Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/238

298 rant to the 2nd of July, from thence to the 27th of July, and from thence to the 8th of December, of which date no entry appearing, the lord advocate seems to have been prevailed with to give up the pursuit; Keith of Benholme, who seems to have occupied, or been steward of, the house so strangely dilapidated, was outlawed for not appearing.

The earl died at five o'clock on the morning of the fifth day of April, 1623, and a monument with a poetical inscription was erected to his memory. The funeral oration so frequently referred to, was read at Marischal college on the 30th June, 1623, by Ogston, the professor of moral philosophy; it compares his death to an earthquake, and sundry other prodigies of nature—heaps too great a load of virtues on his shoulders for mankind to bear with comfort, and in detailing the perfections of the dead Meceenas, the author does not neglect those of the living Solomon. A book of "Tears" was also published to his memory, chiefly composed by Massy and Alexander Wedderburn. The lady already so equivocally mentioned was his second wife, a daughter of James, sixth lord Ogilvie: he had previously married Margaret, daughter cf Alexander, fifth lord Hume, and by both he had several children.

KEITH, (the Honourable), commonly called marshal Keith, the younger son of William, ninth earl Marischal, and lady Mary Drummond, daughter to the earl of Perth, was born in the year 1696. His aptness for learning seems to have been very considerable, since he acquired in after-life a reputation for letters scarcely inferior to his military renown; a circumstance which was possibly in no small degree owing to his having had the good fortune to receive the rudiments of his education from the celebrated bishop Keith, who was allied to his family by consanguinity, and who officiated as tutor to himself and his elder brother, the tenth earl Marischal.

Mr Keith was originally designed for the law, and with the view of making it his profession, he was sent to Edinburgh to complete his studies. It was soon discovered, however, that he entertained a much stronger predilection for the camp than the bar;—he seems indeed to have been very early attached to the military profession. His language, when the subject happened at any time to be alluded to, was always full of martial enthusiasm, even while yet a mere stripling. "I have begun to study the law," he said, "in compliance with the desires of the countess of Marischal, (his mother,) but commend me, gentlemen, to stand before the mouth of a cannon for a few minutes; this either makes a man in an instant, or he dies gloriously in the field of battle." Such was the spirit in which the young soldier entered on his career of fame.

The earl Marischal, elder brother of the subject of this memoir, was one of those Tory noblemen who signed the proclamation of George I. The party being disappointed in their hopes of office under the new dynasty, he returned in a state of high irritation to Scotland, and at York met his brother James, who was on his way to London for the purpose of asking a commission in the army. The two young men returned home together, burning with resentment, and on the commencement of the insurrection of 1715, they were incited at once by their own feelings, and by the advice of their mother, who was a catholic, to declare for the Pretender. The meeting held by the earl of Mar, (who was their cousin,) under the semblance of a hunting match, was attended by the two brothers, and they continued, throughout the remainder of the campaign,