worship of God; and, agreeably to the opinion of some, the rest of the week for the service of the devil.

As all strangers are, I was admitted to one of their musical assemblies, which was conducted with the utmost propriety, and shewed that the performers were not only acquainted with antient, as well as modern compositions, but also with the powers of harmony, and those peculiar combinations of sound that are calculated to raise the most delightful sensations.

Though to some on the south side of the Tweed, the people here may be thought, comparatively speaking, barbarous, yet they have only to come and see, in order to be convinced that there are as well bred, as well dressed, and as polite people at Aberdeen, as anywhere in Britain.

There is perhaps no city in Britain where more spirited improvements are going on, than at Aberdeen, and no place in Europe where, in the course of the last fifty years, a greater revolution in general has taken place in the people's notions, customs, manners, &c. for the better. In short, the very lowest classes of the people are become much more enlightened than they were. In the year 1745, upon some muskets and bayonets being sent to Aberdeen, to be distributed to the inhabitants, a certain old magistrate, having the good of his country at heart, and afraid lest the citizens, not knowing how to use the bayonets, should hurt one another, and as they might be of high consequence, were they to fall into the hands of the rebels, moved, That the muskets should be dispersed among the inhabitants, but that

the bayonets, those outlandish weapons, should be taken some miles into the sea, and heaved overboard.

However, refinement in manners has not here, any more than in other places, made all the people what they ought to be. Mr. B. an apothecary, lately paid his addresses to a young lady, who, he knew, had some money at her own disposal; and he managed matters so as to induce the young lady to give him a few hundreds, without asking any bill or bond from him. However, after he had got the money, his visits, though frequent, were not so much so as before; nor his arguments for her to marry him so frequent or urgent. She began to suspect it was the money he wanted; and, therefore, wished to have some security for it; as he had got almost her all; but yet she did not like to ask it, lest he might be offended. Thus circumstanced, she pretended to be ill, and sent for him twice or three times, as a physician. Her servant ran a fourth time, telling him her mistress was at the point of death. When he arrived, and saw her, he told those around her that he was afraid she was going, and that he was

sorry for it. She was speechless,

and indeed pale,

like a corps, her face having been rubbed with chalk; and she feigned death so well, that the apothecary actually thought she was dead. He told them to bury her the best way they could, and that, if he could, he would attend her funeral; though he rather feared it would not be in his power. On his saying this, without any manner of concern, nay, rather, by the tone of his voice, seemingly glad, the young woman, who heard every word distinctly, rose

from her bed, and said,

you impudent scoundrel! but you are mistaken, and you shall not leave this room till you give me security for the money: then go and never let me see your face again." The poor apothecary, confounded and astonished, offered to marry her instantly; but she insisted and obtained security for her money, and refused his offer of marriage with the utmost disdain.

However improbable it may appear to the landholders in England, yet certain it is, that an acre of land in the neighbourhood of Aberdeen fetches near double the rent to the proprietors than an acre does in the neighbourhood of London; and being forced by manure from the city, as all lands about great towns generally are, produces equally good crops. The poors rates in England amount nearly to five millions a year, three of which are paid in and about London; which, being proportioned according to the rent of land, becomes a heavy burden on the occupier; and, consequently, lessens its value very considerably to the proprietor.

As I was walking the streets here one day, I heard two men speaking loud, and following me. One of them, being a plumber, and having been in the country with a lead coffin, to a certain great man, who it seems did not possess all the virtues, swore he had soldered the lid of the coffin so firmly down, that even the devil himself would not get his lordship out of it.

The colleges here have, for some time past, been accused of conferring degrees, without examining minutely into the qualifications of the persons on whom they were conferred. This report, whether

true or false, has determined, it seems, the professors to tie up one anothers hands, and be a little more cautious whom they honour. The truth is, like the Grecians, who created three hundred statues to Demetrius Phalerius, thereby making the honour of a statue nothing, so injudicious have the professors here been in conferring their degrees, that the title of Dr. is become a kind of nick-name, and so common, that many who deserve it, and enjoy it, would wish to lay it aside.

There is something I find even in names that creates prejudice. In the neighbourhood of London, where a great many houses were built and building, the place somehow went by the name of Botany Bay; and this very circumstance prevented some, that otherwise would have taken houses there, from doing it. This induced the proprietors and builders to apply to parliament, to give it the name of Somerstown, which had the desired effect, in making the houses let. Something of this kind happened to me, when at Aberdeen; for, when in my own mind I had fixed on lodgings, yet I did not take them, though neat and every way to my mind, because they were in the street called the GUESTS (Ghosts) Row: not choosing my letters to be sent to me directed to a place having such a name. It is astonishing that the proprietors do not procure an act, at least of the town-council, for changing its name.

They have a tolerable collection of natural and artificial curiosities, both at the Old Town and New Town Colleges; and professor James Beattie, of the New Town College, nephew to the late Dr. Beattie, seems to know more of natural history, and the important

and now fashionable branches of knowledge, connected with it, than any other person I know in any part of Scotland; except the accomplished professor Ogilvie, of King's College here. Professor Copland has evidently an excellent turn for mechanics, and an uncommonly neat apparatus for philosophical experiments, though the language in which he communicates his ideas is certainly too often ungrammatical, particularly when he happens to use Latin phrases and terms.

But what I thought the most perfect of the kind, though nothing when compared to that at Slough, near Windsor, where Dr. Herschel resides, and that at the Observatory at Portsmouth, both of which I have inspected narrowly, was, the telescope and moon glass at the Old Town College.

There are some branches of knowledge taught here, with tolerable care and success, but there are two things that strike me as rather surprising; that the collection of natural curiosities is not greater, as the funds of the colleges are considerable; and that one of the colleges is not carried to Inverness. There is no occasion for duplicates of a college at Aberdeen.

There is no preventing young men, when collected together, from sometimes doing mischief. However, tricks, which endanger life, ought not only to be discouraged, but the perpetrators of them severely punished. At the Old Town College lately, a young English gentleman, seeing a carrier come frequently to the college with provisions, &c. for a young man, from his mother in the country, and finding that he seemed on a cold day to relish a glass of spirits, and