one Sunday, was surprised by the entry into her room of a man with a crape over his face, who quietly took her keys from their accustomed place, opened a bureau, took out a considerable sum of money, and, having replaced the keys on the lady's table, retired "with a low bow." The lady, speechless till her visitor had withdrawn, in amazement exclaimed, "Surely that was Deacon Brodie!" Subsequent events showed that she was probably right in the surmise. Lord Monboddo, who gave suppers after the manner of the ancients, with the table strewn with flowers and the flasks garlanded with roses. It was the same kind patron whom the poet consulted as to the prudence or policy of including in an edition of his works the fragment of a "Ballad on the American War; " and there is extant a letter obviously addressed to him, beginning: "There are two things which, I believe, the blow that terminates my existence alone can destroy, my attachment and propensity to poesy, and my sense of what I owe to your good-mentioned to him casually that he was ness." Burns was accidentally present when Erskine and the then lord advocate (Ilay Campbell) were opposed to each other in an important cause, and he immediately pencilled down his impressions in two stanzas, headed "Extempore in the Court of Session." The lord advocate comes first: He clenched his pamphlets in his fist, Till in a declamation mist His argument he tint it; He gaped for't, he graped for't, He faud it was awa, man: But what his common sense came short Á friend of the councillor at supper going to the country for a few days on a certain day. Something occurred to detain him in town. In the dead of the night he was disturbed by a creaking in the floor. A light glanced across the wall of his bedroom. Through a window which looked into another room he observed his friend the deacon, in a mask, calmly at work by the help of a dark lantern, making a selection from amongst his valuables. It has been noted, remarks Colonel Fergusson, as characteristic of the town's manners, that this little episode should have been quietly tided over, apparently, with little or no unpleasant remark. Up to the hour of his detection Brodie was frequently employed in the way of his trade by the Erskines, and their son (Lord Buchan) mentions in proof of his mother's insight into character that she had an instinctive distrust of the deacon, and never could endure his presence with complacency. The trial took place at the High Court of Justiciary on August 29, 1788. Brodie had retained Erskine, remarking that "however the matter might re-go, he had pitted the best cock what ever fought." The lord advocate led for the prosecution. The only plausible plea was an alibi, and when this broke down, Erskine's case was hopeless, for the facts of the robbery were clearly proved, and the line of defence to which he was driven was irreconcilable with the now notorious antecedents of the prisoner. According to the printed report, the dean of faculty rose at three in the morning to address the jury: This was very far from Erskine's ordinary style and manner, which were markable for grace and polish. One morning in the summer of 1788 the good citizens of Edinburgh were startled by the announcement that Deacon Brodie, a member of the Town Council, had been apprehended on a charge of burglary, for having (with others) broken into the Excise Office and carried off whatever fell within their reach; which, however, turned out not to exceed 147. in value. The deacon, a cabinet-maker by trade, was the son and grandson of burgesses of good repute, and his hereditary claims to respectability, combined with his social qualities, had enabled him to laugh off, as invented pleasantries, some stories which sound as if the famous pickpocket, Barrington, had been the hero of them. How, for example, as Colonel Fergusson relates, an invalid lady, unable to go to church He observed, that the situation of his unfortunate client presented to the world a most descended from an ancient and respectable astonishing moral phenomenon! That a man family, who, from the state of his affairs, made up by himself, was in opulent circumstances, and infinitely removed from indigence and temptation; who for a long series of years had maintained an irreproachable character in so ciety, and had often filled offices of honor and This town is now very quiet after the great trust among his fellow-citizens, the duties of bustle of the General Assembly, and a sad which he had discharged with attention and one it has been too for such a trifle as 84 pound fidelity; that such a person should even be a-year, but it came quite to be a political suspected of the crime charged in the indict-affair, and Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox combatants. ment was a most extraordinary fact. If it was true, he allowed that he was of all men the most culpable. But who could give credit to such a charge as was here exhibited? for as an eminent poet of our own country, who was still alive, had expressed himself: The needy man who has known better days, One whom distress has spited all the world, Is he whom tempting fiends would pitch upon To do such deeds, as make the prosperous men Lift up their hands, and wonder who could do them. It being therefore highly incredible that Mr. Brodie would have all at once departed from his integrity, and dashed into such guilty and atrocious crimes as now were charged against him, it would require a very strong and unsuspicious proof indeed to fix the guilt upon him; and if parts of Mr. Brodie's conduct which appeared to infer suspicions against him could be ascribed to any other cause, the gentlemen of the jury would lay these appearances altogether out of their view in judging of the import of the evidence. The jury were unanimous in the verdict of guilty, and Brodie was sentenced to be hanged on the 1st of October following. Creech, the publisher of the trial, who was on the jury, states that he applied for a report or notes of the speech, but was informed that it was extempore; that there had not been a syllable in writing, and that the dean was too much immersed in business to attempt setting down anything from memory. The nomination to the clerkship of the General Assembly, which lay with the members, becoming vacant in 1789, was contested with as much eagerness as if everything valuable in Church and State was involved in the issue, although the salary was only 841. a year. "Jupiter Carlyle was the candidate of the Moderates; Dr. Dalzell, professor of Greek in the university, of the Highflyers. Erskine was manager and leader for the one party; his old and constant antagonist, Henry Dundas, for the other. Erskine opened the campaign by proposing and carrying a resolution that it should be competent to any elector to demand a scrutiny, which was opposed, not without reason, by Dundas; for although in the first instance a majority of three (145 to 142) was declared for Carlyle, he eventually retired from the contest rather than await the result of a scrutiny. The importance attached to this affair may be collected from a letter addressed to Lady Betty Cunningham by Mrs. Mure: The latter, however, carried it merely by the great abilities and exertion of our friend Harry Erskine. Some people say it is to come on again, but I don't believe that will answer. In his capacity of lord advocate to the Prince of Wales, Erskine was bidden to all the formal gatherings of the prince's friends, and Lord Buchan (the son) states that whenever his father was in London, the prince "appropriated" him, and desired he should be invited wherever H.R.H. went. His conversational powers were particularly in request, and taxed to the uttermost, to entertain the Stadtholder when on a visit to this country; "the sleepiest prince in Europe," as the Prince of Wales described him to Erskine in an aside at the presentation. le slept through performance after performance at the theatre, and gave audible evidence of heavy slumber during the greater part of a State ball. There were occasions, however, when he was wide awake, to the confusion of those who mistook his sleepiness for stupidity. When he was at Cambridge, he was taken to divine ser vice at one of the college chapels. On coming out attended by the vice-chancellor and some heads of houses, he turned to them and asked where the text of the sermon was taken from, as he had not heard it distinctly. None of them knew. At length, risking a haphazard answer, Dr. B named the Second Epistle of Jude. "There is but one epistle of Jurde," said the Stadtholder. "Oh, yes, I meant of course the second chapter." "There is but one chapter." "You It was about 1790 that Erskine purchased an estate in the Valley of the Almond, which he christened Ammondell. The situation he chose for the house was low, and his elder brother, Lord Buchan, who had a fancy for living upon a hill, exclaimed on being taken to it, "Why there is actually no prospect whatever! forget, my dear David," was the laughing reply," that I have always the prospect of your estate." He was already a Fifeshire laird in right of his wife, and in 1790 he was looking to the representation of the Fifeshire District of Burghs. On the 30th of March the Duke of Portland writes: The prospect you give us of your success in Fifeshire is highly gratifying to the wishes of all your friends, and especially so to myself, | tage: you have the advantage of the panic, who look to it with the interested view of its the infatuation, and the contrition of both.* furnishing me with the means which I have long wished for, of knowing you personally. It is perfectly true that no new or additional motive was wanting to call forth the question of my best endeavors in promoting any object you have at heart; but I am ingenuous enough not to attempt to deny the force of that which I have just stated and to be proud of the avowal. The biographer states that Erskine only appeared in one of the State trials, one in which the prosecution was withdrawn upon a point of law. This is the more remarkable, because his readiness to take up the cause of the oppressed had grown into an article of popular belief. A writer to the signet in the west of Scotland, representing to a needy tacksman a wealthy neighbor, was told: "We dinna the futility of entering into a lawsuit with Erskine's moderate politics account in some measure for the difficulty he experienced in obtaining a seat in Parliament, and also for his not figuring as the cham-ken what ye say, maister; there's nae a pion of free discussion, like his brother puir man in Scotland need want a friend, Lord Erskine in England or Curran in or fear an enemy, whilst Harry Erskine Ireland. lives." The truth is, Harry Erskine was "What," asks Lord Cockburn, himself something of an alarmist in the preserves the forensic glory of Thomas Erskine except the 'State Trials,' which great Whig schism of 1792, he sided with gave subjects of permanent dignity to his Burke against Fox, and although he was genius, and which, thus sustained, his an active member of the convention for genius made immortal? Few such occa- the royal burghs, he threatened to with reforming the internal administration of sions occur in England, and far fewer in draw from it if it meddled in any manner Scotland." There were enough and more with Parliamentary reform. In April, than enough of such occasions for any one willing and able to take advantage of 1792, his younger brother, who had just them. It was a Scotch State trial (of joined the "Society of Friends of the Muir in 1793) that Curran, in one of his People," writes to the eldest, Lord Bufinest passages, adduced as an example become a member; I am quite sure nothchan: "I have, after serious reflection, of the persecuting spirit generated by ing less will save the country. fear : In com. pleting the original body, each member has leave to name two non-resident mem bers, and my wish is to name you and Henry; we have never yet come forward together, and I like the Tria juncta in uno' in a good cause." Lord Buchan assented; Henry declined. In the June following he writes to Sir Gilbert Elliot : For myself I have ever been of opinion, that, however excellent the principles of our Constitution may be, it certainly admits (particularly in respect to Parliamentary representation) of many very salutary amendments; and whenever, at a proper time, and in a proper mode, there shall be brought forward a plan of reformation in that respect, it shall meet with my cordial support. But I am decidedly of opinion that this is of all others the most im To what other cause, gentlemen, can you ascribe that in the wise, the reflecting, and the philosophic nation of Great Britain, a printer has been gravely found guilty of a libel, for publishing those resolutions to which the present minister of that kingdom had actually subscribed his name? To what other cause can you ascribe what in my mind is still more astonishing, that in such a country as Scotland- -a nation cast in the happy medium between the spiritless acquiescence of submissive poverty and the sturdy credulity of pampered wealth; cool and ardent, adventurous and persevering; winging her eagle flight against the blaze of every science, with an eye that never winks, and a wing that never tires; crowned as she is with the spoils of every art and decked with the wealth of every Muse, from the deep and scrutinizing researches of her Hume, to the sweet and simpler, but not Speech in defence of Archibald Hamilton Row less sublime and pathetic morality of her Burns an," Jan. 29, 1794. Thomas Muir, a member of the -how, from the bosom of a. country like that, sedition, and sentenced to be transported for fourteen Faculty of Advocates, was tried (Aug. 30, 1793) for genius, and character, and talents should be years. Jeffrey and Romilly were present at the trial, banished to a distant barbarous soil, con- which (Lord Cockburn states) Jeffrey never mentioned demned to pine under the horrid communion without horror. Romilly writes to Dumont: "I am not surprised that you have been shocked at the ac of vulgar vice and base-born profligacy, for count you have read of Muir's trial. You would have twice the period that ordinary calculation gives been more shocked if you had been present at it as I to the continuance of human life? But I will was." Palmer, a Dissenting minister who had been not press any idea that is painful to me and I educated at Eton and Cambridge where he graduated, was tried for the same offence and underwent the same am sure must be painful to you. I will only sentence. We cannot venture to print the retort of say that you have now an example of which Lord Braxfield to a person similarly accused, who justineither England nor Scotland had the advan-fied being a reformer by divine example. VOL. XL. 2058 LIVING AGE. # 64 proper time that such a plan could have been suggested, and that the mode adopted is in the present conjuncture the most unfortunate that could have been devised. At the same time he thought the coercive measures proposed by the government too strong; and at a public meeting in Edinburgh, Nov. 20, 1795, he was the mover of resolutions condemnatory of the Seditious Meetings and Writings Bill and strongly protesting against the continuation of the war. "Who is not with us is against us," was the motto of the anti-Gallican party, as indeed it is of most parties when what they think their vital interests are at stake, and Erskine's political opponents, finding that they could command a majority amongst his professional brethren, resolved on striking a blow which turned out, as they meant it should, the most mortifying that could be inflicted on such a man. The office of dean of the faculty, as already mentioned, was formally an annual one. Erskine had held it for ten years, when a circular signed by eight members was addressed to the body at large, calling on them to show their disapproval of their dean's conduct and principles by displac ing him in favor of a candidate better fitted to "represent them to the world, and to sustain their character of attachment to the laws and constitutions of their country." This candidate was the lord advocate, Robert Dundas of Arniston, who was chosen by a majority of 85, 123 to 38. Lord Cockburn, who condemns the proceeding, is obliged to admit that the provocation was strong: Considering the state of the times, the propriety of his presiding at a public meeting to petition against the war may be questioned. The official head of a public body should consider what is due to the principles and the feelings of those he may be supposed to represent; and to the great majority of the Faculty, Erskine's conduct must have been deeply offensive. Still the resolution to dismiss him was utterly unjustifiable. It was nearly unprecedented, violent, and very ungrateful. He had covered the Faculty with the lustre of his character for several years; and if wrong, had been misled solely by a sense of duty. Nevertheless, on the 12th of January, 1796, he was turned out of office. Had he and the Faculty alone been concerned in this intemperate proceeding, it would not have occurred. But it was meant, and was taken, as a warning to all others to avoid the dangers of public meetings on the wrong side. In times long after, when men's minds had calmed down, it was a subject of pride and self-congratulation to have been one of the minority, and a subject of regret to have refrained from voting with them. Jeffrey was eager to be one of the chosen band, but was over-persuaded by his father and Lord Glenlee to stay away. "He envied the thirty-eight, and always thought less of himself from his not having been one of them." Lord Buchan (the son) says: "I believe this expulsion from the deanship was a great grief to my father; though, according to his nature, he bore it with a sweetness and equanimity unchanged. My mother controlled her feelings less." There were occasions when his equanimity gave way, and the feeling of irritation at the treatment he had received from his professional brethren was too strong for him. As his biographer suggests, he was but human. At some public Whig dinner at this time the chairman proposed "the health of the gentlemen of the Faculty who had done themselves the honor of voting for Mr. Erskine's re-nomination to the deanship." Mr. Erskine rose, and very quietly remarked, "Mr. President, would it not be sufficient to propose the health of the gentlemen of the Faculty?" Burns gave vent in verse to his indig nation at the affront put upon his distinguished friend in "The Dean of Faculty: a New Ballad." It was not one of his happiest effusions. The first verse describes the heat of the contest: Dire was the hate at old Harlaw, There appeared also amongst several satirical pieces in verse and prose on this event, one entitled: "The Telegraph: a Consolatory Epistle from Thomas Muir, Esq., of Botany Bay, to the Hon. Henry Erskine, late Dean of Faculty." It contains some spirited lines: The vote is passed, and black balls fill the urn; One of the most remarkable cases in which Erskine was engaged after his degradation or (as his friends insisted in calling it) his elevation, was the trial of Macdonald of Glengarry for a duel which ended fatally. The victim of the duel was Lieut. Macleod of the 42nd Highland- | and he seemed to do well at first; but he ers. The scene of the quarrel was the ball-gradually declined, and died on the 3d of room at Inverness, May 1st, 1798. At June. Throughout the affair, adds Colonel a late hour, after supper, Glengarry came Fergusson, the prime idea in the poor up to a young lady, Miss Forbes of Cul- lad's mind seems to have been to bear loden, and claimed her promise to dance himself in a manly fashion, and to supthe last country dance with. him. She port the dignity of the 42nd, under the disclaimed any such promise, and said gross insult that had been put upon him. she was engaged for the dance to Mr. When he shook hands with his adversary, Randal Macdonald, and on this gentle- his naïve remark was, "You will allow, man's relinquishing his right in Glen- Glengarry, that I stood your fire like a garry's favor, she refused to dance with man.' either of them. On Glengarry's still insisting on his claim, Macleod, a mere youth, who was sitting by her, said: "Why do you tease the lady? Can't you allow her to choose for herself? You are one of the stewards, and can command as many dances as you please." Glengarry replied, "It is no business of yours; you should not interfere." Macleod explained that he only did it "in a friendly manner." After this, Miss Forbes danced a reel with Macleod, and then left the room. This was the lady's account of the occur rence. The gentlemen adjourned to the mess-room of the 79th Regiment. There high words passed between Glengarry and Macleod, and Macdonald, it is said, struck the lieutenant over the bonnet with his stick, and kicked him, with the remark, "It is now daylight, and you know the use of your pen and ink." Macleod drew his dirk, but the company interposed to prevent further mischief. A hostile meeting was arranged, but was delayed by some mistake as to the locality: the magistrates interfered; and a rumor had got abroad that Glengarry was disposed to show the white feather. When the meeting took place, Major Macdonald, Glengarry's second, endeavored to bring about an amicable arrangement; but besides an apology in writing to be dictated by military men, Macleod required that the stick with which he had been struck should be placed in his hands to be used as he thought proper. This was positively refused, and the parties took their ground at eleven paces. Cap. tain Campbell (Macleod's second) had proposed ten, and Major Macdonald twelve. The bullets for the pistols proved to be too small, but Major Macdonald would not hear of their being wrapped in leather to make them fit. Macleod was hit at the first fire, under the arm. At this stage the seconds induced the gentlemen to shake hands. Macleod, it was found, was badly wounded. He was taken by the surgeon in attendance to Fort George, when the ball was extracted, Whilst an indictment for murder was preparing by the direction of the lord advocate, Erskine was consulted whether it would be safe for Glengarry, who was still at large, to stand a trial. The reply was that the case was a serious one, but that he (Erskine) would do his best, and Glengarry at once determined to "stake his chance on Henry Erskine." The facts were proved as stated, and we can well believe that the excitement was extreme when the principal witness presented her. self, a handsome young woman, dressed in a riding-habit, black hat, and green veil, to whom Lord Eskgrove, the presiding judge, addressed the remark, after she had been sworn, "Sit down, young leddy, but ye maun pit up your veil, and let's see your face." The court had sat nearly fourteen hours, and it was close on midnight, when Erskine began his speech for the defence, which occupied upwards of three hours. No report of it is extant, but it consisted, we are told, of a powerful appeal to the jury, on the point of honor, stress being laid on the persistent efforts of Major Macdonald and his principal, to offer every kind of apology consistent with their character as gentlemen. It was four o'clock in the morning when the jury were enclosed, and appointed to give in their verdict at twelve o'clock that day. Such had been the effect of Erskine's appeal to the jury, that it was felt that the matter was as good as ended. So much was this the case, that a question arose as to the necessity for Glengarry's returning to his quarters in the Tolbooth. Coll Macdonald, Glengarry's agent and kinsman, came to consult Mr. Erskine on the point, when he said, "If Glengarry is wise he will return to the prison." He deemed it impru dent at this stage to appear over-confident of the result. The jury accompanied their verdict of "not guilty" with a statement of their reasons, which were essentially the points urged by Erskine, disclaiming, with doubtful consistency, the doctrine that killing in a fair duel was any defence |