CHAP. I.] CLERKS OF PENICUIK. 19 



a paper manufactory, and the Duchess playfully " congratulates " 

 his " good self on every new sprouting up manufacture by means 

 of so good a planter and planner." But by this time it has been 

 found advisable to add to his studies some more certain source 

 of income, and he applies for the Postmastership, and (through 

 the Duke of Q.) obtains an office in the Customs. In this, as in 

 all relations of life, he seems to have won golden opinions. And 

 ere he succeeded to Penicuik, the loss of Middlebie proper and 

 Dumcrieff had doubtless taught the lesson of prudence which his 

 father the Baron had vainly tried to impress upon his youth. 

 The friendship of Allan Ramsay and the affectionate confidence 

 of the " good Duke and Duchess of Queensberry," sufficiently 

 indicate the charm which there must have been about this man. 



" Sir John Clerk (the Baron of Exchequer) married 

 Janet Inglis of Cramond, and was succeeded by his eldest 

 son, Sir James Clerk, in 1755. Sir James died without 

 children in 1782, and was succeeded by his next brother, 

 Sir George Clerk, who had married his cousin, Dorothea 

 Maxwell, heiress of Middlebie." 



The betrothal of George Clerk and Dorothea Clerk Maxwell 

 is said by the Baron (in a special memorandum) to have been in 

 accordance with her mother's dying wish. (Dorothea was seven 

 years old when Agnes Maxwell died!) They were married 

 privately when he was twenty and she was seventeen, but " as- 

 they were too young to live together," he was sent to join his 

 brother James at Leyden. After a short interval the marriage 

 was declared, and they lived very happily at Dumcrieff. 



"Sir George Clerk Maxwell was a Commissioner of Cus- 

 toms, and a trustee for the improvement of the fisheries and 

 manufactures of Scotland. His brother, John Clerk of Eldin r 

 was the author of the well-known work on Naval Tactics. 

 He was the father of John Clerk, a distinguished lawyer 

 in Edinburgh, afterwards Lord Eldin, a Lord of Session." 



The following account of Mr. Clerk of Eldin is from the 

 above-mentioned biographical notice of Dr. James Hutton : 



1 Edinburgh Koyal Society's Transactions, vol. v., part iii., p. 97. 



