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No. 103.

To MRS. DUNLOP.

Ellisland, 11th. April, 1791.

I AM once more able, my honoured friend, to return you, with my own hand, thanks for the many instances of your friendship, and particularly for your kind anxiety in this last disaster, that my evil genius had in store for me. However, life is chequered-joy and sorrow-for on Saturday morning last Mrs. Burns made me a present of a fine boy; rather stouter, but not so handsome as your godson was at his time of life. Indeed I look on your little namesake to be my chef d'œuvre in that species of manufacture, as I look on Tam o' Shanter to be my standard performance in the poetical line. 'Tis true, both the one and the other discover a spice of roguish waggery, that might perhaps be as well spared; but then they also shew, in my opinion, a force of genius, and a finishing polish, that I despair of ever excelling. Mrs. Burns is getting stout again, and laid as lustily about her to day at breakfast, as a reaper from the corn-ridge. That is the peculiar privilege and blessing of our hale, sprightly damsels, that are bred among the hay and hea

ther. We cannot hope for that highly polished mind, that charming delicacy of soul, which is found among the female world in the more elevated stations of life, and which is certainly by far the most bewitching charm in the famous cestus of Venus. It is indeed such an inestimable treasure, that where it can be had in its native heavenly purity, unstained by some one or other of the many shades of affectation, and unallayed by some one or other of the many species of caprice, I declare to Heaven, I should think it cheaply purchased at the expence of every other earthly good! But as this angelic creature is, I am afraid, extremely rare in my station and rank of life, and totally denied to such a humble one as mine; we meaner mortals must put up with the next rank of female excellence-as fine a figure and face we can produce as any rank of life whatever; rustic, native grace; unaffected modesty, and unsullied purity; nature's mother-wit, and the rudiments of taste; a simplicity of soul, unsuspicious of, because unacquainted with, the crooked ways of a selfish, interested, disingenuous world; and the dearest charm of all the rest, a yielding sweetness of disposition, and a generous warmth of heart, grateful for love on our part, and ardently glowing with a more than equal return; these, with a healthly frame, a sound, vigorous constitution, which your higher ranks can

scarcely ever hope to enjoy, are the charms of lovely woman in my humble walk of life.

This is the greatest effort my broken arm has yet made. Do let me hear, by first post, how cher petit Monsieur comes on with his small-pox, May almighty goodness preserve and restore him!

No. 104.

To MR. CUNNINGHAM.

11th. June, 1791.

LET me interest you, my dear Cun. ningham, in behalf of the gentleman who waits on yon with this. He is a Mr. Clarke, of Moffat, principal Schoolmaster there, and is at present suffering severely under the ****** of one or two powerful individuals of his employers. He is accused of harshness to * * * that were placed under his care. God help the teacher, if a man of sensibility and genius, and such is my friend Clarke, when a booby father presents him with his booby son, and insists on lighting up the rays of science, in a fellow's head whose skull is impervious and inaccessible by any other way than a positive fracture with a cudgel: a fellow whom in fact it savours of impiety to attempt making a scholar of, as he has been

marked a blockhead in the book of fate, at the almighty fiat of his Creator.

The patrons of Moffat school are, the ministers, magistrates, and town-council of Edin burgh; and as the business now comes before them, let me beg my dearest friend to do every thing in his power to serve the interests of a man of genius and worth, and a man whom I particularly respect and esteem. You know some good fellows among the magistracy and council, *

but particularly you have much to say with a reverend gentleman to whom you have the honour of being very nearly related, and whom this country and age have had the honour to produce. I need not name the historian of Charles V. I tell him, through the medium of his nephew's influence, that Mr. Clarke is a gentleman who will not disgrace even his patronage. I know the merits of the cause thoroughly, and say that my friend is falling a sacrifice to prejudiced ignorance, and *

God help the children of dependence! Hated and persecuted by their enemies, and too often alas! almost unexceptionably, received by their friends with disrespect and reproach, under the thin disguise of cold civility and humiliating

* Dr. Robertson was uncle to Mr. Cunningham.

advice. O! to be a sturdy savage, stalking in the pride of his independence, amid the solitary wilds of his desarts, rather than in civilized life, helplessly to tremble for a subsistence, precarious as the caprice of a fellow-creature! Every man has his virtues, and no man is without his failings; and curse on that privileged plain dealing of friendship, which, in the hour of my calamity, cannot reach forth the helping hand without at the same time pointing out those failings, and apportioning them their share in procuring my present distress. My friends, for such the world calls ye, and such ye think yourselves to be, pass by my virtues if you please, but do, also, spare my follies: the first will witness in my breast for themselves, and the last will give pain enough to the ingenuous mind without you. And since deviating more or less from the paths of propriety and rectitude, must be incident to human nature, do thou, fortune, put. it in my power, always from myself, and of myself, to bear the consequences of those errors. I do not want to be independent that I may sin, but I want to be independent in my sinning.

To return in this rambling letter to the subject I set out with, let me recommend my friend, Mr. Clarke, to your acquaintance and good offices; his worth entitles him to the one, and his gratitude will merit the other. I long much to hear from you. Adieu!

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