o'clock a gentleman was attacked by three men on Lieth walk, and robbed of four guineas.

We have the pleasure of acquainting the public, that part of the great canal between the Forth and Clyde is now opened, and lighters are paffing through twenty locks as far as Kilfyth, which is about twelve miles from the fea, and a good way beyond the greateft height of the country; and that in a few weeks hence the navigation will be compleated the length of Kirkintilloch, which is nineteen miles in all, and within fix miles of Glasgow: that thefe locks upon repeated trials answer extremely well, the veffels paffing a lock in four minutes.

Bon mot at the late Masquerade: a Shepherdefs being afked where were her sheep, Look round the room, faid fhe, are they not a goodly flock.

On the 25th inft. The Court of Jufticiary met at 9 o'clock in the morning according to adjournment, to hear counfel on the import of the verdict returned by the jury in the trial of Murdiefon and Millar; the pleadings lafted near fix hours, when the court ordered informations to be given in, and then adjourned to Tuesday the 9th of February, at one o'clock.

Alexander Provan, Alexander Morrifon, and John Watfon, now prifoners in the tolbooth here, accused of theft and house-breaking, have been ferved with their indictments, to ftand trial before the Court of Justiciary.

BIRTH S. Jan. 22. At the Earl of Lauderdale's house, at Hatton, Lady Betty Gavin, of a daughter.

23. Mrs. Garfhore, younger of Alderston, was fafely delivered of a fon.

DE A TH S. Jan. 8. At London, Sir James Gray Knight of the Bath, being feized with a fit while attending the Levee at St. James's, was carried home in a chair, and died on Saturday morning, he was Ambaffador to Spain in 1769.

Charles Campbell, Efq; late Mafter of the Affumption, bound to London from Barbadoes.

12. At his feat near Glafgow, James Campbell Efq; of Blythfwood.

12. At his house in Edinburgh, Mr William Smith, principal clerk to the Chancery in Scotland.

13. Mr William Nicol, Wine Merchant, fincerely regreted.

14. At his houfe in Piccadilly, Mr Thomas Denham, his death was occafioned by eating 200 oysters, which he did for a wager of 50 guineas, he was allowed one hour and a half, but eat them in one hour and twenty-three mi

nutes.

14. At his chambers, in Gray's Inn, aged 80, Thomas Smith, Efq; a Gentleman of confiderable property in York-fhire, and particulary of a rich lead mine: concerning which there was a trial at Bar in November laft, determined in his favour against Lord Pomfret who claimed it.

20. The Rev. Mr James Mitchell first Minifter of Old Machar, in the 72d year of his age, and the 45th year of his Ministry, 41 years of which he has spent in that parish, much efteemed and beloved by his Parishoners.

23. At Aberdeen, Peter Gordon, Efq; younger of Avochy, Advocate. 24. At Edinburgh, Mr Thomas Rannie, fen. merchant.

At Newcastle upon Tyne, Dr. Adam Askew, an eminent physician at that place.

PER T H. Extract of a Letter from Montrofe, January 26.

"I fhould have wrote you before this time, of the devaftation made by the wind laft Wednesday morning; but I have been from home this two days. We had here all that night a very hard gale of wind, but from four to feven o'clock in the morning it increafed to a hurricane; a good number of houfes were unroofed, and feveral chimney

chimney-tops blown down, fome of which went through the roofs into the upper ftories, and feveral families were obliged to leave their houfes; two houfes for drying thread at the outfide of the town were blown down, very luckily there was not a fingle perfon hurt, and had it been in the day time, this could fcarce been the cafe, for flates and bricks were fly, ing in the air and falling every way on the streets. There was a veffel overturned in the harbour, and had it not been low water, there behove to been much damage among the fhipping."

We hear from Dundee, that the mob who committed the outrages at the houfe of Milnfield, on Friday the 8th curt. (which we mentioned in a former magazine,) behaved in the most daring lawless manner, and plundered the houfe of every thing valuable; what they could not carry away they broke and deftroyed.-Col. Duncan of Lundin, who lives on his eftate in that neighbourhood, having got notice of the approach of the mob, haftened to Milnfield, where he found only a few fervants; (Mr Milne being from home) he ordered the fires to be put out, which faved the houfe from being burnt down, which it is faid was intended; the Colonel then retired a little, but meeting with a party of about thirty farmers on horfeback, to whom he was known, he held a confultation with them, and it was refolved to attack the rioters, but he had the precaution to order them to lay aside what fire arms they had along with them, which being complied with; Col. Duncan charged the mob, at the head of this little party, and with whips and sticks made his way feveral times through them,

many of them loaded with plunder; the mob began foon to run, when the Colonel (reinforced by other country people) feized fixteen of them, and fent them prifoners to Edinburgh, where they now remain in order to be tried by the laws of their country. The Colonel's prudent and gallant behaviour, with the refolution of the brave farmers who joined him, cannot be too much commended, and altho' a dangerous mob, confifting of fome thoufands, were routed and difperfed, yet no lives were loft.

SIR,

HAVING obferved, in your from gazine of this date,a letter from your first correfpondent, who calls him felf Prifcus; and in regard in the laft paragraph, fave one of his letters, he fignifies "he is far from dogmatizing (that is being pofitive) on fuch doubt full anecdotes as are fome of thofe he has narrated, and submitted to the public." And expreffes his defire" that if any ingenious or curious gentlemen in Perth, or its neighbourhood, will take the trouble to fet him to rights, either as to errors or prejudices, it would be esteemed a favour." I fhall therefore do myfelf the pleafure (or rather take the trouble as he expreffes it) to fet him to rights, as to the firft paragraph of his letter, where he has fallen into a very capital mistake; at the fame time I profefs myfelf to be quite fenfible of the very great deference I owe to Prifcus, (if his affumed name correfponds with his years) in ar greeablenefs to an adage of the very higheft authority; viz. Days fhould fpeak, and multitude of years fhould teach wifdom."

Having premifed thus much by way of preface, I now proceed to point out where the error lies, and therefore deAres your correfpondent, Prifcus to

VOL. III.

observe, that he has miftaken the date

that of the action of Bertha, and alfo that of the death of King William ; he fays the former was in 1312, and the latter in 1314, what his reafons are for this I know not, but if he pleases I fhall give him my opinion as to the antiquity of Perth.

It appears evidently that Bertha was deftroyed by an inundation in the year 1210, and Perth built immediately after in a more commodious place, where it prefently is, and alfo that King William died in 1214.

In fupport of this I fhall take the li berty to lay before Prifcus, and your readers, the following refpectable authority, viz. an extract from Buchanan's hiftory of Scotland, who writes thus,

"In the year 1199, the King (viz. William) had a fon named Alex. nder, born to him; and Richard of England dying, his brother John fuc ⚫ceeded him.

against Philip his old friend. So that as foon as John returned out of France, he fought occafion for a war ' with the Scots, and began to build a fort over against Berwick. William having in vain complained of the injury by his ambaffadors, gathered a company together, and demolished as ⚫ much as was built of it. Upon which, • armies were levied on both fides, but 'when their camps were near one another, peace was made by the intervention of the nobles on these terms, that William's two daughters should ❝ be given in matrimony to John's two fons, as foon as ever they were marriageable. A great dowry was promifed, and caution made, that no fort fhould be built, and haftages alfo were given in the cafe. William at his return, fell into an unexpected danger; the greatest part of the town of Bertha was fwept away in the night, by an inundation of the river Tay; neither was the king's palace exempted from the calamity; but his fon, an infant, with his nurse, and fourteen more, were drowned, the reft hardly efcaping; many alfo of the promifcuous multitude loft their lives. The king perceiving that the water had overwhelmed the greateft part of the ground on which the city ⚫ftood, and that almost every house in the town had fuffered by it, caufed a

·

new city to be built a little below in a ⚫ more commodious place, on the fame river; and making fome fmall variation of the name, called it Perth, in memory (as fome fay) of one Perth, a nobleman, who gave the king the land on which the city was built. About the fame time the king took. Gothred Makuel, captain of the rebels in the north, who was betrayed to him by his own men. When he was prifoner, he conftantly abftained from all food, to prevent, as it is thought, a more heavy punishment. This was, in a manner, the laft memorable fact of William's, which yet, in regard of his unwieldy age, was

acted by his captains; for he died foos after in the 74th year of his age, and the 49th year of his reign, A. D. · 1214." Buchanan's Hift. London Edit. 1690. Fol. p. 235. 236.

For confirmation of the above, and for afcertaining the date of the treaty of peace betwixt John king of England, and king William,which is narrated above to have been a very short time before the overthrow of Bertha, at leaf the year immediately before, I fhall likewife fubjoin another authority from Abercromy's Martial Atchievements of the Scots Nation, as follows,

"While these matters were in agitation, (viz. the difputes between the Pope and John king of England,) one 'fhould have thought, that William king of Scotland had feveral opportunities of regaining, by treaty or force, his loft territories in England; but king William was by this time grown old, and probably too confcientiously fcrupulous. He lay by an unconcerned fpectator of all thefe great events; nor had he stirred at all, but for an encroachment made upon him by king John. That prince wanted, it seems, to have a quarrel, and fought to regain at home what he had fo ingloriously loft abroad. With this view he made fome fuccefsful expeditions, both upon the Irish and Welch; and fays Buchanan,caufed a fortrefs to be built hard by the town of Berwick, then in the hands of the Scots. King William first complain'ed of the injury, then ordered the fort to be demolished, and fo both 'nations began to arm. The English 'hiftorians give another reafon of this war; they fay, that King John quar⚫relled with the King of Scots, because ' of his receiving fome outlaws out of England, and for marrying his daughter to the Earl of Boloign, without confent: as if for the county of Huntington, the only one poffeffion then held by the Scots in England, King William, a free and independent prince, had been obliged neither

to

to marry his own children, nor to give fanctuary to English refuges 'within his kingdom. However, it is certain, that they did' quarrel, and both princes anno 1208, fet themfelves upon the head of their refpec<tive armies, but neither it feems had a mind to fight. They met, and by the mediation of friends to both, a peace was concluded upon the following terms: King William's two daughters were promifed in marriage to King John's two fons, and with them a confiderable fum of money, ⚫ for which King William gave hoftages to King John; who, on his part confented to the demolishing of his fortrefs near Berwick, and obliged himself to perform certain ftipulations agreed to. What these were, hifto⚫rians do not relate; but that he did agree to ftipulations honourable and

English, and by them admirably well fortified, the manner of his taking it was by means of certain fcaling ladders of ropes, which were hung by fopes u pon the walls. Many more particulars might be condefcended upon to prove the importance of Perth before that period,but these few may ferve, I shall conclude this paragraph, by obferving that a great number of private grants or charters from the kings of Scotland, are dated at Perth during the above period.

If these hints will be of any ufe to Prifcus in his intended publication they are entirely at his fervice,and perhaps at another time he may command more.

4

tainly know, from the obligation 'granted to King John, by King William, at Northampton, in Auguft, 1209, for the fum of 15,000 marks, payable at feveral terms: and the 'reafon of this grant is,because of the ftipulations or contracts entered into, and confirmed by the charter of ⚫ both kings.

King William died in the forty' ninth year of his reign, and the feventy fecond of his life, anno 1214." Abercromby's Martial Atchievements. 8vo. Edit. Vol. 1. p. 374, 375, 376. That Perth was a place of confiderable note before 1312 appears from the following confiderations. A monaftery of Dominicans or Black Friars

1773.

I am Sir,

Your's, &c.

Perthenfis.

anno 1231, by king Alexander II. king William's fucceffor. A treaty of peace between Alexander III. king of Scot

SIR,

MAGAZINE.

Imagine, in order to make fuch ap

was agreed upon at Perth, anno 1266; being a folemn renounciation of the latter's claim to the Western islands of Scotland. In the year 1312, king Robert Bruce furprized Perth (or St. Johnstoun) ther in the hands of the

of its removal, it is very neceffary to find out the disorder itself. According to my ardent defire then, to contribute to the relief of the poor, I chuse the method of finding out, as much as X 2

poffible,