314 



CHAPTER XV. 



RECOLLECTIONS OF MILLER. 



inXCEPT Miss Fraser, Miller's most favoured corre- 

 JLj spondent at this time was Miss Dunbar of Boath. 

 She read and admired his poems soon after their appear- 

 ance, and his correspondence with her began some two 

 years before he saw Miss Fraser. He refers to her in 

 terms of admiring affection in the Schools and School- 

 masters, and the letters which passed between them 

 prove that the feeling on both sides was one of ardent 

 esteem and tender enthusiasm. She was about twenty 

 years his senior, and her tone in speaking of his plans 

 and prospects is that of motherly solicitude, almost of 

 motherly pride. The tender strength of the affection 

 with which, unconsciously and without effort, he in- 

 spired her, is remarkable. The fascination of his gen- 

 tleness and sincerity, and of the gleams of beauty in 

 which his genius revealed itself when he spoke, is no- 

 where more strikingly evinced than in the spell which 

 he cast over this noble woman. He visited her twice 

 in Forres, and she spent three weeks in Cromarty, prin- 

 cipally in order to enjoy his society. These and other 

 circumstances of their intercourse are alluded to in the 

 correspondence. Along with the letters of Miller to 



