and weeds, and its height is known by some parts yet standing. The arch of one of the gates is entire, and of another only so far dilapidated as to diversify the appearance. A square apart. ment of great loftiness is yet standing; its use I could not conjecture, as its elevation was very disproportionate to its area. Two corner towers

boundaries, or are separated by walls of loose | found by following the walls among the grase stone. From the bank of the Tweed to St. Andrews, I had never seen a single tree, which I did not believe to have grown up far within the present century. Now and then about a gentleman's house stands a small plantation, which in Scotch is called a policy, but of these there are few, and those few all very young. The variety of sun and shade is here utterly un-particularly attracted our attention. Mr. Bosknown. There is no tree for either shelter or timber. The oak and the thorn is equally a stranger, and the whole country is extended in uniform nakedness, except that in the road between Kirkaldy and Cowpar, I passed for a few ards between two hedges. A tree might be a show in Scotland, as a horse in Venice. At St. Andrews, Mr. Boswell found only one, and recommended it to my notice; I told him that it was rough and low, or looked as if I thought so. This, said he, is nothing to another a few miles off. I was still less delighted to hear that another tree was not to be seen nearer. Nay, said a gentleman that stood by, I know but of this and that tree in the county.

well, whose inquisitiveness is seconded by great activity, scrambled in at a high window, but found the stairs within broken, and could not reach the top. Of the other tower we were told that the inhabitants sometimes climbed it, but we did not immediately discern the entrance, and as the night was gathering upon us, though proper to desist. Men skilled in architectur might do what we did not attempt; they migł probably form an exact ground-plot of this vene rable edifice. They may, from some parts ye standing, conjecture its general form, and perhap by comparing it with other buildings of the same kind and the same age, attain an idea very near 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 inheritance regular, yet it may be doubted whether before the Union any man between Edinburgh 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.

At our inn we did not find a reception such as we thought proportionate to the commercial upu lence of the place; but Mr. Boswell desired me 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 ull 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 deviation.

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.

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.

grees separately, with total independence of one on the other.

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 testimony 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, and some time after, were, for the most part, learning to speak, rather than to think, and were therefore more studious of elegance than of truth. The contemporaries of Boethius thought it sufficient to know what the ancients had delivered. The examination of tenets and of facts was reserved for another generation.

I received the next day a very kind letter from Sir Alexander Gordon, whom I had formerly known in London, and after a cessation of all intercourse for near twenty years, met here professor of physic in the King's College. Such unexpected 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.

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.

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

ability in the professors. The students wear |
scarlet gowns, and the professors black, which
is, I believe, the academical dress in all the Scot-
tish universities, except that of Edinburgh, where
the scholars are not distinguished by any parti-
cular habit. In the King's College there is kept
a public table, but the scholars of the Marischal
College are boarded in the town. The expense
of living is here, according to the information
that I could obtain, somewhat more than at St.
Andrews.

By a lady who saw us at the chapel, the Ear of Errol was informed of our arrival, and we had the honour of an invitation to his seat, called Slanes Castle, as I am told, improperly, from the castle of that name, which once stood at a place not far distant.

The road beyond Aberdeen grew more stony, and continued equally naked of all vegetable decoration. We travelled over a tract of ground near the sea, which not long ago suffered a very uncommon and unexpected calamity. The sand of the shore was raised by a tempest in such quantities, and carried to such a distance, that an estate was overwhelmed and lost. Such and so hopeless was the barrenness superinduced, that the owner, when he was required to pay the the usual tax, desired rather to resign the ground. SLANES CASTLE. THE BULLER OF BUCHAN. We came in the afternoon to Slanes Castle, built upon the margin of the sea, so that the walls of one of the towers seem only a continuation of a perpendicular rock, the foot of which is beaten by the waves. To walk round the house seemed impracticable. From the win

The course of education is extended to four years, at the end of which those who take a degree, who are not many, become masters of arts; and whoever is a master may, if he pleases, immediately commence doctor. The title of doctor, however, was for a considerable time bestowed only on physicians. The advocates are examined and approved by their own body; the ministers were not ambitious of titles, or were afraid of being censured for ambition; and the doctorate in every faculty was commonly given or sold into other countries. The ministers are now reconciled to distinction, and as it must always happen that some will excel others, have thought graduation a proper testimony of uncom-dows the eye wanders over the sea that sepa mon abilities or acquisitions.

happen, I may say, without violence of humanity, that I should willingly look out upon them from Slanes Castle.

rates Scotland from Norway, and when the winds The indiscriminate collation of degrees has beat with violence, must enjoy all the terrific justly taken away that respect which they ori- grandeur of the tempestuous ocean. I would ginally claimed, as stamps by which the literary not for my amusement wish for a storm; but as value of men so distinguished was authoritative-storms, whether wished or not, will sometimes ly denoted. That academical honours, or any others, should be conferred with exact proportion to merit, is more than human judgment or human integrity have given reason to expect. When we were about to take our leave, our Perhaps degrees in universities cannot be better departure was prohibited by the countess, till we adjusted by any general rule, than by the length should have seen two places upon the coast, of time passed in the public profession of learn- which she rightly considered as worthy of curi ing. An English or Irish doctorate cannot be osity, Don Buy, and the Buller of Buchan, to obtained by a very young man, and it is reason-which Mr. Boyd very kindly conducted us. able to suppose, what is likewise by experience commonly found true, that he who is by age qualified to be a doctor, has in so much time gained learning sufficient not to disgrace the title, or wit sufficient not to desire it.

The Scotch universities hold but one term or session in the year. That of St. Andrew's continues eight months, that of Aberdeen only five, from the first of November to the first of April.

In Aberdeen there is an English chapel, in which the congregation was numerous and splendid. The form of public worship used by the church of England, is in Scotland legally practised in licensed chapels served by clergymen of English or Irish ordination, and by tacit connivance quietly permitted in separate congregations, supplied with ministers by the successors of the bishops, who were deprived at the Revolution.

We came to Aberdeen on Saturday, August 21st. On Monday we were invited into the town-hall, where I had the freedom of the city given me by the Lord Provost. The honour conferred had all the decorations that politeness could add, and, what I am afraid I should not have had to say of any city south of the Tweed, I found no petty officer bowing for a fee.

The parchment containing the record of admission is, with the seal appending, fastened to a riband, and worn for one day by the new citiLon in his hat.

Don Buy, which in Erse is said to signify the Yellow Rock, is a double protuberance of stone, open to the main sea on one side, and parted from the land by a very narrow channel on the other. It has its name and its colour from the dung of innumerable sea-fowls, which in the spring choose this place as convenient for incu. bation, and have their eggs and their young taken in great abundance. One of the birds that frequent this rock has, as we were told, its body not larger than a duck's, and yet lays eggs as large as those of a goose. This bird is by the inhabitants named a Coot. That which is called Coot in England, is here a Cooter.

Upon these rocks there was nothing that could long detain attention, and we soon turned our eyes to the Buller, or Bouilloir of Buchan, which no man can see with indifference, who has either sense of danger, or delight in rarity. It is a rock perpendicularly tubulated, united on one side with a high shore, and on the other rising steep to a great height above the main sea. The top is open, from which may be seen a dark gulf of water which flows into the cavity, through a breach made in the lower part of the enclosing rock. It has the appearance of a vast well, bordered with a wall. The edge of the Buller is not wide, and to those that walk round, appears very narrow. He that ventures to look downward, sees that if his foot should slip, he must fall from his dreadful elevation upon stones on one side, or into the water on the other. We

however went round, and were glad when the circuit was completed.

When we came down to the sea, we saw some boats, and rowers, and resolved to explore the Buller, at the bottom. We entered the arch, which the water had made, and found ourselves in a place, which, though we could not think ourselves in danger, we could scarcely survey without some recoil of the mind. The basin in which we floated was nearly circular, perhaps thirty yards in diameter. We were enclosed by a natural wall, rising steep on every side to a height which produced the idea of insurmountable confinement. The interception of all lateral light caused a dismal gloom. Round us was a perpendicular rock, above us the distant sky, and below an unknown profundity of water. If I had any malice against a walking spirit, instead of laying him in the Red Sea, I would condemn him to reside in the Buller of Buchan. But terror without danger is only one of the sports of fancy, a voluntary agitation of the mind that is permitted no longer than it pleases. We were soon at leisure to examine the place with minute inspection, and found many cavities which, as the watermen told us, went backward to a depth which they had never explored. Their extent we had not time to try; they are said to serve different purposes. Ladies come hither sometimes in summer with collations, and smugglers make them storehouses for clandestine merchandise. It is hardly to be doubted but the pirates of ancient times often used them as magazines of arms, or repositories of plunder. To the little vessels used by the northern rowers, the Buller may have served as a shelter from storms, and perhaps as a retreat from enemies; the entrance might have been stopped, or guarded with little difficulty, and though the vessels that were stationed within would have been battered with stones showered on them from above, yet the crews would have lain safe in the caverns.

totally forgotten. The frames of their windows are all of wood. They are more frugal of their glass than the English, and will often, in houses not otherwise mean, compose a square of two pieces, not joining like cracked glass, but with one edge laid perhaps half an inch over the other. Their windows do not move upon hinges, but are pushed up and drawn down in groves, yet they are seldom accommodated with weights and pulleys. He that would have his window open, must hold it with his hand, unless what may be sometimes found among good contrivers, there be a nail which he may stick into a hole, to keep it from falling.

What cannot be done without some uncom mon trouble or particular expedient, will not often be done at all. The incommodiousness of the Scotch windows keeps them very closely shut. The necessity of ventilating human ha bitations has not yet been found by our northern neighbours; and even in houses well built, and elegantly furnished, a stranger may be sometimes forgiven, if he allows himself to wish for fresher air.

These diminutive observations seem to take away something from the dignity of writing, and therefore are never communicated but with hesitation, and a little fear of abasement and contempt. But it must be remembered, that life consists not of a series of illustrious actions, or elegant enjoyments; the greater part of our time passes in compliance with necessities, in the performance of daily duties, in the removal of small inconveniences, in the procurement of petty pleasures; and we are well or ill at ease, as the main stream of life glides on smoothly, or is ruffled by small obstacles and frequent interruption. The true state of every nation is the state of common life. The manners of a people are not to be found in the schools of learning, or the palaces of greatness, where the national character is obscured or obliterated by travel or instruction, by philosophy or vanity: Next morning we continued our journey,pleased nor is public happiness to be estimated by the with our reception at Slanes Castle, of which we assemblies of the gay, or the banquets of the had now leisure to recount the grandeur and the rich. The great mass of nations is neither rich elegance; for our way afforded us few topics of nor gay; they whose aggregate constitutes the conversation. The ground was neither unculti- people, are found in the streets and the villages, vated nor unfruitful; but it was still all arable. in the shops and farms; and from them, colOf flocks or herds there was no appearance. Ilectively considered, must the measure of genehad now travelled two hundred miles in Scotland, and seen only one tree not younger than myself.

BAMFF.

We dined this day at the house of Mr. Frazer, of Streichton, who showed us in his grounds some stones yet standing of a Druidical circle, and what I began to think more worthy of notice, some forest-trees of full growth.

At night we came to Bamff, where I remember nothing that particularly claimed my attention. The ancient towns of Scotland have generally an appearance unusual to Englishmen. The houses, whether great or small, are for the most part built of stones. Their ends are now and then next the streets, and the entrance into them is very often by a flight of steps, which reaches up to the second story; the floor which is level with the ground being entered only by stairs descending within the house.

The art of joining squares of glass with lead is little used in Scotland, and in some places is

ral prosperity be taken. As they appproach to delicacy, a nation is refined; as their conveniences are multiplied, a nation, at least a commercial nation, must be denominated wealthy.

ELGIN.

Finding nothing to detain us at Bamff, we set out in the morning, and having breakfasted at Cullen, about noon came to Elgin, where, in the inn that we supposed the best, a dinner was set before us which we could not eat. This was the first time, and, except one, the last, that I found any reason to complain of a Scottish table; and such disappointments, I suppose, must be expected in every country, where there is no great frequency of travellers.

The ruin of the cathedral of Elgin afforded us another proof of the waste of reformation. There is enough yet remaining to show that it was once magnificent. Its whole plot is easily traced. On the north side of the choir, the chapter-house, which is roofed with an arch of stone, remains

We were favoured by a gentleman, who lives in the castle, with a letter to one of the officers Let us not, however, make too much haste to at Fort George, which being the most regular despise our neighbours. Our own cathedrals fortification in the island, well deserves the noare mouldering by unregarded dilapidation. It tice of a traveller, who has never travelled before. seems to be part of the despicable philosophy of We went thither next day, found a very kind the time to despise monuments of sacred mag-reception, were led round the works by a gentlenificence, and we are in danger of doing that deliberately, which the Scotch did not do but in the unsettled state of an imperfect constitution.