Dr. Somerville's Character. 85 



had assisted in life, and what generous actions he had 

 done, many of them requited with ingratitude, and with 

 betrayal of confidence. From the way my mother speaks 

 of their life, it can be seen how happy was their marriage 

 and how much sympathy there was between them. 

 Speaking of his son's marriage with my mother, the llev. 

 Dr. Somerville says, in his " Life and Times," page 390 : 

 " To myself this connection was on every account pecu- 

 liarly gratifying. Miss Fairfax had been born and nursed 

 in my house ; her father being at that time abroad on 

 public service. She afterwards often resided in my 

 family, was occasionally my scholar, and was looked 

 upon by me and my wife as if she had been one of our 

 own children. I can truly say, that next to them she 

 was the object of our most tender regard. Her ardent 

 thirst for knowledge, her assiduous application to study, 

 and her eminent proficiency in science and the fine 

 arts, have procured her a celebrity rarely obtained 

 by any of her sex. But she never displays any pre- 

 tensions to superiority, while the aff ability of her 

 temper, and the gentleness of her manners afford con- 

 stant sources of gratification to her friends. But what, 

 above all other circumstances, rendered my son's choice 

 acceptable to me, was that it had been the anxious, 

 though secret, desire of my dear wife." I have already 

 said that this esteem and affection of her father-in-law 

 was warmly responded to by my mother. The following 

 letter from her to him shows it vividly : 



