DECEMBER 301 



He was not an old man probably not more than 

 fifty but his health was breaking; and the remedies 

 he sought from divers ' chirurgeons ' bleeding and 

 powerful drugs- hastened the end. In August 1729 

 he paid 3s. ' to one Wallace for a shoe to my right foot, 

 big swelled/ and in May following he was laid beside 

 his bonnie Jean in the roofless chapel of Kirkmaiden 

 by the sea, where the winds and waves, the curlew and 

 the black-backed gull, chant ceaseless requiem. The 

 last payment entered in his beloved cash-book, only ten 

 days before his demise, was 7s. l(Hd. for 2 yards of 

 muslin ' for two aprons to Peggie.' 



The impression received from an examination of 

 these venerable volumes is that of a cheerful affectionate 

 family inhabiting a comfortable home, finding ample 

 occupation in the affairs of their own neighbourhood, 

 yet not indifferent to what was moving in the outer 

 world. A recent authority has pronounced the books 

 of the period to have been few and dull. Well, it was 

 the age of Addison and Steele, Jonathan Swift and 

 Alexander Pope, not to mention a few others who drove 

 the quill to some purpose. Sir Alexander was a great 

 book-buyer, for which the present writer has daily cause 

 for gratitude. Probably the sunlight lay as broad upon 

 his landscape as it does upon that of men of his class 

 in the present day. 



