Rumour told me something of a son of yours who was returned from the East or West-Indies. If you have gotten news of James or Anthony, it was cruel in you not to let me know; as I promise you on the sincerity of a man who is weary of one world and anxious about another, that scarce any thing could give me so much pleasure as to hear of any good thing befalling my honoured friend.

Can it be possible, that when I resign | nervous affections are in fact diseases of this frail, feverish being, I shall still find the mind. I cannot reason, I cannot myself in conscious existence! When the think; and but to you I would not venlast gasp of agony has announced that I ture to write any thing above an order to am no more to those that knew me, and a cobbler. You have felt too much of the the few who loved me; when the cold, ills of life not to sympathize with a disstiffened, unconscious, ghastly corse is re- eased wretch, who is impaired more than signed into the earth, to be the prey of half of any faculties he possessed. Your unsightly reptiles, and to become in time goodness will excuse this distracted a trodden clod, shall I be yet warm in scrawl, which the writer dare scarcely life, seeing and seen, enjoying and en- read, and which he would throw into the joyed? Ye venerable sages, and holy fire were he able to write any thing betflamens, is there probability in your con- ter, or indeed any thing at all. jectures, truth in your stories, of another world beyond death; or, are they all alike, baseless visions, and fabricated fables? If there is another life, it must be only for the just, the benevolent, the amiable, and the humane: what a flattering idea, then, is a world to come! Would to God I as firmly believed it, as I ardently wish it! There I should meet an aged parent, now at rest from the many buffetings of an evil world, against which he so long and so bravely struggled. There should I meet the friend, the disinterested friend of my early life; the man who rejoiced to see me, because he loved me and could serve me.- -Muir; thy weaknesses, were the aberrations of human nature, but thy heart glowed with every thing generous, manly and noble; and if ever emanation from the All-good Being animated a human form, it is thine! There should I, with speechless agony of rapture, again recognise my lost, my ever dear Mary! whose bosom was fraught with truth, honour, constancy, and love.

My Mary, dear departed shade!

Where is thy place of heavenly rest?
Seest thou thy lover lowly laid;

Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast?

Jesus Christ, thou amiablest of characters! I trust thou art no impostor, and that thy revelation of blissful scenes of existence beyond death and the grave, is not one of the many impositions which, time after time, have been palmed on credulous mankind. I trust that in thee "shall all the families of the earth be blessed," by being yet connected together in a better world, where every tie that bound heart to heart in this state of existence, shall be, far beyond our present conceptions, more endearing.

I am a good deal inclined to think with those who maintain, that what are called

If you have a minute's leisure, take up your pen in pity to le pauvre miserable.

No. LXXXVIII.

R. B.

TO SIR JOHN SINCLAIR.

SIR,

THE following circumstance has, I believe, been omitted in the statistical account transmitted to you, of the parish of Dunscore, in Nithsdale. I beg leave to send it to you, because it is new, and may be useful. How far it is deserving of a place in your patriotic publication, you are the best judge.

To store the minds of the lower classes with useful knowledge is certainly of very great importance, both to them as individuals, and to society at large Giving them a turn for reading and reflection, is giving them a source of innocent and laudable amusement; and, besides, raises them to a more dignified degree in the scale of rationality. Impressed with this idea, a gentleman in this parish, Robert Riddel, Esq. of Glenriddel, set on foot a species of circulating library, on a plan so simple as to be practicable in any corner of the country; and so useful as to deserve the notice of every country gentleman, who

thinks the improvement of that part of his own species, whom chance has thrown into the humble walks of the peasant and the artisan, a matter worthy of his attention.

removed, except in shape, from the brutes he drives.*

Wishing your patriotic exertions their so much-merited success,

I am, Sir, your humble servant,
A PEASANT

No. LXXXIX.

TO CHARLES SHARPE, ESQ.
OF HODDAM.

Under a fictitious Signature, enclosing a ballad, 1790, or 1791.

It is true, Sir, you are a gentleman

Mr. Riddel got a number of his own tenants, and farming neighbours, to form themselves into a society for the purpose of having a library among themselves. They entered into a legal engagement to abide by it for three years; with a saving clause or two, in case of a removal to a distance, or of death. Each member, at his entry, paid five shillings; and at each of their meetings, which were held every fourth Saturday, sixpence more. With their entry-money, and the credit which they took on the faith of their future funds, they laid in a tolerable stock of books, at the commencement. What authors they were to purchase, was always decided by the majority. At every meet-of rank and fortune, and I am a poor deing, all the books, under certain fines and forfeitures, by way of penalty, were to be produced and the members had their choice of the volumes in rotation. He whose name stood for that night first on the list, had his choice of what volume he pleased in the whole collection; the second had his choice after the first; the third after the second; and so on to the last. At next meeting, he who had been first on the list at the preceding meeting was last at this; he who had been second was first; and so on through the whole three years. At the expiration of the engagement, the books were sold by auction, but only among the members themselves; and each man had share of the common stock, in money or in books, as he chose to be a purchaser or not.

At the breaking up of this little society, which was formed under Mr. Riddel's patronage, what with benefactions of books from him, and what with their own purchases, they had collected together upwards of one hundred and fifty volumes. It will easily be guessed, that a good deal of trash would be bought. Among the books, however, of this little library, were, Blair's Sermons, Robertson's History of Scotland, Hume's History of the Stuarts, The Spectator, Idler, Adventurer, Mirror. Lounger, Observer, Man of Feeling, Man of the World, Chrysal, Don Quixotte, Joseph Andrews, &c. A peasant who can read and enjoy such books, is certainly a much superior being to his neighbour, who perhaps s'alks beside his team, very little

vil; you are a feather in the cap of soci ety, and I am a very hobnail in his shoes; yet I have the honour to belong to the same family with you, and on that score I now address you. You will perhaps suspect that I am going to claim affinity with the ancient and honourable house of Kilpatrick: No, no, Sir: I cannot indeed be properly said to belong to any house, or even any province or kingdom, as my mother, who for many years was spouse to a marching regiment, gave me into this bad world, aboard the packet boat, somewhere between Donaghadee and Portpatrick. By our common family, I mean, Sir, the family of the Muses. I am a fiddler and a poet; and you, I am told, play an exqui

This letter is extracted from the third volume of Sir John Sinclair's Statistics, p. 598.-It was enclosed to Sir John by Mr. Riddel himself, in the following letter, also printed there.

"Sir John, I enclose you a letter, written by Mr Burns, as an addition to the account of Dunscore parish. It contains an account of a small library which he was so good (at my desire) as to set on foot, in the barony of Monkland, or Friar's Carse, in this parish. As its utility has been felt, particularly among the younger class of people, I think, that if a similar plan were established in the different parishes of Scotland, it would tend greatly to the speedy improvement of the tenantry, trades people, and work-people. Mr. Burns was so good as to take the whole charge of this small concern. He was treasurer, librarian, and censor, to this little society, who will long have a grateful sense of his pubspirit and exertions for their improvement and in

formation.

I have the honour to be, Sir John,
Yours, most sincerely,

ROBERT RIDDEL
To Sir John Sinclair of Ulster, Bart.

to you, Madam, long ere now. My health | daring adventurous spirits which Scotland, is greatly better, and I now begin once beyond any other country, is remarkable more to share in satisfaction and enjoy- for producing. Little does the fond moment with the rest of my fellow-creatures. ther think, as she hangs delighted over the sweet little leech at her bosom, where the poor fellow may hereafter wander, and what may be his fate. I remember a stanza in an old Scottish ballad, which notwithstanding its rude simplicity, speaks feelingly to the heart:

Though the death of Falconer happened so lately as 1770 or 1771, yet in the biography prefixed by Dr. An-nity in the carriage of his head, and the

may be mentioned, that he was a native of one of the towns on the coast of Fife: and that his parents who I thought to have sent you some rhymes, nad suffered some misfortunes, removed to one of the but time forbids. I promise you poetry sea-ports of England, where they both died soon after, until you are tired of it, next time I have of an epidemic fever, leaving poor Falconer, then a the honour of assuring you how truly I am, &c.