Should you meet with Miss Nimmo, please remember me kindly to her. WHETHER in the way of my trade, I can be of any service to the Rev. Doctor, is I fear very doubtful. Ajax's shield consisted, I think, of seven bull hides and a plate of brass, which altogether set Hector's utmost force at defiance. Alas! I am not a Hector, and the worthy Doctor's foes are as securely armed as Ajax was. Ignorance, superstition, bigotry, stupidity, malevolence, self-conceit, envy-all strongly bound in a massy frame of brazen impudence. Good God, Sir! to such a shield, bumour is the peck of a sparrow, and satire the pop-gun of a schoolboy. Creation-disgracing scelerats such as they, God can only mend, and the Devil only can punish. In the comprehending way of Caligula, I wish they had all but one neck. I feel impotent as a child to the ardour of my wishes! O for a withering curse, to blast the germins of their wicked machinations. O for a poisonous Tornado, winged from the Torrid Zone of Tartarus, to sweep the spreading crop of their villainous contrivances to the lowest hell! • Dr. M'Gill, of Ayr. No. 291. TO MR. ALEXANDER DALZIEL, FACTOR, FINDLAYSTON. MY DEAR SIR, Ellisland, March 19th, 1791. I HAVE taken the liberty to frank this letter to you, as it incloses an idle poem of mine, which I send you; and, God knows, you may perhaps pay dear enough for it, if you read it through. Not that this is my own opinion; but an author, by the time he has composed and corrected his works, has quite pored away all his powers of critical discrimination. I can easily guess from my own heart, what you have felt on a late most melancholy event. God knows what I have suffered, at the loss of my best friend, my first, my dearest patron and benefactor; the man to whom I owe all that I am and have! I am gone into mourning for him, and with more sincerity of grief than I fear some will, who by nature's ties ought to feel on the occasion. I will be exceedingly obliged to you indeed, to let me know the news of the noble family, how the poor mother and the two sisters support their loss. I had a packet of poetic bagatelles ready to send to lady Betty, when I saw the fatal tidings in the newspaper. I see by the same channel that the honoured REMAINS of my noble patron, are designed to be brought to the family burial place. Dare I trouble you to let me know privately before the day of interment, that I may cross the country, and steal among the crowd, to pay a tear to the last sight of my ever revered benefactor? It will oblige me beyond expression. No. 292. TO MR. THOMAS SLOAN, CARE OF WM. KENNEDY, ESQ. MANCHESTER MY DEAR SLOAN, Ellisland, Sep. 1st, 1791. SUSPENCE is worse than disappointment; for that reason I hurry to tell you, that I just now learn that Mr. Ballantine does not chuse to interfere more in the business. I am truly sorry for it, but cannot help it. You blame me for not writing you sooner, but you will please to recollect, that you omitted one little necessary piece of information,-your ad dress. However, you know equally well, my hurried life, indolent temper, and strength of attachment. It must be a longer period than the longest life in the world's hale and undegenerate days,' that will make me forget so dear a friend as Mr. Sloan. I am prodigal enough at times, but I will not part with such a treasure as that. I can easily enter into the embarras of your present situation. You know my favourite quotation from Young -'On Reason build resolve, That column of true majesty in man. And that other favourite one from Thomson's Alfred 'What proves the hero truly great, Is, never, never to despair.' Or, shall I quote you an author of your acquaintance? -Whether doing, suffering, or forbearing, You may do miracles by-persevering.' I have nothing new to tell you. The few friends we have are going on in the old way. I sold my crop on this day se'nnight, and sold it very well. A guinea an acre, on an average, above value. But such a scene of drunkenness was hardly ever seen in this country. After the roup was over, about thirty people engaged in a battle, every man for his own hand, and fought it out for three hours. better in the house. Nor was the scene much folks lying drunk on the floor, and decanting, until both my dogs got so drunk, by attending them, that they could not stand. You will easily guess how I enjoyed the scene; as I was no farther over than you used to see me. Mrs. B. and family have been in Ayrshire these many weeks. Farewell! and God bless you, my dear friend! No. 293. TO FRANCIS GROSE, ESQ. F. A. S. SIR, 1792. I BELIEVE among all our Scots literati you have not met with professor Dugald Stewart, who fills the moral philosophy chair in the university of Edinburgh. To say that he is a man of the first parts, and what is more, a man of the first worth, to a gentleman of your general acquaintance, and who so much enjoys the luxury of unincumbered freedom and undisturbed privacy, is not perhaps recommendation enough: but when I inform you that Mr. Stewart's principal characteristic is your favourite feature; that sterling independence of mind, which, though every man's right, so few men have the courage to claim, and fewer still the magnanimity to support: When I tell you, that, unseduced by splendour, and undisgusted by wretchedness, he appreciates the merits of the various actors in the great drama of life, merely as they perform their parts-in short, he is a man after your own heart, and I comply with his earnest request in letting you know that he wishes above all things to meet with you. His house, Catrine, is within less than a mile of Sorn castle, which you proposed visiting; or if you could transmit him the inclosed, he would, with the greatest pleasure, meet you any where in the neighbourhood. I write to Ayrshire to inform Mr. Stewart that I have ac |