Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/117

Rh severe snow storm in a night march toward Lauder, lost a great part of his army; Buchanan escaped, but, completely cured of his warlike enthusiasm, if any such sentiment ever inspired him, was confined the rest of the winter to his bed. In the ensuing spring, being considerably recovered, and having completed his eighteenth year, he was sent to the university of St Andrews to attend the prelections of John Mair, or Major, who at that time, according to his celebrated pupil, "taught logic, or, more properly, the art of sophistry," in St Salvator's college. Buchanan's eldest brother, Patrick, was matriculated at the same time. Having continued one session at St Andrews, where he took the degree of Bachelor of Arts, on the 3d of October, 1525, being then, as appears from the college registers, a pauper or exhibitioner, he accompanied Major to France the following summer. Mackenzie says, that, on account of his great merits and at the same time his great poverty, Major sent for him, in 1524, and took him into his house as a servant, in which capacity it was that Buchanan went with him to Paris, and remained with him two years; but this has been regarded by the vindicators of Buchanan as a story set forth for the purpose of fixing a charge of ingratitude upon the poet, for an epigram which he wrote upon one of Major's productions, and in which his old instructor is termed " solo cognomine major."

On returning to France, Buchanan became a student in the Scots college of Paris, and in March was incorporated a bachelor of Arts—the degree of Master of Arts he received in April, 1528. In June the following year he was elected procurator for the German nation, one of the four classes, into which the students were divided, and which included those from Scotland. The principles of the Reformation were by this time widely extended on the continent, and every where excited the most eager discussion. Upon Buchanan's ardent and generous mind they made a powerful impression, and it was not in his nature to conceal it. Yet he seems to have acted with considerable caution, and was in no haste to renounce the established forms of worship, whence we conclude that the reported mortifications he is said to have met with at this time and on that account, are without foundation. At the end of two years he was elected a professor in the college of St Barbe, where he taught grammar three years ; and, if we may believe himself, his remuneration was such as to render his circumstances at least comparatively comfortable. It appears to have been in 1529, that this office was conferred upon him; he was consequently only in his twenty-third year. Soon after entering on his professorship, Buchanan attracted the notice of Gilbert Kennedy, earl of Cassillis, then residing in Paris, whither he had been sent to prosecute his studies, as the Scottish nobility at that period generally were; and at the end of three years Buchanan was engaged to devote his time entirely to the care of the young Earl's education. With this nobleman he resided as a preceptor for five years ; and to him, as "a youth of promising talents and excellent disposition," he inscribed his first published work, a translation of Linacre's rudiments of Latin grammar, which was printed by the learned Robert Stephens, in 1533.

In 1536, James V. made a matrimonial excursion to France, where he found the earl of Cassillis, who had just finished his education. James having, on the 1st of January, 1537, married Magdalene, daughter of Francis I., returned to Scotland in May, bringing with him Cassillis and George Buchanan. This accounts for the future intimacy between the latter person and the king, which in the end was like to have had a tragical termination. The connexion between Buchanan and the earl seems, however, not to have been immediately dissolved; for it was while residing at the house of his pupil, that the poet com- posed Somnium or the Dream, apparently an imitation of a poem of Dunbar's,