i.] PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. 3 



of Pitsligo. The Jacobite blood in their veins was visi- 

 ble in Sir William and every one of his descendants, and 

 coloured all their views and feelings on matters of Church 

 and State. Old Tory and strong Episcopalian principles 

 were part of the family inheritance. These old-world 

 views, however, did not interfere either with Sir 

 William's business talent, the fascination of his manners, 

 or the warmth of his heart. 



Sir Walter Scott makes feeling allusion to Sir William, 

 immediately after his death, in the Introductory Epistle to 

 the Fourth Canto of ' Marmion,' which was addressed to 

 one of his sons-in-law. The passage beginning 



' Far may we search, before we find 

 A heart so manly and so kind ' 



is by no means in Scott's most finished style, but it 

 contains a fine tribute of gratitude and affection. In 

 the Notes he speaks of Sir William Forbes as a man 

 'unequalled, perhaps, in the degree of individual affec- 

 tion entertained for him by his friends, as well as in the 

 general respect and esteem of Scotland at large. His 

 " Life of Beattie," whom he befriended and patronized 

 in life, as well as celebrated after his decease, was not 

 long published before the benevolent and affectionate 

 biographer was called to follow the subject of his 

 narrative/ 



The second Sir William was like the first in all but 

 this : that the father had made by his own exertions the 

 fortune and position which the son worthily upheld and 

 used. Of this gentleman, much as he was beloved and 

 looked up to by the more intimate circle of relatives 

 and friends, that which the world will now most care to 

 remember is his lifelong friendship with Sir Walter Scott, 

 and the strange way in which tin -ir fortunes were inter- 

 twined. Walter Scott and William Forbes had known 

 each other in boyhood; in opening manhood they had, 

 with a number of other comrades, helped to raise a corps 

 of volunteer cavalry, and both served together in what, 

 i Scott's record of it, must have been a very jovial 



B 2 



