Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/325

Rh their whole superstructure rested, and, indeed, without the last, no church could stand. With the first the right of the people to choose their ministers I have no sympathies: with the last, every feeling of my heart and reason is on your side and no one knows how soon the Church of England may have to contend for it. Let us hope that if it does come to this, there may be as much courage and conscience in England as across the border."

In his mode of study, Mr. Tytler, although so deeply immersed in the absorbing research of history and antiquarianism, was no peevish recluse student, sheltering himself within the innermost recesses of his hermitage, and quarreling with every sound above a gentle whisper: instead of this, his favourite place of work was the parlour or the drawing-room, surrounded by the society of his family and friends; and there he consulted his authorities, arranged his notes, and wrote out his copy for the printer, animated and cheered onward rather than disturbed by the society around him; listening to the music that might be going on, to which he was very partial, and mingling in the subjects of conversation. In this cheerful, genial fashion, he embodied into living form the materials of his anxious research, which he had gleaned among the MSS. of the British Museum, or the State Paper Office. That he might be near these fountain-heads also, he resided for a considerable period during the latter part of his life in the metropolis. During the present reign, he was oftener than once a guest at Windsor, where he was received with honourable distinction; and during the administration of Sir Robert Peel, when literary merit was not thought unworthy of state recognition and reward, his high services as a national historian were attested by a pension of £200 per annum.

In everyday life, unconnected with his intellectual pursuits, the high moral worth, amiable gentle temper, and conversational powers of Mr. Tytler, endeared him to a wide circle of friends, by whom these qualities are still most affectionately remembered. But the characteristic by which he was especially distinguished, was the deep-seated religious principle for which he was noted from his earliest youth, and by which his whole course of life was regulated to the close, both in his private and literary relationships. In subservience to this were his hilarity and wit, which were so pervaded with his own amiable temperament, that instead of repelling, they attracted all around him, and mesmerized the company for the time into happy beings like himself. In this way the historian, amidst the throngs and events of centuries, maintained and preserved to the end his own personal identity, instead of losing it among past ages a trait of intellectual independence, hard indeed to compass, and very rarely to be found among those who have won for themselves a high literary reputation, especially among the more crabbed and abstruse departments of intellect. In the earlier part of his life Mr. Tytler served in the troop of the Mid-Lothian Yeomanry Cavalry—a corps in which not only the highest rank but the best talent of Scotland was enrolled; and among such congenial spirits he soon took the lead, not only on account of the fascinating wit and cheerfulness of his conversation, but the songs which he composed and sung for he was also a poet of no common mark; and the lyrics with which he was wont to charm the mess-table, were connected with the military affairs of the regiment, and the duties with which his comrades were occupied. On one occasion, being desirous of retirement, probably for a holiday's recreation, and aware how his furlough would be apt to be invaded, he stole away to the house of his brother, at Woodhouselee. But his absence was instantly felt in