ANNAN IN LAst Four DECADES oF 18TH CENTURY. 167 
In 1790, a year after the erection of the new Parish Church, 
there died in Edinburgh a distinguished man who had wielded 
the schoolmaster’s rod in this town. At a meeting of Annan 
Town Council held as far back as 11th June, 1739, the Provost 
reported that he had “contracted and agreed with Robert 
Hendrie, schoolmaster, to teach the school of Annan for 
the year commencing upon the 9th day of April last, and 
in name of the said burgh had engaged to pay to the 
said Robert Hendrie the sum of ten pounds sterling in name of 
salary the said year, and that the inhabitants of the burgh and 
territories thereof who sent their children to the said school 
should pay to the said master the school wages following, viz. :— 
“For teaching English, one shilling sterling per quarter; for 
teaching English, writing, and arithmetic, one shilling and six- 
pence sterling per quarter; and for teaching Latin and writing, 
two shillings sterling per quarter.’’ I have been able to identify 
the “ Robert Hendrie ’’ of the minute quoted with the Rev. Dr 
Henry, moderator of the General Assembly in 1774, and author 
of a “ History of Great Britain’’ that excited the curiosity of 
Samuel Johnson and won generous praise from David Hume. 
It is strange to reflect that a historian whose monumental work 
cleared for him £3300 should at the outset of his career have 
been glad to accept £10 a year and some paltry fees for teaching 
a few dull children in a border town! 
Dr Henry’s death was followed by that of another well- 
known Edinburgh author connected with Annan—Dr Blacklock. 
As the productions of a poet who, to use his own words, “ never 
saw light,’’ the descriptive passages of Blacklock excited much 
attention in his own day. Dr Johnson declares that they are 
“but combinations of what he remembered of the works of other 
writers who could see.’? No doubt Dr Blacklock’s familiarity 
with the English poets accounts for his command of poetical 
language ; but as Henry Mackenzie, his biographer, points out, 
this does not completely solve the difficulty, for “it throws no light 
on his early passion for reading poetry, and poetry of a-kind, 
too, which lies very much within the province of sight.’’ Not 
having much intrinsic value, Blacklock’s poetry is seldom read 
now ; but as the friend of Burns he has a secure title to remem- 
brance. 
