84 Tranifaclions. 



uie as a gift in a generous iiiaiuier by the liev. Dr Edgar of 

 Newburgh, formerly of Gretna. He was stout, and ratlier 

 little in stature. 



He was a great classical scholar, and when a student in 

 theology lie obtained an Exchciiuer Bursary, in acknowledg- 

 ment of which he yearly composed a Latin poem. He was 

 recommended by the General Assembly in 1822 as a good Gaelic 

 scholar ; and I have no doubt that this language was tlien 

 spoken by many in the south of Scotland, and would be a 

 special qualitication for a rural minister in tliis district. But his 

 cliiof delight was in Latin versihcation, into which lie translated 

 the Book of Job and the Proverbs of Solomon. Some of his lighter 

 poems in that language, entitled " Miscellanea Metrica," are said 

 to have been line scholarly productions. In Steven's History of 

 the High Scliool of Edinburgh it is stated that one of the masters 

 — ^Mr Luke Fraser — read a Latin memoir and criticism on the 

 Latin compositions of the Rev. Mr Gatt for the Literary Society, 

 which existed from 1807 to 1821 in Edinburgh; but although 

 searcli has been made for the MS. it has not been discovered. 

 Mr Fraser was famous as a Latin scholar, and as the members of 

 this Society were mostly masters of the school and Professors of 

 the University, this circumstance testifies also to the scholarship 

 of Mr Gatt. He kept a diary in Latin, which I have seen, but 

 it is now difficult to decipher. It records that he finished his 

 translation of tlie Proverbs of Solomon on 4tli July, 1734, and 

 had made a copy of it by March of the year following, which 

 copy he took with him in May to Edinburgh, when he likewise 

 attended the meeting of the General Assembly of the Church, 

 and submitted it to Mr Ruddiman, the greatest of Scotch 

 graniniarians; who, I find, was like Mr Gatt, a native of Banfi"- 

 sliire ; and at that time settled in Edinburgli as a printer 

 and publisher of several learned Latin works. On his return to 

 Gretna from Edinburgh he makes this entry in his diary, dated 

 26th May, 1735 — Gloria sit Deo in excelsis, quod ego incolumis 

 reversus sum a Synodo Nationali. 



He was also a Hebrew scholar, and I show you a small Jewish 

 calendar or almanack, now very worn and fragile, which bears 

 within it the following writing : — " Ja. Gatt, Graitney, gifted by 

 Jacob and Simon Levi, who brought the same from London." 



It is not only, however, as a great scholar that Mr Gatt's 

 memory has been so long preserved ; but for liis unatt'ec'cd piety, 



