Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/146

440 Burns, in an address to Edinburgh, thus celebrates the beauty and excellence of Miss Burnet:

His eldest daughter was married to Kirkpatrick Williamson, Esq. late keeper of the outer house rolls, who had been clerk to his lordship, and was eminent as a Greek scholar.

About 1780, he first began to make an annual journey to London, which he continued for a good many years, indeed, till he was upwards of eighty years of age. As a carriage was not a vehicle in use among the ancients, he determined never to enter and be seated in what he termed a box. He esteemed it as degrading to the dignity of human nature to be dragged at the tails of horses instead of being mounted on their backs. In his journeys between Edinburgh and London he therefore rode on horseback, attended by a single servant. On his last visit, he was taken ill on the road, and it was with difficulty that Sir Hector Monroe prevailed upon him to come into his carriage. He set out, however, next day on horseback, and arrived safe in Edinburgh by slow journeys.

Lord Monboddo being in London in 1785, visited the King's bench, when some part of the fixtures of the place giving way, a great scatter took place among the lawyers, and the very judges themselves rushed towards the door. I Monboddo, somewhat near-sighted, and rather dull of hearing, sat still, and was the only man who did so. Being asked why he had not bestirred himself to avoid the ruin, he coolly answered, that he " thought it was an annual ceremony, with which, being an alien, he had nothing to do."

When in the cpuntry he generally dressed in the style of a plain farmer; and lived among his tenants with the utmost familiarity, and treated them with great kindness. He used much the exercises of walking in the open air, and of riding. He had accustomed himself to the use of the cold bath in all seasons, and amid every severity of the weather. It is said that he even made use of the air bath, or occasionally walking about for some minutes naked in a room filled with fresh and cool air. In imitation of the ancients, the practice of anointing was not forgotten. The lotion he used was not the oil of the ancients, but a saponacious liquid compound of rose water, olive oil, saline aromatic spirit, and Venice soap, which, when well mixed, resembles cream. This he applied at bed-time, before a large fire, after coming from the warm bath.

This learned and ingenious, though somewhat eccentric, man died upon the 26 th May, 1799, at the advanced age of eighty-five years.

BURNS,, a celebrated poet, was born January 25, 1759; died July 22, 1796. Of this illustrious genius I originally intended to have compiled an account, from the materials that have been already published, adding such new facts as have come in my way. But, having been much struck with the felicity of a narrative written by the unfortunate Robert Heron―which nearly answers my purpose as to length, and contains many fresh and striking views of the various situations in which the poet was placed in life, together with, what appears to me, a comprehensive and most eloquent estimate of his genius―I have been induced to prefer it to anything of my own. By this course I shall revive a very rare and interesting composition, which is often quoted but seldom seen,