- ness. 231 LETTER XX. to the rev. baviu williams. Dear Williams, The life I have led here has been such a strange mixture of all .sorts of occupations, that were I to send yon a literal diary of my transac- tions, I believe you would not fail to discover abundant room for doubting the authenticity of the M.S. I shall therefore reserve the full and entire history of this part of my existence, till I may have opportunity of communicating it to you vit'ci voce over a bottle of Binn D, and pro- ceed in the meantime, as I have been doing, to give you little .jj^limpses and fragments of it, ex- actly in the order tiiat pleases to suggest itself. In Smollet's time, according' to the inimitable and unquestionable authority of our cousin, IVIatthew Bramble, no stranger could sleep more than a single night in Edinburgh, with the pre- servation of any thing like an effectual incog- nito. In those days, as I have already told 3 on, the people all inhabited in the Old Town of 232 EDINBURGH HOUSES. Edinburgh packed togetlicr, family above fa- mil}-, for aught I know clan above clan, in little more than one street, the houses of which may, upon an average, be some dozen stories in height. The aerial elevation, at which an immense pro- portion of these people had fixed their abodes, rendered it a matter of no trifling moment to as- cend to them ; and a person in the least de- gree affected with asthma, might as soon have thought of mounting the Jungfrau, as of paying regular devoirs to any of the fair cynosures of these vTrifTaTx (Pco/xxra. The difficulty of access, which thus prevented many from undertaking any ascents of the kind, was sufficient to prevent all those w^ho did undertake them, from entering rashly on their pilgrimages. No man thought of mounting one of those gigantic staircases, without previously ascertaining that the object of his intended visit was at home unless it might be some Hannibal fresh from the High- lands, and accustomed, from his youth upwards, to dance all his minuets on Argyle's bowling-green. To seek out a strano;er amono; a hundred or two such staircases, was of course an undertaking beyond the patience even of a person who had enjoyed such an education as this ; and so it be- came a matter of absolute necessity, that F.din- EDINBUllGH CADIES. 233 burgh should possess some body of citizens set apart, and destuied ah oi:o, for cUmbing stair- cases, and carrying messages. From this necessity, sprung the high Uneage of " the Cadies of Auhl lieekie." AVhen I use the word rnicdgc, I do not mean to say that their trade ran in tlicir blood, or that the cadies, as the Lake poet sings, '' To sire from granelslre, and from sire to soil. Throughout their generations^ did pursue With pur[)ose^ and hereditary love^ Most stedfast and unwavering, the same course Of hibour, not unpleasant, nor unpaid." The cadies bore more resemblance in this respect to the Janissaries and Mamelukes of IModern, than to the liereditary hammermen, cooks, phy- sicians, and priests of Ancient Egypt. The breed of th.em Avas not kept up in the usual way, ' By ordinance of matrimonial love ;" but by continual levies of fresh recruits from the same rut>M>;ed wilds, wherein alone, the Gc- niifs I'jpct'i was supposed to retain suflicient vi- gour ibr the production of individuals, adapt- ed f >r so aspiring a course of life. Every year ])rought from the fastnesses of Lochaber and Eracuiar, a r.ev/ supply of scions to be engrafted upon the stock rooted imnioveably in the lieart 234 EDINBURGH CADIES. of Auld Reekie so that season after season, the tree of the cadies, like that of Virgil, might be said, " Mirari noviis frondes et non sua poma." However produced and sustained whatever might be the beauties or the blemishes of their pedigree this race continued for many genera- tions, to perform with the same zeal and success the same large variety of good offices to the citi- zens of Edinburgh. The cadie preserved amidst all his functions not a little of the air and aspect natural to him in his own paternal wildernesses : " A savage -wildness round him hung, As of a dweller out of doors ; In his whole figure and his mien A savage character was seen. Of mountains and of dreary moors." He climbed staircases with the same light and elastic spring Avhich had been wont to carry him unfatio'ued to the brow of Cairno-orm or Ben- Nevis ; and he executed the commands of his employer ^)7'o /c^wj;or(?, whatever they might be, in tlie same spirit of unquestioning submission and thorough-going zeal, with which he had been taught from liis infancy to obey the orders of Mac- callamorc, CilenJiarrv, Gordon, Grant, or whoso- EDINBURGH CADIES. 235 ever the chieftain of his clan might be. In order to qualify him for the exercise of this laborious profession, it was necessary that the apprentice- cadie should make himself minutely familiar with every stair-case, every house, every family, and every individvial in the city, and to one who had laid in this way a sound and accurate foun- dation of information, it could be no difficult matter to keep on a level with the slight flood of mutation, which the city and its population was at that period accustomed to. The moment a stranger arrived in Edinburgh, his face was sure to attract the observation of some of this indefatigable tribe, and they knew no rest till they had ascertained his name, residence, and condition considering it, indeed, as a sort of in- sult upon their body, that any man should pre- sume to live within the bounds of their jurisdic- tion, and yet remain unpenetrated by the per- spicacity of their unwearied espionage. But why should I say any more of this race ? They are now gathered to their fathers ; and their deeds, are they not written in the Book of the Expedi- tion of liumphrey Clinker ? Althouiih, however, the orio;inal and reo-ular iVaternity no longer exists, and although, in- deed, the cliange Vv'hich lias taken place, both in 236 EDINBURGH CADIES. the residence and in the manners of the inhabit- ants, has removed almost all shadow of pretence for the existence of any such fraternity Edin- burgh is still possessed of a species of men who retain the name, and, in so far as the times per- mit, the functions of the cadies. At the corner of every street is usually to be seen a knot of these fellows lounging on a wooden bench in expectation of employment. They are very busy in the evenings during the gay season of the year ; for they are exclusively the bearers of the chairs which convey the beaux and belles from one rout and ball to another ; but even at that season, their mornings, for the most part, are passed in a state of complete inaction. A pack of sorely blackened cards, or an old rotten backgammon board, furnishes a small proportion with something like occupation ; but the greater part are contented with an indefatigable dili gcnce in the use of tobacco, which they seem to consume indifferently in all its shapes, smoking, cliewing, and snuffing, v,'ith apparently the same intensity of satisfaction. Whenever I pass one of these groupes, my ears are saluted with ac- cents, which the persons I usually walk with lalk of as coarse and disgusting, but which are interesting at least, if not delightful, to me, be- GAELIC LANGUAGE. 237 cause they remind me most strongly of those of our own native dialect. At first, indeed, the only resemblance I was sensible to, lay in the general music and rythm of their speech ; but, by dint of listening attentively on all occasions, I soon began to pick up a few of their words, and am now able, I flatter myself, to understand a gi'eat part of their discourse. With a few va- rieties in the inflections, and some more striking variations in the vowel sounds, the Gaelic is evi- dently the same language with our own. I do not mean merely, that it is sprung remotely from the same Celtic stem ; but that it is en- tirely of the same structure in all essential re- spects, and bears, so far as I can judge, a much nearer resemblance to our tongue, than is any where else to be traced between the lanmiaeces of peoples that have lived so long asunder. I shall pay particular attention to this subject during my stay in Scotland, and doubt not I sliall be able to give you some very interesting details when we meet. In the mean time, I have al- ready begun to read a little of the Gaelic Ossian, not you may believe out of any reverence for its authenticity, but witli a view to sec what the written Ciaclic is. Nothing can l)e more evi- VOL. L Q 2S8 GAELIC LANGUAGE. dent than its total inferiority to the Welsh. It is vastly inferior in per&picuity, and immeasura- bly inferior in melody ; in short, it bears no marks of having undergone, as our language has done, the correcting, condensing, and polishing labour of a set of great poets and historians. These de- fects are still more apparent in a collection of Gaelic songs which I have seen, and which I believe to be really antique. The wild and em- passioned tone of sentiment, however, and the cold melancholy imagery of these compositions, render them well worthy of being translated ; and, indeed, Walter Scott has already done this service for some of the best of them. But I have seen nothing that should entitle them to share in anything like the high and devout admira- tion which we justly give, and which all Europe would give, had they the opportunity, to the su- blime and pathetic masterpieces of our own great bards. I trust, David, you are not neglecting your truly grand and important undertaking. Go on, and prosper ; and I doubt not, you will confer the * highest honour both on your coun- try and yourself * This refers to a great work on Welsh Poetr}' an(1 History, in whicl) Mr VVilh'ams has been engaged for some years, and EDlNBUiiGII CADIKS. U'd^ The cadies, from whom I have made this di- gression, have furnished me with another, and ahnost as interesting- field of study, in quite a different way. Their ])h} siognomies are to me an inexhaustible fund of observation and enter- tainment. They are for the most part, iv, I have said, Highlanders l>y birth, ])iit the experience of their Lowland lives has had the merit of tem- pering, in a very wonderful maimer, the mere mountaineer parts of their aspect. A kind of wild stare, which the eyes retain from the keen and bracing atmosphere of their native glens, is softened with an infusion of quiet urban shrewd- ness, often productive of a most diverting incon- sistency in the general effect of their counte- nances. I should certainly have supposed them, prima facie, to be the most unprincipled set of men in the world ; but I am told their character for honesty, fidelity, and discretion, is such as to justify the most implicit reliance in them. This, however, I by no means take as a complete proof of my being in the wrong. Honesty, fide- lity, and discretion, are reccssaLy to their em- wliich, when it is published, will, I doubt not, create a greater sensation in Wales, than anything that has occurred since the death of Llewellvn. 240 KDINBURGII CADIES. ployment, and success; and therefore I doubt not they are honest, faithful, and discreet, in all their dealings with their employers. But I think it is not possible for fellows, with such faces as these, to have any idea of moral obligation, be- yond what is inspired in this way by the imme- diate feeling of self-interest ; and I have no doubt, that, with proper management, one might find on occasion an assassin, almost as easily as a pimp, among such a crew of grinning, smiling, cringing savages, as are at this moment assem- bled beneath my window. I am making a col- lection of drawings of all the most noted of these cadies, and I assure you, my sketch-book does not contain a richer section than this will afford. You will be quite thunderstruck to find what uniformity prevails in the developement of some of the leading organs of these topping cadies. They are almost all remarkable for projection of their eye-brows the consequence of the luxuri- ant manner in which their organs of observation have expanded themselves. At the top of their heads, the symbols of ambition, and love of praise, are singularly prominent. A kind of dogged pertinacity of character may be inferred from the knotty structure of the region behind tlicii- cars ; and the choleric temperament be- EDINBURGH C A DIES. 241 traycd in their gestures, wlieii among themselves, may probably be accounted for by the extraor- dinary developement of the organ of self-love, just above the nape of the neck which circum- stance again is, no doubt, somewhat connected with the continual friction of burthens upon that delicate region. It is very ungrateful of me, however, to be saying anything disrespectful about a class of meU;, from whom I have derived so much ad- vantage since my arrival in this place. When- ever a stranger does arrive, it is the custom that he enters into a kind of tacit compact with some of the body, who is to perform all little offices he may require during the continuance of his visit. I, myself, was particularly fortunate in falling into the hands of one whom I should take to be the cleverest cadie that at present treads the streets of Auld Tleekie. His name is D d INI'N , and, if one may take his word for it, he has gentle blood in his veins, being no less than " a bairn o' our chief himscll." Nor, indeed, do I see any reason to call this account of his pedigree in question, for Donald is broad of back, and stout of limb, and has, I think, not a little of the barbarian kind of pride about the top of his forehead ; and 242 KDINBUllOH CADIES. I hear, the Phvlarchiis with whom he claims kindred, led, in more respects than one, a very patriarchal sort of life. P. M. 243 LETTER XXL TO THE IlEV. DAVID WILLIAMS. I SPENT an afternoon very pleasantly the other day at Dr B 's, the same who is so ce- lebrated for his discoveries concerning light- his many inventions of optical instruments and his masterly conduct of that best of all works of tlie kind, the Edinburgh Encyclopae- dia. l)r E is still a young man, although one would scarcely suppose this to be the case, who, never having seen himself, should form his p'uess from considerinix "what he has done. He cannot, I should tiiink, be above forty, if so nuich. Like most of tlie scicntitic men in Edin- burgh, the doctor is quite a man of the world in his manners ; his countenance is a very mild 244 1)11 B . and agreeable one, and in his eyes, in particii- lai', there is a wonderful union of penetration and tenderness of expression. From his conver- sation, one would scarcely suspect that he had gone so deep into the hidden parts of science, for he displays a vast deal of information con- cerning the lighter kinds of literature, although, indeed, he does all this with a hesitative sort of manner, which probably belongs to him as a man of abstruse science. It is, no doubt, mainly owing to this happy combination of accomplish- ments, that he has been able to render his great work so much more truly of an Encyclopa2dic character, than any other which has been pub- lished imder the same name in our island. In a work of that kind, which cannot be finished without the co-operation of a vast variety of con- tributors continued throughout many successive years, it is quite obvious how much must de- pend on the superintending and arranging skill and judgment of the editor. Now, it is a very rare thing indeed, to meet with a person of fine talents, who is alike a man of science, and a man of literature ; and unless under the care of such a person, I do not see how an Encyclopaedia can be conducted in such a way as to give equal sa- tisfaction t(j both the irreat classes into which readers of Encyclopaedias must necessarily be di- vided. All the other Encyclopaedias published in this country, have been edited either by per- sons possessed of skill in one department only, and negligent of the rest, or, what is still worse, by persons alike destitute of skill in all depart- ments whatever in other words, members of the great corporation of charlatans. There w^ere several very pleasant men of the party, and the conversation, both during dinner, and afterwards, was extremely lively and agree- able, a;> well as instructive ; but from the time w^e sat down, there was one face which attracted my attention in a way that I was quite at a loss to account for. I experienced, in looking at it, a stranoe and somewhat uncomfortable sort of feeling, of which you must often have been sen- sible, as if I had seen the countenance before, where, when, or how, it w^as impossible for me to recollect. At last, the gentleman wdio thus occupied my attention, happened, in talking to I)r B , to utter the w^ord Freyherg, and the whole affair flashed across me as swift as light- ning. That single sound had opened a key to the wliole mystery, and a moment after, I could not help wondering how I should have been at a loss. Some years ago (I shall not say how many,) 2.J.6 PKOFESSOR J- when I was stronger, and more active than I now am, and capable of making longer excursions in ruder vehicles than I now venture upon in my shandrydan, I remember to have travelled in the common post- waggon from Dresden to Leip- sig. I had gone on horseback quite through the Hartz, and passed from thence in the same manner all up the delightful banks of the Elbe, from Magdeburg to the Saxon Switzerland. I then sold my horse, (much the worse for the wear I had given him,) and was making the best of my way towards the west, in that most coarse, and most jumbling of all machines, " The neat post-waggon trotting in." We had got as far as within a single stage of Leipsig, when a little adventure befel us, M^hich, till this face recalled it, I had, for years, as ut- terly forgotten as if it never had occurred. We Avere just about to enter a village, (I cannot re- collect its name,) v/hen our vehicle was surround- ed by a party of mounted gens-d'armes, and a fierce-looking fellow, thrusting his mustachio and his pipe into the window, commanded the whole party to come out and shew ourselves. A terrible mu rder, he said,had been committed some- PKOFKSSOK J . 247 where by a Jew a watchman, I think, of Koin- ingsberg, and lie had every occasion to believe, that the mnrdercr had left Dresden that morn- ing in one of the post-waggons. After we had all complied Avith his order, and dislodged our- selves from the pillar of tobacco-smoke in which we sat enveloped, there were two of the com- pany on whom our keeper seemed to look with eyes of peculiar sus])icion. I myself was one, and the other was a thin, dark-complexioned, and melancholy-looking young man, whom, till this lyioment, I liad not remarked ; for of the six benches swung across the waggon, I had sate upon the one nearest the front, and he on that nearest the rear. I had allowed my beard to grovv' u})on my upper lip, and I believe looked as swarthy as any Jew ever did; but my scanty al- lowance of nose would have alone satisfied a more skilful physiognom.ist, that I could not be the guilty man. The other had somewhat the same cast in that feature, and he wore no mus- tachio, but his hair seemed to be of the genuine israelitish jet and the gens-d'armes were posi- tive that one or other of us must be the mur- tlerer. I spoke (Term an with fluency, and wdth a prevty just accent, and made a statement i'or iny^clf. ^vliich seemed to remove something 248 rROFESSOR J- of the suspicion from me. The other deliver- ed himself with more hesitation, and with an accent, which, whatever it might be, was evi- dently not Saxon, and therefore the Hussar seemed to take it for granted that it was Jewish, imperfectly concealed. At last, after a good deal of discussion, we were both taken to the Amt-house, where the magistrate of the village sat in readiness to decide on the merits of our case. The circumstances which had determined the chief suspicion of the officers, appeared to weigh in the same manner on the mind of the magistrate, and, at the end of the examination which ensued of our persons and our papers, it was announced, that I might proceed on my journey, but that the other must be contented to remain where he was, till his passport should be sent back to Dresden for the examination of the police. Upon this, my fellow-traveller lost temper, and began to complain most bitterly of the inconvenience to which such a delay would expose him. He was on his way, he said, to Freyberg, where he had already studied one year under the celebrated Werner, as his pass- port testified, and he had particular reasons for being anxious to reach his university before a certain day in the following week. The ma- rROFESSOR J . 249 gistratc, who was a very mild-looking person, seemed to consider with himself for a moment, and then said, " A thought strikes me the son of our clergyman has studied at Freyberg, and if you have really been there, sir, it is probable he may recognize you." INIy companion had no objections to an experiment, which at least could not place him in a worse situation than that in w^hich he w^as and in a few minutes the son of the clergyman made his appearance. I remember as distinctly as if the thing had oc- curred only yesterday, the expression of delight which illuminated the countenance of the accu- sed, when this person declared that he recollect- ed him perfectly at Freyberg, and that he had heard Professor AVerner speak of him as a young Scotchman who gave infinite promise of being distinguished in the study of mineralogy. This removed every difficulty, and the magi- strate, with many apologies, gave us permission to take our seats in the post- waggon. The dis- tance of our positions in the vehicle rendered it impossible for me to exchange more than a very few ^v()rds Avith my fellow-sufferer, after we be- gan to move, although, having discovered him to be my countryman, I was sufficiently inclined to enter into conversation. It was late at night 250 PROFESSOR J- before we arrived at Tjcipsig ; and, as I remain- ed there for a day cr two, while he passed on without stopping to Freyberg, we had no fur- ther opportunity of conimunication. In short, I had never seen the face from that time till now ; but I felt assured, that, in spite of the years which had intervened, I could not be mis- taken, and here was the very gentleman at the table of Dr E . In the course of a few minutes, I heard him addressed by the name of J , and immedi- ately conjectured that he might probably be the well-known Professor of Xatural History, whose System of I\lineralcgyyou have often seen on my table. This turned out to be the case ; and, af- ter a second bottle liad somewhat diminished our ceremony, I had a pleasure in recalling to him the story of the murderous Jew, and so of commencing (for it could scarcely be called re- newing) an acquaintance with one from whose works I had received so much information and advantage. After the Doctor's company dis- persed themselves, I walked along Prince's-Street with Professor J , and he invited me to call on him next day, and see his museum an invi- tation which you, who know my propensities, will not suspect me of declining. He also offer- PROFESSOR J . 251 ed to shew me the collection of mineralogy be- longino' to the University, of which I had heard a great deal. I went yesterday, and it is, un- doubtedly, a very superb collection. It is of great value, and admirably arranged ; and the external characters of minerals, particularly those derived from colours, are finely illustrated by an extensive series of the most valuable specimens arranged according to the system made use of by \Verner. Professor J is chiefly known to the world as a mineralogist, and in this character he cer- tainly stands entirely without a rival in his own country ; and when we consider that his system of mineralogy has been adopted by a celebrated Frenchman, as the text-book to his own lectures in Paris, we may fairly conclude, from the pre- ference shown by so competent a judge, that the knowledge and -ability displayed in that work, render it at least equal to the most ap})roved publications of the continental authors. But it is not his intimate acquaintance with minera- logy alone, which renders ^Ir J so capable of doing honour to the chair which he holds. He is also greatly versed in zoology, and, what is of great importance in these times, seems much inclined to indulge in those more general and 252 PROFESSOU J- philosophical views of that science, which the study of nomenclature and classification has well- nifich banished from the remembrance of most of his brethren in the south. A residence of many years in different parts of the continent, and, in particular, a perfect knowledge of the German tongue, which he acquired during his stay at Freyberg, have opened to him many sources of information, from which he continues to derive infinite advantage ; and, at a time when, from the extent and multiplicity of his labours in mi- neralogy, one might naturally suppose his atten- tion to be entirely engrossed by that study, his pupils, I am assured, find him on every occasion both able and willing to instruct them regarding all the recent and most important discoveries and improvements in the other branches of natural science. The professor delivers his lectures both during the winter and summer season, and he divides his course into five great branches : INIeteorology Hydrography INIineralogy a Sketch of the Philosophy of Botany, sufficient to enable his pupils to understand the relations which subsist between that science and a complete history of the inorganic parts of the globe and, lastly, Zoology. The first of these divisions is render- PROFESSOR J . 23.1 ed particularly interesting, by the number and variety of curious facts which are collected, and the more so, as there are scarcely any good books written professedly on the subject. In truth, I should think the whole science of Natural His- tory, as a popular branch of education, is likely to assume a new aspect under the auspices of this ingenious and indefatigable man. Now, that all the known facts of Mineralogy are to him " familiar as household words," he will have it in his power to devote more of his attention to the various branches of Zoology, which hi- therto, as he says very candidly, he has not had either leisure or opportunity to discuss and illus- trate, as his inclinations would lead him to do. The same acuteness which has enabled him so completely to overcome all the difficulties of his own favoiu'ite department, will ere long, I doubt not, elevate him to the first rank among the zoologists of Britain ; and he will soon have the honourable satisfaction of instituting a school of Natural History in the northern metropolis, which may long remain unrivalled in any other country. This desirable object, I am happy to learn, he is now likely to accomplish more easily and speedily than ho could before have expected, vol . I. K 254 PHOFESSOE J- by means of a most valuable and interesting ac- quisition, which is about to be obtained by the University. The fine cabinet of M. Dufresne of the Jardin des Plantes, so well known and de- servedly admired by all the Parisian S9avants, has just been purchased for the public Mu- seum. This, with certain additions to be pro- cured at the approachino' sale of ]Mr Bullock's extensive collections, when combined with the great treasures which the University already possesses, will certainly form by far the most magnificent IMuseum of Natural History in Bri tain. Such is the general view I have been able to form of the actual state of the science, under this celebrated professor. From various conver- sations, however, with himself, Dr B , and some of the yoimg gentlemen who attend the professor's lectures, I am sorry to hear, that, on the whole, the science of Natural History nei- ther has been, nor is, cultivated throughout Scot- land, with any degree of zeal corresponding to the opportunity which the country affords. Its natural advantages are far superior, in most re- spects, to those of the sister kingdom ; and the situation of Edinburgh, in particular, may be 4 PROFESSOR J . 2i55 justly regarded as more favourable than any in the island for the pursuit of this delightful stu- dy. Indeed, it would not be easy to determine, why a higher state of advancement has not been attained ; and the difficulty is much increased when we consider, that, in addition to the great facility which this most picturesque district af- fords for the practical pursuit of the science, the Professorship of Natural History has already been held for several years by the assiduous and intelligent gentleman, of whom I have spoken so much. I am inclined to attribute this to the joint operation of a great number of causes ; but I observe, that Professor J himself considers the too engrossing influence of the law as being the most immediate and effectual of all the dampers under which his favourite study has so louii' lan>uished. jMost of the vountx men of this city are trained up either as barristers or attor- nies ; and it very unfortunately happens, that all more liberal pursuits, (botli classical and scientific,) so far from being much respected or held in estimation by these classes of men, are, for the most part, regarded as quite inconsistent with a diligent discharge of their professional 266 PROFESSOR J- duties and functions. Professor J informs me, that three-fourths of the students who at- tend his lectures, are strangers and students of medicine, chiefly English. Those of the last mentioned faculty, who are indigenous to Scot- land, have, till very lately at least, either procu- red appointments in regiments stationed in fo- reign quarters, or retired to distant corners of the country, where the entire absence of books, and the laborious and unsettled life enjoyed, or rather endured, by rural practitioners, have been more than sufficient to extinguish every spark of science, which might have been kindled in their bosoms during their attendance at the Universi- ty. And thus, though very great and increasing benefits are derived by the students of this science in Edinburgh, from the zeal and talents of Pro- fessor J , and other causes, it would seem that the science must, for a considerable time, look for its best fruits in the south. I rejoice to find that the English students who resort to this place, are duly impressed with a sense of the ad- vantages which they enjoy. I dined with Professor J yesterday, with a small party of his most distinguished pupils. Among these there was one whom the Profes- I'UOFESSUR J . 25T 8or particularly introduced me to a Mr James W 11, brother to the poet. This young gentleman follows the profession of a Writer to the Signet, (which, as I have told you, is the name for the highest class of attornies in Edinburgh) ; but forms, as Mr J as- sured me, a brilliant exception to the neglect with which matters of science are commonly treated by the members of the profession. He is very young many years junior to his more celebrated brother, and no casual observer would suspect them to be of the same family. I have already described to you the exterior of the poet ; James is a thin, pale, slender, con- templative-looking person, with hair of rather a dark colour, and extremely short-sighted. In his manners also, he is as different as possible from his brother ; his voice is low, and his whole demeanour as still as can be imairined. In conversation he attempts no kind of display ; but seems to possess a very peculiar vein of dry humour, which renders him extremely diverting. Notwithstanding all these differences, however, I could easily trace a great similarity in the con- struction of the bones of their two faces ; and, indeed, there is nothing more easy to imagine, than that, with much of the same original powers 258 riioFESsoii J- and propensities, some casual enough circum- stances may have been sufficient to decide, that the one of the brothers shovdd be a poet, and the other a naturalist. The parts of the science of which ]Mr James W- n is fondest, are Orni- thology and Entomology studies so delightful to every true lover of nature, that, I suspect, they are, in some measure, practically familiar to every poet who excels in depicting the manifes- tations, and in tracing the spirit of beauty in the external universe. Professor J , indeed, in- formed me, that his young friend is, in truth, no less a poet than a naturalist that he possesses a fine genius for versification, and has already pub- lished several little pieces of exquisite beauty, although he has not ventured to give his name along with them. On leaving the professor's, Mr W n and I adjourned to this house (where, by the way, Mr Oman enjoys very little of my company,) and had a quiet bowl of punch together, and a great deal of conversation respecting subjects connect- ed with the science in which he so greatly excels, and for which 1 myself, albeit nothing of an adept, have long entertained a special partiality. Among other topics, the brumal retreat of the swallow was haiullcd at considerable Icnoth. Mr c7 FUOFESSOR J . 259 W n I find rather inclined to that theory, which would represent Africa as the principal winter-depot of at least several of the species the Hirundo, Apus, and Rustica, in particular ; and he adduced, in confirmation of this, a pas- sage from Herodotus, which I had never before heard pointed out with a view to this subject according to which, one kind of swallow (from the description, he seemed to suppose it must be the Swift,) remains ifi Kgt/pt througliout the whole yecir //' trsoc tovTit; yjc aTTOKiiTT'dG-i. I have never, indeed, met with any man who seemed to possess a greater power of illustrating sub- jects of natural history, by quotations from writers of all kinds, and in particular from the poets. JNlilton and Wordsworth, above all, he appears to have completely by heart ; and it was wonderfully delightful to me to hear mat- ters, which are commonly discussed in the driest of all possible methods, treated of in so graceful a manner by one who is so much skilled in them. Xothing could be more refreshiiig than to hear some minute details about birds and insects, interrupted and illuminated by a frag- ment of grand melancholy music from the Para- dise liOst, or the Excursion, I shall liavc occasion to sav a ercat deal more 260 PKOFKSSOIl J . to you, both about I'rofessor J and his young friend. Meantime, believe me ever Most affectionately your's, P.M. 361 LETTER XXII. TO THE llEV. DAVID WIJ-LIAMS. Dear David, I BELIEVE I have already hinted to you, that the students in this University are very fond of Debating Societies, and, indeed, the nature of their favourite studies might prepare one abun- dantly to find it so. They inhale the very atmos- phere of doubt, and it is in the course of nature that they should exhale the very breath of dispu- tation. They are always either actually struggling, vi et a?'?/ils\ to get over some quagmire or an- other, or, after establishing themselves once more on what they conceive to be a portion of the Terra Firma, falling out among themselves, which of the troop had picked his way along the neat- est set of stcppiiig-stones, or made his leap from the firmest knot of ruslic.^. Before they have 262 SPKCULATIVE SOCIETV. settled this mighty quarrel, it is possible they may begin to feel the ground giving way be- neath their feet, and are all equally reduced once again to hop, stride, and scramble, as they best may for themselves. The first of the institutions, however, which I visited, is supposed to be frequented by persons who have already somewhat allayed their early fervour for disputation, by two or three years' attendance upon Debating Societies, of an infe- rior and of a far more ephemeral character. While he attends the preelections of the Profes- sor of Logic, the student aspires to distinguish himself in a club, constituted chiefly or entirely of members of that class. The students of Ethics and of Ph}sics are, in like manner, provided with separate rooms, in whicli tliey canvass at night the doctrines they have heard promulga- ted in tlie lecture of the morning. It is not till all this apprenticeship of discipline has been re- gularly gone through, tliat the juvenile pliiloso- })her ventures to draw up a petition, addressed to the president and members of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh, which humbly shewetli ibrth, that he would fain be permitted to give to his polemical and oratorial faculties the last SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 263 finish of sharpness and elegance, under the high auspices of their venerable body. Without sending in such a petition as this, and being admitted fornaally a member of the Society, it is not possible to be present at one of their meetings. These sages will scarcely allow a poor passing stranger to catch even one side- long odour of their wisdom. No it is neces- sary to assume the regular garb of the initiated, before these Hierophants will expand the gates of their Adytus, and reveal to you the inspiring glories of their mysteries. Although I could not help feeling some qualmish suspicions, that this arrangement might, in part at least, have been dictated by a due reverence for the old maxim, ourne igjioium pro magnifico^ yet the way in which I heard the Society spoken of, by per- sons for whose opinion I could not but entertain a high respect, and the curiosity which I cer- tainly felt, to witness for myself all possible ma- nifestation of the rising genius of Scotland, were enough to counter-balance any little scruples I might have, and I resolved, since less might not avail, to affix the name of Peter IMorris, M. D. to the regular formula of supplication. It was attested by ^Ir , who is an honorary mem- ber oi" the Society, and by his nephew, a young 264 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. man of considerable promise, that the said Peter Morris, M. D., was, in their judgment, possess- ed of such a measure of learning and ability, as might justify the Society in admitting him into their bosom ; and after the usual ceremonies of doubt, delay, examination, and panegyric, the said Peter was ballotted for and admitted as aforesaid. I rather grudged a fee of three gui- neas, which, I was given to understand, formed an essential preliminary to my taking my seat ; but, however, as I had been pretty fortunate at loo the evening before, I did not allow this to form any lasting impediment to my honours. As the poet sings, " I prize not treasure for itself. But what it can procure ; Go hang, said I-, the paltry pelf Would keep the spirit poor." So I paid my three guineas, and prepared to make my appearance next Tuesday evening. For the sake of being near the scene of action, 1 agreed to the proposal of the gentlemen who had reconnnended me to the society, viz. to ha- ving' a smio' dinner Avitli one or two friends in addition, in a tavern immediately adjoining. The name olllie house is the Lord Nelson; and SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 265 it is kept by an Englishman, one Barclay. We went at half past four, in order that we might have time to drink our bottle comfortably be- fore the meeting ; and I assure you, I have very seldom enjoyed either a better dinner or a better bottle. There is an ordinary in the house every day at that very hour, which is attended, as I was informed, by a considerable number of stu- dents, besides a host of bagmen, and other tra- vellers of all descriptions, and many half-pay officers of the naval, military, and, above all, of the medical establishments. AVe had a glimpse of them and their dinner, en2)assa?if, and I pro- mise you both made a very joyous appearance. As for us, we dined apart in a room of very magnificent proportions, which, of old, it seems, had been the dining-room of a celebrated Presi- dent of the Court of Session ; a lofty hall, with a rich ceiling in the French style of stucco work, and decorated at one extremity with a huge portrait of the Hero whose name the tavern bears evidently a genuine production of the sign-post school. The princely size of the room, however, and elevation of the roof, were sufficient to give the whole affiiir an air of gentility, and even of splendour, such as is not often to be met with in a liou^o of this description. 1 don't SCO PF,CUI,ATIVE SOCIETY know whether your comfort is so much affected by accessories of this sort as mine are ; but I do at all times enjoy a dinner tenfold, when it is served up in a room of airy and stately dimen- sions. The fare in itself was very excellent. We had a dish of JMullica tawny, and some cod's- head and shrimp-sauce superior corned beef, and a boiled turkey a haricot a pigeon-pie and macaroni all for half-a-crown a-head, being only a sixpence more than the charge at the or- dinary. But to me, the greatest luxury was some very fine draught-porter, the first I have met with since I came to Scotland, for the people of this place in general drink all their malt-liquor bottled but the landlord of the Nelson is an Englishman, and knows better. After finishing a bottle of jNIadeira, we had some very fair Port, which we chose to drink mulled, being assured that JNIrs Barclay piques herself upon her scien- tific use of spices in that kind of preparation. The skill of our hostess gave us entire satisfac- tion, and we kept her at work pretty closely till seven o'clock. Being so very agreeably seated and entertained, I could scarcelv think of remo- ving at so very extraordinary an hour, and dropped a modest hint that the Speculative luialil ])0 ad^;^Ua2f^olIslv deferred till another SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 26T opportunity ; but my objections were over-ruled by my companions. I insisted, however, that we should, at least, come back after the debate, to enjoy an epilogue in the same taste with our prologue, an idea w'hich appeared to meet the wishes of the company, and was indeed agreed to per acclamationem. The Speculative Society is the only institu- tion of the kind, whose existence is acknowled- ged in a formal manner by the University. It forms a part of the system, and, as such, is pro- vided with chambers within the College ad- vantages which are, no doubt, owing to the high reputation the Society has at particular times enjoyed. At the present time, as it happens, the alterations and improvements which are go- ing on within the University buildings, have dislodged the Society from their old chambers, and the new and more splendid accommodations designed for them, are not quite in readiness for their reception. Their temporary place of meet- infj is in the hall of the Theolooical Professor alow'-roofed, dark, mean-looking place, surround- ed with shelves groaning under Dutch and Pu- ritanical Divinity ; and her^ it was that I had the honour of beino- introduced to them. 268 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. Right opposite to the door at which we enter- ed, in a huge elbow-chair, or rather pulpit from which the Professor of Divinity is, no doubt, ac- customed to expound the mysteries of Calvinism, and, with an air of grave dignity, which any professor might be happy to equal, sate a pale snub-nosed young gentleman, with a hammer in his hand, the President {prima Jacie) of the Spe- culative Society. His eyes half-shut, as if to exclude the distracting dazzle of the tallow can- dles that blazed close before him ; his right hand on his hammer, and his left supporting with two of its fingers the weight of meditation lod- ged within his forehead ; his lips compressed with the firmness of conscious authority, and his whole attitude, as it were, instinct with the very spirit of his station, completed a picture, which, I should suppose, might have produced no trifling effect on the nerves of an intrant more juvenile than myself Even on me, the " Vultus sedentis tyranni" was not entirely lost, and I confess I was glad when I found that I had fairly seated myself in a dark and remote corner of the room, without attracting any of his attention. Immediately under this imposing figure might bPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 269 be descried the less awful, but no less important face and figure of the secretary, who was em- ployed at this moment in calling over the names of the members, according to their position in the muster-roll of the Society. Around a green table, at the head of which INIr Secretary was placed, a few of the more grave and dignified- looking members were accommodated with cane- backed chairs ; while, on either side, the humilior caterva occupied some rows of narrow wooden benches, which rise one above another out of the area of the apartment. All together there was an appearance of expectation and preparation, both in their arrangement and in their counte- nances, which could not fail to excite a consider- able degree of attention and respect. In general, they seemed to be very young men, the majority of them, I dare say, not above twenty ; but here and there might be seen a few persons of somewhat maturer age in the midst of them. These, as ]Mr ii. formed me, arc, for the most part, incipient advocates willing,! presume, to exercise their lungs here, be- cause they have less opportunity than they could wish of exercising them elsewhere and not, per- adventure, without hope, that the fame acquired and sustained by them among their brethren of vol.. I. s 270 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. the Speculative, may tend to procure them rea- dier access to a more lucrative species of reputa- tion elsewhere. I thought I could see in some of the faces of these gentlemen, an air of peculiar suavity and graciousness, as if they were willing to have something of the credit of condescension to keep them in countenance with themselves and their neighbours. One gentleman, much older than any of these, occupied a place close by the table, with a mild and paternal look of protection. On asking JVIr , who this was, I learned that INIr W (for that is his name) liad long been treasurer of the Society, and had, in the course of his life, conferred upon its members, both in their individual and corporate capacity, so many important favours, that it is no wonder he should have formed a warm at- tachment to all their interests, and should take a sincere pleasure in coming regularly to be a witness of their exertions. It is easy to imagine the impression, which long custom, and the con- sciousness of having done good, may have been sufficient to make upon a person of benevolent dispositions, such, as I am informed, are those of Mr W . By and by, the catalogue being finished, and some minor ceremonies duly performed, one of sriXUI-ATIVE SOCIETY. iJ71 the young gentlemen stepped from his place, and ascending to a small tribune on the left hand of the President, began to read aloud from a MS. which he held in his hand. It is the cus- tom, it seems, that the business of the Society is always opened by an essay from one of the mem- bers, and the person, whose turn it was to mi- nister in this way to their edification, had al- ready announced, as the title of his discourse " A few Considerations on the Policy of the Corn-Bill." I listened for some minutes to what he said ; but soon perceived, that the whole of his merits amounted to nothing more than ha- ving translated from bad into w^orse English, a treatise on the same subject in the Edinburgh Review ; so I amused myself during the rest of the performance with some hearty sighs, for ha- ving so easily been induced to distrust my own inclinations, and quit JNIrs Barclay for the Spe- culative. After the essayist had brought his labours to a close, the President opened his eyes, (which as yet he had never found leisure to do,) and began to ask the members, if they had any remarks to offer in regard to the performance they had heard. A pause of several minutes ensued during \\hich the funereal silence of expectation 272 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. was only disturbed by a few faint hems from those who intended to be most critical on the occasion, and the rustling of the leaves of the MS., which the author was restoring to his poc- ket, with a look that spoke as plain as look could speak it " .Tamque opus exegi !" At last, one of the gentlemen I have mentioned stood up in his place, and observed, that " considering it as a very improper thing, that an essay of so much brilliancy should be allowed to pass unnoticed, he could not help rising to express his astonish- ment at the delay which had just occurred. The essay," he said, " displayed every quality which could render an essay honourable to its writer, and agreeable to the Society. Its matter was not, indeed, new ; but in its arrangement, a very extraordinary degree of skill had certainly been exemplified. The language he could not help considering as still more worthy of admira- tion it was simple, concise, and elegant, where matters of detail were treated of; but rose to a pitch of splendour and majesty in the more im- passioned parts of the subject, such as he could not say he had often met with in any authors of our age. On the whole, when he reflected on the weight and importance of the subject, and the difficuhy of treating such a subject in a way SPECUI.ATIVE SOCIETY. 273 at once popular and scientific, he could not help saying, he looked upon the essay which the ho- nourable gentleman had just delivered, as one of the most wonderful productions to which, in his long his very long experience, even the Specu- lative Society of Edinburgh had ever had the honour of giving birth. {Hear ! hear !) He beg- ged to sit down with returning his warmest ac- knowledgments to the honourable essayist, for the instruction and delight which his genius had afforded to himself individually, and had no doubt, the Society would concur in the propriety of expressing similar sentiments, in a way more consistent with their dignity, and more gratify- ing to the honourable essayist, through the mouth of his honourable friend their President." {Hear! hear!) The applauses with which the termination of this address was greeted, yielded in a few se- conds to the sharp, shrill, discordant accents of a stout young man, who had started up with an air of much vehemence, from a very aerial and distant part of the room, and descended into the centre of the assembly. " Mr President," (said he for the energy of his style would be lost^ were I to make use of the third person,) " Mr President, I rise imder such a mixture of feel- ings, as at no former period of my life ever agi- 274 SPECUI,ATTVE SOCIETY. tated, overwhelmed, confounded, oppressed, and disturbed this struggling bosom. Mr President, I rise, I say, under the pressure and influence under the weight, burden, and impending impe- rativeness of a host of feelings, in which, not- withstanding all their respect for the honourable and learned member w^ho has just sat down, I am confident, and proudly confident, the great majority, the great and enlightened majority of this great and enlightened Society, will have no difficulty in expressing their entire, and hearty, and cordial concurrence. INIr President, I rise, in a word, to give vent to the conflicting tu- mults, which at this moment are displaying all their might in rending asunder the repose of a mind, w^hich, whatever in other respects it may be entitled to, will be acknowledged, by all the members who hear me, to have at no period dis- played any measure of lukewarmness, coldness, or indifference, to the high, enduring, and im- portant interests of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh. {Hear I hear !) Mr President, I have been for seven years a member I hope you will bear me witness, a faithful, diligent, and at- tentive member (more, my humble natural fa- culties will not permit me to be,) of the Specu- lative Society of Edinburgh. {Ilea?-, hear.) Mr President, on my legs as I now am, in the pre- SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 275 sence of this Society, a body, for whom, so long as life stirs within my bosom, or consciousness within my brain, I shall always retain the warm- est, and most affectionate, and most filial, and most fraternal admiration, gratitude, and re- spect, {Hear ! hear ! Bravo ! hear ! hear !) Mr President, on my legs as I now feel my- self to be," (by the way, the orator stood only upon one of them, and kept the other extend- ed behind him, as if to assist the effect of his manual gesticulations) " JNIr President, it is absolutely impossible that I should refrain from expressing my feeling of pain, horror, con- tempt, disgust, and indignation, that the Spe- culative Society of Edinburgh should ever have been subjected to listen to such an essay as has just been delivered, from any of its members. Mr President, the essay which you have just heard, possesses no one iota of such merit as an essay delivered in the Speculative Society of Edinburgh ought to possess meagre in matter, cold in conception, impotent in illustration, false in facts, absurd in argument, and barren in basis, it would scarcely have been better than it is, though it had wanted its supernumerary sins, and blazing blemishes, of dark diction, farragoed phraseology, lame language, and offensive figura- 27$ SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. tiveness. {Hear! hear!) Mr President, I shall not stop at present to enlarge upon defects, which my mind tells mehave excited the same sensations in almost every bosom that beats around this table. Mr President, I shall not waste breath in the vain endeavour to express an indigna- tion, which is too big for utterance, too full for words. I shall sit down, with proposing, that the gentleman who delivered this essay receive from the chair a warning to consider better with him- self before he again presumes to insult the Spe- culative Society of Edinburgh, with the crude and hasty suggestions of a mind, that, I am sorry to say, does not seem to be filled with pro- per ideas concerning the nature, the objects, and the duties of the Speculative Society of Edin- burgh." {Hear ! hear ! hear !) A small creaking voice arose from the right side of the President, on the conclusion of this harangue, and its proprietor proceeded in a tone of quiet, feeble, and querulous hesitation, (which afforded an irresistibly ludicrous contrast to the manner of his fiery and foaming predecessor,) to " reprobate the idea of the warmth the unne- cessary the improper and, he must add, the disagreeable warmth, with which his honour- able and learned friend, who had just sat down. 6 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 277 had expressed himself. The merits of an essay, such as his honourable and learned friend on the opposite side of the house had this evening de- livered, were not to be annihilated by such an effusion of invective as that which his honour- able and learned friend in his eye had thought proper to make use of The essay of his honour- able friend had probably been produced at the expense of very great labour and exertion of body and mind. The midnight oil had been wasted in the composition of his honourable friend's essay. His honourable friend had, to his certain knowledge, absented himself from all parties of pleasure to which he had been invited during the greater part of this spring, in order to collect materials, and facts, and illustrations, for the essay, which they had that night heard from his friend. The honourable gentleman in his eye should have recollected, that it is not to be expected that every member of this Society should possess the same rapidity of genius as he (the gentleman in his eye) possessed. He should have considered, that the question of the corn bill is one attended with infinite difficulty in all its branches ; that it is necessary, in order to write an essay on this subject, to undergo the fatigue of examining into a vast variety of do- 278 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. cuments and treatises, and to study what all the great authors on political economy, from Adam Smith downwards, have written concern- ing the nature of the sources of national wealth and prosperity, and to decide among the conflict- ing opinions of a vast variety of the most eminent persons who were at this moment occupied with the study of the whole question, both within and without the pale of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh. For himself, he had not come to this house with the view of merely criticising the production of his honourable and learned friend the Essayist, but rather of laying before the Society the results of his own investigations on the same highly interesting topic; and the first of these results, to which he begged to call the attention of the house, was a view of the ef- fects which were produced on Hamburgh, by the occupation of that port and city by Marshal Da- voust. It would be found, that no subject could be attended with greater difficulties than that now upon the table of the Society ; they ought to enter upon the enquiry with all the calmness which subjects of that imperative interest de- mand ; and he must say, that he expected, after they should have gone over the thirteen heads of argument which he had marked out for the SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. 270 subject of his present address, he expected the Society would come to the conclusion, that the question of the corn-bill was one, which at least required to be studied before it could be ex- pected to be solved. " The first topic to whicli I shall call the no- tice of this house," said he, " is that of the true nature of corn corn, Mr President eorn is not to be regarded," ke. kc. kc. But I think it would be rather too much, were I to trouble you with the rest of the silly, confused, \mintelligible string of hackneyed facts, and hackneyed conclusions, with which this young o-entleman troubled his audience for at least an hour and a half At the end of that period, one half of the company were fast asleep ; the rest yawnino- and fidn-ettino;, and now and then shut- fling with their feet. No hints, however, could produce the least effect on the unwearied inde- fatigable listlessncss of their apathetic orator, AVhole pages from the Parliamentary Debates, mixed up with whole pages from jMalthus, and these a2:ain intermino'lcd with endless trite dis- quisitions, stolen from Reviews, JNIagazincs, and AVeekly Papers the whole mighty mass of dul- ness intermingled, with not one ray either of 280 SPECULATIVE SOCIETY. novelty or ingenuity power or elegance the dose proved too much even for my iron nerves. My uneasiness was such, that at last I fairly lost temper, and seizing my hat, escaped, as best I might, from the Speculative Society of Edin- burgh. My companions on each side of me had been asleep for an hour, but my removal awaken- ed them ; and, after rubbing their eyes, and look- ing round them for a moment, they both had the good sense to follow my example. On looking at my watch, I found it was eleven o'clock, and I could not help reproaching myself a good deal for the time I had been wasting. The transition from this scene of solemn and stupid drivelling, to the warm fire-side of Mrs Barclay, her broiled haddocks, her scolloped oysters, and her foaming tankards, was one of the most re- freshing things I have ever experienced. But I see it is now late ; so adieu for the present. P.M. 281 LETTER XXIII. TO THE SAME. Dear David, I AM extremely delighted to observe how much effect the craniological remarks, so liberal- ly, yet so modestly, distributed over the surface of my correspondence, have been able to pro- duce upon you. I once thought you had the organ of stubbornness and combativeness very luxuriantly brought out, but shall from hence- forth be inclined to think I had been mistaken in my observation of your head. JNIy best ad- vice to you in the meantime is, to read daily with diligence, but not with blind credulity, in Dr Spurzheim's book, which, I rejoice to hear, you have purchased. Pass your fingers gently around the region of your head, whenever any CRANIOSCOPY AND CRANIOLOGY. new idea is suggested to you by his remarks, and I doubt not you will soon be a firm be- liever, that " there are more things in heaven and earth than we once dreamt of in our phi- losophy." The aversion which you say you at first felt for the science is, however, a natural, and there- fore I cannot help regarding it as a very excu- sable sort of prejudice. The very names which have been bestowed upon the science Cranios- copij and Craniologij to say nothing of the still coarser Sch'ddeUehre (or skull-doctrine) of its first doctor and professor, are disagreeable terms, on account of their too direct and distinct refer- ence to the bones. They bring at once before the imagination a naked skull, and in persons who have not been trained to the callousness of the dissecting-room, conceptions of a nature so strictly anatomical, can never fail to excite a certain feeling of horror and disgust. I am glad to find that this feeling had been sanctioned by antiquity ; for, in some quotations from Athe- Uc'cus, which fell casually into my hands the other day, it is expressly mentioned, that the Greeks considered it as " improper to speak of the ])hysical substances of the head." I perfect- CRA.NIOSCOPY AND CRANIOLOGY. 283 ly enter into the spirit of tastefulness and wis- dom, which suggested such a maxim to that most intellectual people. Among them the doctrine of pure materialism had not merely been whispered in mystery in the contemplative gardens of Epicurus ; it had gone abroad over the surface of the people, and contaminated and debased their spirit. The frail fabric of their su- perstitious faith presented but too obvious a mark for the shafts of infidel wit, and it was no wonder that they who were wise enough to feel the necessity of guarding this fabric, should have possessed no very accurate notions concerning the true limits of its bulwarks. In our days, however, there is assuredly no reason for being so very timorous ; and I think a philosophical person like you should, honafide^ set yourself to get rid of a prejudice which is no longer entitled to be regarded as either a necessary or a conve- nient one. It is nuich to be wished notwithstanding, that some name coidd be found for this admir- able science, which would give less offence even to those who are rather disposed than otherwise to gi\'e it its fair chance of thriving in the world. 1 have been thinking a great while on this sub- ject, and have balanced in my own mind the 284 CRANIOSCOPY AND CRANIOLOGY. merits of more oscopies and ologies^ than I care to trouble you with repeating. Craniology it- self, over and above the general and natural pre- judice I have already talked of, labours under a secondary, an adventitious, and a merely vulgar prejudice, derived from the ignorant and blun- dering jokes which have been connected with it by the writers of Reviews and Magazines, It is wonderful how long such trifling things retain their influence ; but I would hope this noble science is not to be utterly hanged (like a dog,) because an ill name has been given to it. Some- times, after the essence of a man's opinion has been proved to be false and absurd, even to his own satisfaction, it is necessary, before he can be quite persuaded to give it up, that we should allow a few words to be sacrificed. These are the scape-goats which are tossed relentlessly over the rock, after they are supposed to be sufficient- ly imbued and burthened with the sins of the blundering intellect that dictated them. And such, I doubt not, will, in the issue, be the fortune of poor, derided, despised, but innocent, although certainly somewhat rude and intractable Cranio- logy. Cranioscoiyyy (particularly since Dr lloget lias imdertaken to blacken its reputation in the Supplement to the Encyclopaedia Britannica,) CllANlOSCOPV AND CRAMIOLOGV. 385 may be pretty sure of sharing the same melan- choly fate. There is no doubt that Jack and Gill must tumble down the hill in company. Anthropology pleased me very much for a few days ; but it is certainly too vague. It does not sit close enough, to show the true shape and cha- racter of that which it would clothe. Cephalology and Cephaloscopy would sound uncouth, and nei- ther of them would much improve the original bargain with which we are quarrelling. Organo- logy shares in something of the same defect with Anthropology. In short, as yet I have not been able to hit on any thing which exactly pleases on reflection. Although a worse cranioscopist, you are a better linguist than I am ; so I beg you to try your hand at the coining of a phrase. A comparatively unconcerned person may perhaps be more fortunate than a zealous lover like myself; for it is not in one respect only that women are like words. In the mean time, when it is neces- sary to mention any person's brain, it may be best to call it his Organization. It is perhaps impossible altogether to avoid employing expres- sions of an anatomical cast ; but the more these can be avoided, the better chance there will most assuredly be of rendering the science popular. VOL. I. T 286 CKAMOSCOPY AND CRANlOLOOr. It is one in which the ladies have quite as much interest as we have ; and I think every thing should be done, therefore, that may tend to smooth and soften their reception of it. In its essence, it possesses many, very many, points of captivation, which I should think were likely to operate with wonderful success on the imagina- tion of the female sex. The best and the wisest of the sex, with whom I ever conversed in a con- fidential manner, confessed to me, that the great and constantly besetting plague of women, is their suspicion that they are not permitted to see into the true depths of the character of men. And indeed, when one considers what an over- balancing proportion of the allusions made in any conversation between two men of education, must be entirely unintelligible to almost any wo- man who might chance to overhear them, it is im- possible to wonder that the matter should stand as it does. It is not to be expected, that she should be able to understand the exact relation which the intelligible part of their talk may bear to the unintelligible. She sees a line tossed into a depth, which is to her as black as night, and how should she be able to guess, how far down mav be the measure of its descent ? CKAXlOSCOl'y AND CKANIULUGY. 287 Now, what a charming thing must it appear in the eyes of one, who is habitually tormented in this way, to hear of a science that professes to furnish a key, not indeed to the actual truth of the whole characters of men, but to that of many important parts in their characters ? I can con- ceive of nothing more ecstatic than the trans- port of some bitter unsatisfied Blue-Stocking, on first hearing that there is sucli a science in the world as Craniology. " Ha I" she will say to lierself " we shall now see the bottom of all this mystery. The men will no longer dare to treat us with this condescending sort of conceal- ment. We shall be able to look at their skulls, and tell them a little plain truth, whenever they begin to "ive themselves airs." Xow, I am for making the science as popu- lar as possible indeed, 1 think, if kept to a ihw, it would be the basest and most cruel kind of monopoly tlie world ever witnessed and, there- fore, I should like to see my craniological bre- thren adapt their modes of expression and ex- planation, as nuich as possible, to the common prejudices of this great division of disciples. It is well known, what excellent proselyte-makers they arc in all respects ; and I am decidedly for having all their zeal on our side. One plain and 288 CRANIOSCOPY AND CRANIOLOGY. obvious rule, I think, is, that the head should al- ways be talked of and considered in the light of a Form an object having certain proportions from which certain inferences may be drawn. Besides, in adhering to this rule, we shall only be keeping to the practice of the only great Craniologists the world ever produced the Greeks. I do not mean to their practice in re- gard to expressing themselves alone ; but to their practice, in gathering and perfecting those ideas concerning this science, which they have expressed in a far more lasting way than words can ever rival. As dissection of human bodies was entirely unknown among the ancients, it is obvious, that their sculptors and painters must have derived all their knowledge from the ex- terior of the human form. The external aspect of the head is all that nature exhibits to us, or intends we should see. It is there that expres- sion appears and speaks a natural language to our minds a language of which our knowledge is vague and imperfect, and almost unconscious ; but of which a few simple precepts and remarks are enough to recall to our recollection the great outlines, and to convince me at least, that a very little perseverance might suffice to render us masters of much of the practical detail MADONNAS. 3$9 You will smile perhaps when you hear me talk in so satisfied a tone about the craniologi- cal skill of the Greeks ; and yet there is nothing of which I am more thoroughly convinced, than that they did, practically at least, understand in- finitely more of the science than any of the dis- ciples of Gall and Spurzheim are likely to rival even a century hence. There is one circumstance, a small one, you will say, which suggest- ed itself to me yesterday, for the first time, when I was sitting after dinner, in a room where seve- ral large plaster-of-Paris busts were placed on the extremities of a side-board. What is called Grace, is chiefly to be found in those movements which result from organs on the top of the head. In women, there is more of it than in men, be- cause their animal faculties are smaller. Now, in all paintings of Madonnas, particularly of the Matres Amahiles, the attitude evidently results from the faculties in the region above the fore- head. The chin is drawn in, and the upper fore-part of the head leans forward. This is not done with a view to represent modesty and hu- mility alone ; which, by suspending the action of pride and self-love in the back part of the head, take away what kept it upright. The atti- tude of humility, therefore, results from a nega- Q90 TIEliCT^LKS FAP.NESF.. live cause. But the Madonnas have often a look quite dignified and assured, of unquestioning ado- rable divine serenity ; and the leaning forward of the brow in them, is accompanied w4th an air which denotes the activity of a positive cause namely, the principle of love in the upper parts of the forehead. This was suggested to me, how- ever, not by a picture of the Madonna, but by a Grecian bust and I think you will scarcelv suspect w'hich this was. It was one, of which the whole character is, I apprehend, mistaken in modern times rone which is looked at by fine ladies with a shudder and by fine gentlemen with a sneer. Artists alone study and love it their eyes are too much trained to permit of any thing else. But even they seein to me entirely to overlook the true chai-acter of that, which, with a view to quite different qualities, they fer- vently admire. In the Hercules Farnese (for this is the bust,) no person who looks on the form and attitude with a truly scientific eye, can possibly believe that he sees only the image of brute strength. There are few heads on the contrary more human in their expression more eloquent with the manly virtue of a mild and generous hero. And how indeed could a Grecian sculptor liave dared to represent the HEllCUI.ES FAllNESn. 2<)1 glorious Alcides in any other way ? How do the poets represent him ? As the image of di- vine strength and confidence, struggling with and vanquishing the evils of humanity as the emanation of divine benevolence, careless of all, but doing good purifying the earth from the foulness of polluting monsters avenging the cause of the just and the unfortunate plunging into Hell in order to restore to an inconsolable husband the pale face of his wife, who had died a sacrifice to save him himself at last expiring on the hoary summit of Athos, amidst the blaze of a funeral pile which had been built indeed with his own hands, but which he had been com- pelled to ascend by the malignant cruelty of a disappointed savage. The being who was hal- lowed with all these high attributes in the strains of Sophocles, Euripides, and Pindar would any sculptor have dared to select Him for the object in whicli to embody his ideas of the mere animal power of man the exuberance of corporeal strength ? So far from this, the Hercules has not only one of the most intellectual heads that are to bo found among the monuments of Greek sculpture, but also one of the most graceful. AVith the majesty which he inherits from the emhrnco of JupitfM", thovo is mingled a juiM and 292 HERCULES FARNESE. tender expression of gentleness, which tells that he has also his share in the blood, and in the mi- series, of our own lower nature. The stooping reflective attitude may be that of a hero weary with combat, but is one that speaks, as if his combatting had been in a noble cause as if high thoughts had nerved his arm more than the mere exultations of corporeal vigour. His head is bent from the same quarter as that of the Ma- donnas, and whoever takes the trouble to exa- mine it, will find, that in this particular point is to be found the chief expansion and prominence of his organization. P.M. 293 LETTER XXIV. TO THE SAME. Oman's, Tuesday Evening. Dear David, In a place where education is so much diifu- sed among the men, it is natural to suppose, that the women also must, in no inconsiderable de- gree, be imbued with some passion for litera- ture. The kinds of information most in request here, (and, indeed, necessarily so, when we re- flect on the means of education which the place affords,) are evidently much more within the reach of the Fair Sex, than in most other cities of the same importance. To be able to talk with fluency about the Politics and Belles Lettres of the day, is all that is required of an accomplish- ed man in Edinburgh, and these are accomplish- ments which the ladies, modest as they are, 6 294 EDINBrRGH BLUE- STOCKINGS. would require more modesty than is either natu- ral or proper to suppose themselves incapable of acquiring. That ignorance of the learned lan- guages and ancient literature, which the men have not the assurance to attempt disguising, has broken down effectually the first and most insurmountable barrier which separates the in- tellectual pretensions of the two sexes in Eng- land, and, indeed, in almost all the capitals of Kurope. The universal neglect with which the more ancient and massy literature, even of our own island, seems to be treated, has removed another mighty, although not quite so insur- mountable barrier ; and, in short, between the men and the women, for aught I can see, there is no " gulf fixed." The men, indeed, seem still to be anxious to prolong, in their own favour, the existence of something of that old ^;r^.y/.\o'(?, which owes the decay of its vigour entirely to themselves. Ikit the greatest Mysogynists in the world have never accused the sex of being deficient in acuteness of discernment, and the ladies of Edinburgh are quite sufficiently quick- sighted, not to allow the ad^'antages which have been given them, to slip unused through their fingers. EDINBURGH BLUE-STOCKINGS. 29.'> So far as I may judge from my own short ex- perience, however, the Scottish ladies, in gene- ral, are very far from pushing these advantages to any undue extent. It is not necessary to en- ter minutely into the causes of their forbearance in this respect ; for a much slower person than ]\rr David Williams would have no great diffi- culty in forming a pretty fair guess, as to the most efficient of them. The merit which they do certainly possess and exemplify in this part of their conduct, may perhaps be divided into pretty equal shares between the influences of Nature and those of Art, Those gentler and more delicate feelings of our nature, which all their modes of life their hopes, fears, pleasures, and sorrows, render them better able to appre- ciate, are alone, I should think, more than enough to weaken with the best of them the influence of tho^e lighter and more transitory feelings, which derive gratification or uneasiness from the conscious possession or conscious want of such a measure of literary information, as is common among either the men or the women with Avhom they can be called upon to associate. With those of a less feminine and less just character, in point of mere feeling, there cannot be want- ing enough of penetration to teach them, that 296 EDINBURGH BLUE STOCKING.!. the confession of inferiority is one of the most cunning treacheries with which to bait the hook of female fascination ; and thus it is that the highest and most sacred of inspirations, on the one hand, co-operate wdth not a few less lofty and generous suggestions on the other, to keep within limits the infection of blue-stockinmsm the one set of motives, as might befit their ori- gin, attacking the secret root and essence of the mania for insignificant acquisition the other no less appropriately, and no less powerfully, chill- ing and repressing the mania for insignificant display. There are, however, abundant exceptions to this rule even here. Innate and incorrimble vanity in some ; particular incidents in the early history of others, too minute to be explained in any general terms of description ; and in a few^ cases, without doubt, the consciousness of capa- city of a really extraordinary nature, have been suflficient to create a certain number of charac- ters, which are somewhat inaccurately and un- justly classed together by the gentlemen of Edinburgh, under the appellation of " our Blue- stockings." With the chief and most prominent persons of this class, it has as yet been my good or evil fortime to come very little in contact A ROUT. 297 My introductions into society in this place, have been mostly through the intervention of the men of high literary character, and these are here, as everywhere, the greatest, that is to say, the most contemptuous enemies the Blue-stocking tribe has to encounter. Last night, however, I was present at a small rout, or con]:ei"^atione, which, although the lady of the hovise is by no means a Blue-stocking, had not a little of the appearance of a Blue-stocking party about it. A number of the principal JBashleus WQve there, and a con- siderable proportion of the literati, small and great, were, of course, in attendance. In short, I suspect it was as near an approach to the true and genuine scene, as I am likely to have an op- portunity of observing. I was ushered into a room decently crowded with very well-drest people, and not having any suspicion tliat much amusement was likely to be had, I privately intended to make my bow to ]Mrs , and retire as soon as possible for I had left a very snug party over their claret at my friend W 's, and certainly thought I could spend the rest of the evening more agree- ably with them, than at any such rout as I had yet met with in P^linburgh. I had not been 398 A ROUT. long in the room, however, when I heard Mr J announced, and as I had not seen him for some time, I resolved to stay, and, if possible, enjoy a little of his conversation in some corner. When he entered, I confess I was a good deal struck with the different figure he made from what I had seen at C g C k. Instead of the slovenly set-out which he then sported the green jacket, black neckcloth, and gTey panta- loons I have seldom seen a man more nice in his exterior than Mr J now seemed to be. His little person looked very neat in the way he had now adorned it. He had a very well-cut blue coat evidently not after the design of any Edinburgh artist light kerseymere breeches, and ribbed silk stockings a pair of elegant buckles white kid gloves, and a tri-color Avatch-ribbon. He held his hat under his arm in a very degagee manner and altogether he was certainly one of the last men in the assem- bly, whom a stranger would have guessed to be either a great lawyer or a great reviewer. In short, he was more of a Dandy than any great author I ever saw always excepting Tom Moore and David AN'illiams. Immediately after him, Dr E came into A ROUT, 299 the room, equipped in an equally fashionable, though not quite so splendid manner, and smi- ling on all around with the same mild, gentle air, which I had observed on his entrance to his Lecture-room. Close upon his heels followed Professor L , with a large moss-rose in his bosom. The Professor made his obeisance to one or two ladies that stood near him, and then fixing himself close by the fire-place, assumed an aspect of blank abstraction, which lasted for many minutes without the least alteration. The expression of his massy features and large grey eyes, rolling about while he stood in this atti- tude, was so solemn, that nothing could have formed a more amusin^j contrast to the li^ht and smiling physiognomies of the less contemplative persons around him. I saw that JNlr J was eyeing him all the while with a very quizzical air, and indeed heard him w^hisper something about licat, to Lady , with whom he was conversing, which I fear could have been nothing more innocent than some sarcasm against the ru- minating philosopher. For my part, I now per- ceived plainly, that I was in a rout of no ordi- nary character, and, rubbing njy spectacles, pre- pared to make the best use of njv time. 300 A ROUT. While I was studying very attentively the fine hemispherical developement of the organ of Causality, in the superior part of Mr I^ 's head, I heard the name of the Earl of B , travelling up the stair-case, from the mouth of one lackey to that of another, and looked round with some curiosity to see the brother ci the ce- lebrated Chancellor E . His lordship came into the room with a quick and hurried step, which one would not have expected from the venerable appearance of his white hairs the finest white hairs, by the way, I ever saw, and curling in beautiful ringlets all down his shoul- ders. I could easily trace a strong family re- semblance to his brother, although the Earl has much the advantage, in so far as mere beauty of lineament is concerned. I do not remember to have seen a more exquisite old head, and think it is no wonder that so many portraits have been painted of him by the artists of Edinburgh. The features are all perfect; but the greatest beauty is in his clear blue eyes, which are chased in his head in a way that might teach something to the best sculptor in the world. Neither is there any want of expression in these fine fea- tures ; although, indeed, they are very far from A rtoL'i'. 301 conveying anything like the same ideas of power and penetration, which fall from the overhang- ing shaggy eye-brows of his brother. The per- son of the old Karl is also very good ; his legs, in particular, are well shaped, and wonderfully nuiseular in their appearance, considering their lcn'anti(; rock lifts itself hi"'h above all that sur- rounds it, and breaks upon the sky with the same commandino- blackness of minoled craixs, clitTs, buttresses, and battlements. These, in- deed, shift and vary their outlines at every step, but everywhere there is the same unmoved ef- fect of general expression the same lofty and imposing image, to Avhicli the eye turns with the same unquestioning worship. Whether you pass on the southern side, close imdcr the bare and shattered blocks of granite, where the crum- bling turrets on the summit seem as if they had 328 EDINBURGH THE CASTLE. shot out of the kindred rock in some fantastic freak of Nature and where, amidst the over- hanging mass of darkness, you vainly endeavour to descry the track by which Wallace scaled of whether you look from the north, where the rugged cliffs find room for some scanty patches of moss and broom, to diversify their barren grey and where the whole mass is softened into beauty by the wild green glen which inter- venes between the spectator and its foundations wherever you are placed, and however it is viewed, you feel at once that here is the eye of the landscape, and the essence of the grandeur. Neither is it possible to say under what sky or atmosphere all this appears to the greatest ad- vantage. The heavens may put on what aspect they choose, they never fail to adorn it. Chan- ges that elsewhere deform the face of nature, and rob her of half her beauty, seem to pass over this majestic surface only to dress out its majesty in some new apparel of magnificence. If the air is cloudless and serene, what can be finer than the calm reposing dignity of those old towers eveiy delicate angle of the fissured rock, every loop-hole and every lineament seen clearly and distinctly in all their minuteness? or, if the mist b(? wreathed around the basis of the rock, EDINBURGH THE CASTLE. S29 and frowning fragments of the citadel emerge only here and there from out the racking clouds that envelope them, the mystery and the gloom only rivet the eye the faster, and iuilf-baffled Ima^'^ t ffi.lllfiociQK 1? FormL-9-15m-ll,'27 'To _j:_^ ^ ^i_.T I- r:''^^\^:^&p<:>c=^ 77e, / v.\ 3 1158 00799 302^ UC SOUTHERN RtGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY A A 000 100 564 4