Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 7.djvu/94

230 land, with the view of returning to his native country. On his arrival in the latter kingdom, he was kindly received and patronized by Edward I.; and, after being retained for some time at his court, was permitted to pass to Scotland, where he arrived shortly after the death of Alexander III. That event rendering it necessary to send ambassadors to Norway, to bring over the young queen, Margaret, or, as she is more poetically called, the Maid of Norway, grand-daughter of the deceased monarch, Michael Scott, now styled Sir Michael, although we have no account either of the time or occasion of his being elevated to this dignity, was appointed, with Sir David Weems, to proceed on this important mission, a proof that his reputation as a wizard had not affected his moral respectability. With this last circumstance, the veritable history of Sir Michael terminates; for his name does not again appear in connexion with any public event, nor is there any thing known of his subsequent life. He died in the year 1292, at an advanced age, and was buried, according to some authorities, at Holme Coltrame, in Cumberland; and, according to others, in Melrose abbey.

Although, however, all the principal authenticated incidents in the life of Sir Michael which are known, are comprehended in this brief sketch, it would take volumes to contain all that is told, and to this hour believed, by the peasantry of Scotland, of the terrible necromancer, auld Michael. For some curious specimens of the traditional character of the great magician of other days, the reader may be referred to the notes appended to the "Lay of the Last Minstrel," by the still greater magician of modern times. He will there learn, how Sir Michael, on one occasion, rode through the air to France on a huge black horse; how the devil made an unsuccessful attempt to entrap him by the way; how, on another occasion, when

from a niggardly farmer, he threw down a bonnet which his master had previously enchanted, and which, becoming suddenly inflated, began to spin round the house with supernatural speed, and drew, by its magical influence, the whole household after it, man, maid, and mistress, who all continued the goblin chase, until they were worn out with fatigue. It may not, perhaps, be unnecessary to add, that all these cantrips, and a thousand more, were performed by the agency of a "mighty book" of necromancy, which no man, but on peril of soul and body, might open, or peruse, and which was at last buried in the same grave with its tremendous owner.

SCOTT, (, baronet, a distinguished poet and novelist, was born in Edinburgh, August 15, 1771. He was a younger son of Mr Walter Scott, writer to the signet, by Anne, daughter of Dr John Rutherford, professor of the practice of medicine in the university of Edinburgh. Sir Walter's father was grandson to a younger son of Scott of Raeburn, a branch of the ancient baronial house of Harden; and his mother was grand-daughter to Sir John Swinton, of Swinton, in Berwickshire. Being an ailing child, he was sent at a very early period of life to Sandyknow, a farm near the bottom of Leader water, in Roxburghshire, occupied by his paternal grandfather, where he had ample opportunities of storing his mind with border tradition. The first school he attended is said to have been one in Kelso, taught by a Mr Whale, where he had for school-fellows James and John Ballantyne, who subsequently became intimately connected with him in public life. He entered the high school of Edinburgh in 1779, when the class with which he was ranked (that of Mr Luke Fraser) was commencing its third season. Under this master he continued during two