Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/256

520 particularly successful as a merchant; but the buoyant imagination and restless love of adventure which his writings betoken, were perhaps scarcely compatible with that plodding persevering spirit for which his countrymen are so generally distinguished, especially in mercantile enterprise abroad and in the colonies. It is difficult, indeed, if not impossible, at one and the same time to establish a goodly rich mansion on terra firma, and build bright castles in the air.

It was not till 1829 that Michael Scott appears to have ventured into authorship, by the publication of "Tom Cringle's Log." The first specimens, which he sent to "Blackwood's Magazine," were fragmentary productions, under the name of "Tom Cringle;" but the sharp, experienced eye of "Old Ebony" was not long in detecting their merit, and he therefore advised the anonymous author to combine them into a continuous narrative, even though the thread that held them together should be as slender as he pleased. This advice Mr. Scott adopted; and when the papers appeared as a "Log," detailing the eventful voyage of a strange life through calm and hurricane, through battle and tempest, as they successively occurred to his fancy, the "Quarterly Review "characterized them as the most brilliant series of magazine papers of the time, while Coleridge, in his "Table Talk," proclaimed them "most excellent." The magazine reading public was of the same opinion, and accordingly the question was circulated through every class, "Who is the author of 'Tom Cringle's Log?'" But no one could answer; no, not even Blackwood himself, so well had Scott preserved his incognito; and this eminent publisher descended to the grave without knowing assuredly by whom the most popular series in his far-famed magazine had been written. Afterwards the chapters were pub- lished as an entire work, in two volumes, and so highly was it prized, that it was generally read upon the Continent, while in Germany it has been repeatedly translated. "After Michael Scott had thus led a life almost as mythic as that of his wondrous namesake, he died in Glasgow, on the 7th of November, 1835, and it was only through this melancholy event that the full fact of his authorship was ascertained by the sons of Mr. Blackwood.

SINCLAIR,. Among the many benefactors of Scotland, whose labours were devoted to its agricultural improvement, we know of none who has surpassed, or even equalled, the subject of our present notice.

Sir John was born at Thurso Castle, in the county of Caithness, on the 10th of May, 1754. He was the eldest son of George Sinclair, of Ulbster, by his wife, lady Janet Sutherland, daughter of William, Lord Strathnaven. George, the father, having died suddenly at Edinburgh, in 1770, John Sinclair, then in his sixteenth year, succeeded to the family property, which, until he was of age, was superintended by his mother. Having received his early education at the High School of Edinburgh, and under the direction of Logan, his tutor, afterwards author of "Runnymede," he studied successively at the universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Oxford. At Glasgow he was so fortunate as to be a pupil of Adam Smith, at that time professor of moral philosophy in the university, with whose acquaintanceship he was also honoured at this early period and it may be that the bias of the future father of Scottish agriculture received its first. impulses from his conversations with the author of the "Wealth of Nations." The intellectual ambition of the young student's mind was also manifested at the age of fifteen, among the printed columns of our periodicals.