The roads beyond Edinburgh, as they are less frequented, must be expected to grow gradually rougher; but they were hitherto by no means incommodious. We travelled on with the gentle pace of a Scotch driver, who having no rivals in expedition, neither gives himself nor his horfes unneceffary trouble. We did not affect the impatience we did not feel, but were fatisfied with the company of each other, as well riding in the chaife, as fitting at an inn. The night and the day are equally folitary and equally fafe; for where there are fo few travellers, why 'fhould there be robbers?

ABERDEEN.

We came fomewhat late to Aberdeen, and found the inn fo full, that we had fome difficulty in obtain◄ ing admiffion, till Mr. Bofwell made himself known: his name overpowered all objection, and we found a very good house and civil treatment.

I received the next day a very kind letter from Sir Alexander Gordon, whom I had formerly known in London, and, after a ceffation of all intercourfe for near twenty years, met here profeffor of phyfick in the King's College. Such unexpected renewals of acquaintance may be numbered among the most pleasing incidents of life.

The knowledge of one profeffor foon procured me the notice of the reft, and I did not want any token of regard, being conducted wherever there was any thing which I defired to fee, and entertained at once

with

with the novelty of the place, and the kindness of communication.

To write of the cities of our own ifland with the folemnity of geographical defcription, as if we had been caft upon a newly difcovered coaft, has the appearance of a very frivolous oftentation; yet as Scotland is little known to the greater part of those who may read thefe obfervations, it is not fuperfluous to relate, that under the name of Aberdeen are comprised two towns, standing about a mile distant from each other, but governed, I think, by the fame magiftrates.

Old Aberdeen is the ancient epifcopal city, in which are ftill to be feen the remains of the cathedral. It has the appearance of a town in decay, having been fituated, in times when commerce was yet unstudied, with very little attention to the commodities of the harbour.

New Aberdeen has all the buftle of profperous trade, and all the show of increafing opulence. It is built by the water-fide. The houses are large and lofty, and the ftreets fpacious and clean. They build almoft wholly with the granite ufed in the new pavement of the streets of London, which is well known not to want hardness, yet they fhape it easily. It is beautiful, and must be very lafting.

What particular parts of commerce are chiefly exercifed by the merchants of Aberdeen, I have not enquired. The manufacture which forces itself up. on a ftranger's eye is that of knit-stockings, on which the women of the lower clafs are vifibly employed.

In each of these towns there is a college, or in ftricter language an univerfity; for in both there are profeffors of the fame parts of learning, and the colleges hold their feffions and confer degrees feparately, with total independence of one on the other.

In Old Aberdeen ftands the King's College, of which the first prefident was Hector Boece, or Boethius, who may be juftly reverenced as one of the revivers of elegant learning. When he ftudied at Paris, he was acquainted with Erafmus, who afterwards gave him a public teftimony of his efteem, by infcribing to him a catalogue of his works. The style of Boethius, though, perhaps, not always rigorously pure, is formed with great diligence upon ancient models, and wholly uninfected with monaftick barbarity. His history is written with elegance and vigour, but his fabulousness and credulity are justly blamed. His fabulousness, if he was the author of the fictions, is a fault for which no apology can be made; but his credulity may be excufed in an age when all men were credulous. Learning was then rifing on the world; but ages fo long accustomed to darknefs, were too much dazzled with its light to fee any thing diftinctly. The first race of scholars in the fifteenth century, and fome time after, were, for the most part, learning to fpeak, rather than to think, and were therefore more ftudious of elegance than of truth. The contemporaries of Boethius thought it fufficient to know what the ancients had delivered. The examination of tenets and of facts was referved for another generation.

Boethius,

In

Boethius, as prefident of the univerfity, enjoyed a revenue of forty Scottish marks, about two pounds four fhillings and fixpence of fterling money. the present age of trade and taxes, it is difficult even for the imagination fo to raise the value of money, or fo to diminish the demands of life, as to fuppofe four-and-forty fhillings a year an honourable stipend;

yet

it was probably equal, not only to the needs, but to the rank of Boethius. The wealth of England was undoubtedly to that of Scotland more than five to one, and it is known that Henry the Eighth, among whofe faults avarice was never reckoned, granted to Roger Afcham, as a reward of his learning, a penfion of ten pounds a year.

new town.

The other, called the Marifchal College, is in the The hall is large and well lighted. One of its ornaments is the picture of Arthur Johnston, who was principal of the college, and who holds among the Latin poets of Scotland the next place to the elegant Buchanan.

In the library I was fhewn fome curiofities; a Hebrew manufcript of exquifite penmanship, and a Latin tranflation of Ariftotle's Politicks by Leonardus Aretinus, written in the Roman character with nicety and beauty, which, as the art of printing has made them no longer neceffary, are not now to be found. This was one of the latest performances of the tranfcribers, for Aretinus died but about twenty years before typography was invented. This verfion has been printed, and may be found in libraries, but is little read; for the fame books have been fince tranflated both by Victorius and Lambinus, who

lived in an age more cultivated, but perhaps owed in part to Aretinus that they were able to excel him. Much is due to those who first broke the way to knowledge, and left only to their fucceffors the task of smoothing it.

In both these colleges the methods of instruction are nearly the fame; the lectures differing only by the accidental difference of diligence, or ability in the profeffors. The students wear scarlet gowns, and the profeffors black, which is, I believe, the academical drefs in all the Scottish univerfities, except that of Edinburgh, where the scholars are not distinguished by any particular habit. In the King's College there is kept a publick table, but the scholars of the Marifchal College are boarded in the town. The expence of living is here, according to the information that I could obtain, fomewhat more than at St. Andrews.

The course of education is extended to four years, at the end of which thofe who take a degree, who are not many, become mafters of arts; and whoever is a master may, if he pleases, immediately commence doctor. The title of doctor, however, was for a confiderable time bestowed only on phyficians. The advocates are examined and approved by their own body; the minifters were not ambitious of titles, or were afraid of being cenfured for ambition; and the doctorate in every faculty was commonly given or fold into other countries. The minifters are now reconciled to distinction, and as it must always happen that fome will excel others, have thought graduation a proper teftimony of uncommon abilities or acquifitions.