their last words.

death for the king's murder, cleared Mary with | turies have been considered as originals, by the enemies of Mary's memory, are now discovered The letters were first declared to be sub- to be forgeries, and acknowledged to be transscribed, and were then produced without sub-lations, and, perhaps, French translations of a scription.

They were shown during the conferences at York privately to the English commissioners, but were concealed from the commissioners of Mary.

Mary always solicited the perusal of these letters, and was always denied it.

Latin translation. And the modern accusers of Mary are forced to infer from these letters, which now exist, that other letters existed formerly, which have been lost in spite of curiosity, malice, and interest.

The rest of this treatise is employed in an endeavour to prove, that Mary's accusers were the She demanded to be heard in person by Eliza-murderers of Darnley: through this inquiry it beth, before the nobles of England, and the ambassadors of other princes, and was refused. When Mary persisted in demanding copies of the letters, her commissioners were dismissed with their box to Scotland, and the letters were

seen no more.

The French letters, which for almost two cen

is not necessary to follow him; only let it be observed, that, if these letters were forged by them, they may easily be thought capable of other crimes. That the letters were forged, is now made so probable, that perhaps they will never more be cited as testimonies.

78

A JOURNEY

TO THE

WESTERN ISLANDS OF SCOTLAND

I HAD desired to visit the Hebrides, or West- [affords a southern stranger a new kind of pleaern Islands of Scotland, so long, that I scarcely sure to travel so commodiously without interremember how the wish was originally excited; ruption of tollgates. Where the bottom is rocky, and was in the Autumn of the year 1773 in- as it seems commonly to be in Scotland, a duced to undertake the journey, by finding in smooth way is made indeed with great labour, Mr. Boswell a companion, whose acuteness but it never wants repairs; and in those parts would help my inquiry, and whose gayety of con- where_adventitious materials are necessary, the versation and civility of manners are sufficient ground once consolidated is rarely broken: for to counteract the inconveniences of travel, in the inland commerce is not great, nor are heavy countries less hospitable than we have passed. commodities often transported otherwise than by water. The carriages in common use are small carts, drawn each by one little horse; and a man seems to derive some degree of dignity and importance from the reputation of possessing a two-horse cart.

vehement as it was, raised an epidemical enthu- | present professors; nor can the expense of an siasm, compounded of sullen scrupulousness and warlike ferocity, which in a people whom idleness resigned to their own thoughts, and who, conversing only with each other, suffered no dilution of their zeal from the gradual influx of new opinions, was long transmitted in its full strength from the old to the young, but by trade and intercourse with England, is now visibly abating, and giving way too fast to that laxity of practice, and indifference of opinion, in which men, not sufficiently instructed to find the mid-monly the title of Lord Rector; but being addle point, too easily shelter themselves from rigour and constraint.

Of the two colleges yet standing, one is by the institution of its founder appropriated to divinity. It is said to be capable of containing fifty students; but more than one must occupy St. Andrews indeed has formerly suffered a chamber. The library, which is of late erec- more atrocious ravages, and more extensive detion, is not very spacious, but elegant and lumi-struction; but recent evils affect with greater

boundaries, or are separated by walls of loose | found by following the walls among the grass stone. From the bank of the Tweed to St. and weeds, and its height is known by some Andrews, I had never seen a single tree, which parts yet standing. The arch of one of the gates I did not believe to have grown up far within is entire, and of another only so far dilapidated the present century. Now and then about a as to diversify the appearance. A square apart gentleman's house stands a small plantation, ment of great loftiness is yet standing; its use which in Scotch is called a policy, but of these I could not conjecture, as its elevation was very there are few, and those few all very young. disproportionate to its area. Two corner towers The variety of sun and shade is here utterly un- particularly attracted our attention. Mr. Bosknown. There is no tree for either shelter or well, whose inquisitiveness is seconded by great timber. The oak and the thorn is equally a activity, scrambled in at a high window, but stranger, and the whole country is extended in found the stairs within broken, and could not uniform nakedness, except that in the road be- reach the top. Of the other tower we were told tween Kirkaldy and Cowpar, I passed for a few that the inhabitants sometimes climbed it, but yards between two hedges. A tree might be a we did not immediately discern the entrance, and show in Scotland, as a horse in Venice. At St. as the night was gathering upon us, though Andrews, Mr. Boswell found only one, and re- proper to desist. Men skilled in architectur commended it to my notice; I told him that it might do what we did not attempt; they migħ was rough and low, or looked as if I thought probably form an exact ground-plot of this vene 50. This, said he, is nothing to another a few rable edifice. They may, from some parts ye miles off. I was still less delighted to hear that standing, conjecture its general form, and perhap another tree was not to be seen nearer. Nay, by comparing it with other buildings of the same said a gentleman that stood by, I know but of kind and the same age, attain an idea very near this and that tree in the county. to truth. I should scarcely have regretted my The Lowlands of Scotland had once undoubt-journey, had it afforded nothing more than the edly an equal portion of woods with other coun-sight of Aberbrothick. tries. Forests are every where gradually diminished, as architecture and cultivation prevail, by the increase of people, and the introduction of arts. But I believe few regions have been denuded like this, where many centuries must have passed in waste, without the least thought of future supply. Davies observes in his account of Ireland, that no Irishman had ever planted an orchard. For that negligence some excuse might be drawn from an unsettled state of life, and the instability of property; but in Scotland possession has long been secure, and in- At our inn we did not find a reception such as heritance regular, yet it may be doubted whether we thought proportionate to the commercial opubefore the Union any man between Edinburgh|lence of the place; but Mr. Boswell desired me and England had ever set a tree.

Of this improvidence no other account can be given than that it probably began in times of tumult, and continued because it had begun. Established custom is not easily broken, till some great event shakes the whole system of things, and life seems to recommence upon new principles. That before the Union the Scots had little trade and little money, is no valid apology; for plantation is the least expensive of all methods of improvement. To drop a seed into the ground can cost nothing, and the trouble is not great of protecting the young plant, till it is out of danger; though it must be allowed to have some difficulty in places like these, where they have neither wood for palisades, nor thorns for hedges.

Our way was over the Firth of Tay, where, though the water was not wide, we paid four shillings for ferrying the chaise. In Scotland the necessaries of life are easily procured, but superfluities and elegances are of the same price at least as in England, and therefore may be considered as much dearer.

MONTROSE.

Leaving these fragments of magnificence, we travelled on to Montrose, which we surveyed in the morning, and found it well built, airy, and clean. The townhouse is a handsome fabric with a portico. We then went to view the English chapel, and found a small church, clean to a degree unknown in any other part of Scotland, with commodious galleries, and, what was yet less expected, with an organ.

to observe that the inkeeper was an Englishman, and I then defended him as well as I could.

When I had proceeded thus far, I had oppor tunities of observing what I had never heard, that there were many beggars in Scotland. In Edinburgh the proportion is, I think, not less than in London, and in the smaller places it is far greater than in English towns of the same extent. It must, however, be allowed, that they are not importunate, nor clamorous. They solicit silently, or very modestly, and, therefore, though their behaviour may strike with more force the heart of a stranger, they are certainly in danger of missing the attention of their countrymen. Novelty has always some power; an unaccus tomed mode of begging, excites an unaccustomed degree of pity. But the force of novelty is by its own nature soon at an end; the efficacy of outcry and perseverance is permanent and certain.

The road from Montrose exhibited a continua

tion of the same appearances. The country is still naked, the hedges are of stone, and the fields so generally ploughed, that it is hard to imaWe stopped a while at Dundee, where I re-gine where grass is found for the horses that till member nothing remarkable, and mounting our them. The harvest, which was almost ripe, apchaise again, came about the close of the day to peared very plentiful. Aberbrothick.

Early in the afternoon Mr. Boswell observed, The monastery of Aberbrothick is of great that we were at no great distance from the house renown in the history of Scotland. Its ruins of Lord Monboddo. The magnetism of his conafford ample testimony of its ancient magnifi-versation easily drew us out of our way, and the cence: its extent might, I suppose, easily be entertainment which we received would have

been a sufficient recompense for a much greater | grees separately, with total independence of one deviation. on the other.

The roads beyond Edinburgh, as they are less frequented, must be expected to grow gradually rougher; but they were hitherto by no means incommodious. We travelled on with the gentle pace of a Scotch driver, who, having no rivals in expedition, neither gives himself nor his horses unnecessary trouble. We did not affect the impatience we did not feel, but were satisfied with the company of each other, as well riding in the chaise, as sitting at an inn. The night and the day are equally solitary and equally safe; for where there are so few travellers, why should there be robbers?

ABERDEEN.

In Old Aberdeen stands the King's College, of which the first president was Hector Boece, or Boethius, who may be justly reverenced as one of the revivers of elegant learning. When he studied at Paris, he was acquainted with Erasmus, who afterwards gave him a public tes‐ timony of his esteem, by inscribing to him a catalogue of his works. The style of Boethius, though, perhaps, not always rigorously pure, is formed with great diligence upon ancient models, and wholly uninfected with monastic barbarity. His history is written with elegance and vigour, but his fabulousness and credulity are justly blamed. His fabulousness, if he was the author of the fictions, is a fault for which no apology can be made; but his credulity may be excused in an age when all men were credulous. Learning was then rising on the world; but ages so long accustomed to darkness, were too much dazzled with its light to see any thing distinctly. The first race of scholars in the fifteenth century, I received the next day a very kind letter from and some time after, were, for the most part, Sir Alexander Gordon, whom I had formerly learning to speak, rather than to think, and were know. in London, and after a cessation of all therefore more studious of elegance than of truth. intercourse for near twenty years, met here pro- The contemporaries of Boethius thought it suffifessor or physic in the King's College. Such un-cient to know what the ancients had delivered. expected renewals of acquaintance may be numbered among the most pleasing incidents of life. The knowledge of one professor soon procured Boethius, as president of the university, en me the notice of the rest, and I did not want any joyed a revenue of forty Scottish marks, about token of regard, being conducted wherever there two pounds, four shillings, and sixpence, of sterwas any thing which I desired to see, and enter-ling money. In the present age of trade and tained at once with the novelty of the place, and the kindness of communication.

We came somewhat late to Aberdeen, and found the inn so full, that we had some difficulty in obtaining admission, till Mr. Boswell made himself known: his name overpowered all objection, and we found a very good house, and civil treatment.

To write of the cities of our own island with the solemnity of geographical description, as if we had been cast upon a newly-discovered coast, has the appearance of a very frivolous ostentation; yet as Scotland is little known to the greater part of those who may read these observations, it is not superfluous to relate, that under the name of Aberdeen are comprised two towns, standing about a mile distant from each other, but governed, I think, by the same magis

trates.

Old Aberdeen is the ancient episcopal city, in which are still to be seen the remains of the cathedral. It has the appearance of a town in decay, having been situated, in times when commerce was yet unstudied, with very little attention to the commodiousness of the harbour.

New Aberdeen has all the bustle of prosperous trade, and all the show of increasing opulence. It is built by the water-side. The houses are large and lofty, and the streets spacious and clean. They build almost wholly with the granite used in the new pavement of the streets of London, which is well known not to want hardness, yet they shape it easily. It is beautiful, and must be very lasting.

What particular parts of commerce are chiefly exercised by the merchants of Aberdeen, I have not inquired. The manufacture which forces itself upon a stranger's eye, is that of knit stockings, on which the women of the lower class are visibly employed.

The examination of tenets and of facts was reserved for another generation.

taxes, it is difficult even for the imagination so to raise the value of money, or so to diminish the demands of life, as to suppose four and forty shillings a year an honourable stipend; yet it was probably equal, not only to the needs, but to the rank of Boethius. The wealth of England was undoubtedly to that of Scotland more than five to one, and it is known that Henry the Eighth, among whose faults avarice was never reckoned, granted to Roger Ascham, as a reward of his learning, a pension of ten pounds a year.

The other, called the Marischal College, is in the new town. The hall is large and well lighted. One of its ornaments is the picture of Arthur Johnston, who was principal of the college, and who holds among the Latin poets of Scotland, the next place to the elegant Buchanan.

In the library I was shown some curiosities; a Hebrew manuscript of exquisite penmanship, and a Latin translation of Aristotle's Politics, by Leonardus Aretinus, written in the Roman character, with nicety and beauty, which, as the art of printing has made them no longer necessary, are not now to be found. This was one of the latest performances of the transcribers, for Aretinus died but about twenty years before typogra phy was invented. This version has been printed, and may be found in libraries, but is little read; for the same books have been since translated both by Victorious and Lambinus, who lived in an age more cultivated, but perhaps owed in part to Aretinus that they were able to excel him. Much is due to those who first broke the way to knowledge, and left only to their successors the task of smoothing it.

In each of these towns there is a college, or in stricter language, a university; for in both there In both these colleges the methods of instrucare professors of the same parts of learning, and tion are nearly the same; the lectures differing the colleges hold their sessions, and confer de-only by the accidental difference of diligence, or