LORD WOODHOUSELEE. 587 
animously élected one of the Secretaries of the Literary Classy 
—an office which he continued to fill with zeal for many 
years ; and in the execution of which he drew up that “ Account 
“ of its Origin and History,” which is prefixed to the Ist vo- 
lume of its Transactions. 
In 1788, he contributed to the Royal. Society a biographical 
Memoir of the Tate Roser Dundas of Arniston, Lord Presi= 
dent of the Court of Session,—a paper valle: not only for 
the just and vigorous delineation which it gives of the charac= 
ter of that eminent Judge, but for the interesting account it 
pis some of the earlier branches of a family, so long and 
so honourably distinguished in the legal annals of Scotland. 
In 1789, Mr Tyrirr read a paper to the Royal Society up- 
on the Vitrified Forts in the Highlands of Scotland. Of these 
singular antiquities, the prevailing theory had been, that the 
vferiremttaet was produced i in the process of their erection, and 
that it was the substitute of a rude age forcement. The theory 
which Mr Tyrier suggested was Hie aVEHSdemr ths | ;—that the 
vitrification was the result, —not of their erection, but of their: 
destruction,—and that it was produced by the efforts of ene- 
mies in attempting this destruction by fire. The theory is cer- 
tainly not without some appearances of probability : it assimi- 
lates sufficiently with the period of society to which such build-. 
ings undoubtedly refer; and Mr Tyrier was able to support 
it with learning and ingenuity. Of the impression it made at 
ihe time upon ‘the Society, I am happy to be able to refer to: 
an evidence of no little weight, in a letter from our late illus- 
trious associate Mi Smrru to Mr Tytier upon the subject 
and, althougl 1 the letter is very short, I persuadé myself that it 
will not be unacceptable to. the Society, both because there 
are unhappily very few letters of this. great man remaining, 
and becaiise it involves also. the memor 'y of some other men, 
, whose: 
