(2) HISTORY of the SOCIETT. 



AccoimtcfLorj tlicfe fcw iTionths, been cloiided by the death of him who i« 

 cMoir. ). ^^^ fxibjed of this paper ; but it is fomething for a father, it 

 is fomething for his friends, to mix their forrows witli the ge- 

 neral regret of his covintry. 



His youngeft fon Alexander was early deftiiied for the 

 profeffion of the law, to which his father had himfelf been 

 bred, at a time when the Faculty of Advocates comprehended 

 one half of the gentlemen of Scotland. At that period, com- 

 merce and manufadlures had not attained, in this part of the 

 kingdom, that extenfion and improvement which renders them 

 objecfts of piirfuit to men of birth or fortune. The fword and 

 the gown were here the only profellions fuited for fuch men ; 

 for our church did not, like thofe of England and France, 

 offer endowments coniiderable enough to attradl the interefled 

 or to excite the ambitious. In Scotland, however, the profef- 

 fion of the law was adopted by the eldeft fons of the gentry, 

 rather as conferring a fort of falhionable diftindlion, than as 

 one from which they looked for bufinefs or emolument. It led 

 to a leai'ned, or at leall a polite education, and gave a fort of 

 dignity beyond tlie mere idlenefs of a man of pleafure. Hence 

 perhaps there was in thofe times an elegance of manners, join- 

 ed with a degree of knowledge and information, among the 

 Faculty of Advocates in Scotland, not to be met with among 

 any fimilar body of men in any other coiintry. I mention this 

 hiftorically, becaufe it does not perhaps exadlly fubfift at pre- 

 fent, from caufes which may be held not to Improve the man- 

 ners fo much as, in a political and commercial view, they may 

 be fuppofed to mehorate the fituatlon of a country. 



Mr Abercromby, with a view to the law, which his pro- 

 fpedls made it neceffary for him to follow as a profeffion, re- 

 ceived the cuftomary education at the Univerfity of Edinburgh. 

 There the writer of this memoir firfl knew him. He had abi- 

 lities which qualified him for being more a fcholar, than the 

 3 vivacity 



