420 Biographical Account of Dec. 



M.S. 



GULIELMI TYTLER, de Woodhouselee, 



H, L. P. F. 



En virides aras, en hanc qiiam poninms urnam, 



Tu, fili ex manibus respice dona, Pater! 

 Sic, venerande Senex, olim qua rura placebant 



Sint eadem hiuto nunc deeorata tno. 

 NeveTibi desit post funera sneta voluptas, 



Proximo ab umbroso cantet avis nemore, 

 Etqui Te placido lenibat muruiure rivus, 



Dulcia perpetuis sotnnia portet aquis. 



By the death of his father, Mr. Tytler had succeeded to the 

 estate of Woodhouselee ; and some years before that period 

 Mrs. Tytler had, in a similar manner, succeeded to the paternal 

 estate of Balnain, in Inverness-shire. He was now in circum- 

 stances of affluence — his friends were numerous — his own dispo- 

 sition in the highest degree hospitable and kind — and he felt 

 himself at liberty to attempt to realise some of those visions of 

 retired and rural happiness which had long played in his imagi- 

 nation, and which form, perhaps, one of the earliest reveries of 

 every generous or cultivated mind. He began, therefore, imme- 

 diately to embellish his grounds, to extend his plantations, and 

 in the enlargement of his house to render it more adequate to the 

 purposes of hospitality ; and in the course of a short period, he 

 succeeded in creating a scene of rural and domestic happiness 

 which has seldom been equalled in this country, and which, to 

 the warm-hearted simplicity of Scottish manners, added some- 

 what of the more refined air of classical elegance. It was here, 

 from this period, that all his hours of enjoyment were passed — 

 that all his works were composed — and that, in the bosom of his 

 family, and amid the scenery and amusements of the country, 

 he found the happiness that was most congenial to his character 

 and disposition. 



His morning hours were uniformly given to study ; but his 

 studies were of a nature that tended rather to animate than to 

 fatigue his mind. It was not in abstract or metaphysical specu- 

 lations he was engaged, where the understanding only is exer- 

 cised, and where the progress of discovery is so little proportioned 

 to the time or labour that is employed ; nor in works of imagi- 

 nation, where the mind is ever in pursuit of that ideal excellence 

 which it is never destined to attain. The historical, the 

 antiquarian, or the critical studies, in which he was engaged, 

 required no painful concentration of thought, and no laborious 

 processes of reasoning. They related to the deeds and language 

 of men, where it was not the understanding alone that was 

 employed, but where the imagination and the heart were perpe- 

 tually exercised ; and he could rise from them to the common 

 business or offices of life, with a mind undistracted by doubt, 



