addressed to the poet when about to set off on his Border tour:—

"DEAR SIR,

"AMIDST a variety of occupations in which I am at this moment engaged, I have only time to scrawl these few lines to return you very sincere and cordial thanks for the engraving and the letter accompanying it. The anecdote you obligingly communicate is not less gratifying to the feelings of the man than flattering to the vanity of the author.

"I heartily wish you a pleasant journey and all happiness and success in the cause and in the objects of it. I hope, as soon as you return to Edinburgh, to have the pleasure of seeing you. Mr. Stewart told me he had given you a letter to Mr. Brydone, otherwise I would have written a few lines to him by you, as he expressed to me a very strong desire to see you at his house on the banks of the Tweed. Once more I wish you every thing pleasant and prosperous.

"Yours very faithfully,

" HENRY MACKENZIE."

It is singular that the poet read the Mirror and Lounger for the first time in 1790-in the year 1786 there appeared in the latter a generous article from the pen of Mackenzie on the poems of Burns, in which he was placed nigh the summit of the Scottish Parnassus. -ED.]

No. CLXX.

TO COLLECTOR MITCHELL.

Ellisland, 1790

SIR,

I SHALL not fail to wait on Captain Riddel tonight-I wish and pray that the goddess of justice herself would appear to-morrow among our hon. gentlemen, merely to give them a word in their ear that mercy to the thief is injustice to the honest man. For my part I have galloped over my ten parishes these four days, until this moment that I am just alighted, or rather, that my poor jackass-skeleton of a horse has let me down; for the miserable devil has been on his knees half a score of times within the last twenty miles, telling me in his own way, 'Behold, am not I thy faithful jade of a horse, on which thou hast ridden these many years!'

In short, Sir, I have broke my horse's wind, and almost broke my own neck, besides some injuries in a part that shall be nameless, owing to a hard

hearted stone for a saddle. I find that every offender has so many great men to espouse his cause, that I shall not be surprised if I am not not committed to the strong hold of the law to-morrow for insolence to the dear friends of the gentlemen of the country.

I have the honour to be, Sir,

your obliged and obedient humble

R. B

[Collector Mitchell was a kind and considerate gentleman, and befriended the poet on several occasions : to his grandson, Mr. John Campbell, surgeon, in Aberdeen I am indebted for this characteristic letter. ED.]

No. CLXXI.

SIR,

TO DR. MOORE.

Dumfries, Excise-Office, 14th July, 1790.

;

COMING into town this morning, to attend my duty in this office, it being collection-day, I met with a gentleman who tells me he is on his way to London so I take the opportunity of writing to you, as franking is at present under a temporary death. I shall have some snatches of leisure through the day, amid our horrid business and bustle, and I shall improve them as well as I can but let my letter be as stupid as ********* as miscellaneous as a newspaper, as short as a hungry grace-before-meat, or as long as a law-paper in the Douglas cause; as ill spelt as country John's billet-doux, or as unsightly a scrawl as Betty Byre-Mucker's answer to it; I hope, considering circumstances, you will forgive it ; and as it will put you to no expense of postage, I shall have the less reflection about it.

I am sadly ungrateful in not returning you my thanks for your most valuable present, Zeluco. In fact, you are in some degree blameable for my neglect.

You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of the work, which so flattered me, that nothing less would serve my over-weening fancy, than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I have gravely planned a comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson, and Smollett, in your different qualities and merits as novel-writers. This, I own, betrays my ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never bring the business to bear; and I am fond of the spirit young Elihu shews in the book of Job—“ And I said, I will also declare my opinion." I have quite disfigured my copy of the book with my annotations. I never take it up without at the same time taking my pencil, and marking with asterisms, parantheses, &c. wherever I meet with an original thought, a nervous remark on life and manners, a remarkable well-turned period, or a character sketched with uncommon precision.

Though I should hardly think of fairly writing out my "Comparative View," I shall certainly trouble you with my remarks, such as they are.

I have just received from my gentleman that horrid summons in the book of Revelations" That time shall be no more!"

The little collection of sonnets have some charming poetry in them. If indeed I am indebted to the fair author for the book, and not, as I rather suspect to a celebrated author of the other sex, I should certainly have written to the lady, with my grateful acknowledgments, and my own ideas of the