(2) HISTORT of the SOCIE'tr. 



Account of Lord thcfc fcw moiiths, bceii clouded by the death of him who i* 

 the fubjedl of this paper ; but it is fomething for a father, it 

 is fomething for his friends, to mix their forrows with the ge- 

 neral regret of his country. 



His youngeft fon Alexander was early deftined for the 

 profeflion of the law, to which his father had himfelf been 

 bred, at a time when the Faculty of Advocates comprehended 

 one half of the gentlemen of Scotland. At that period, com- 

 merce and manufadluies had not attained, in this part of the 

 kingdom, that extenfion and improvement which renders them 

 obje(5ts of purfuit to men of birth or fortune. The fword and 

 tlie gown were here the only profeffions fuited for fuch men ; 

 for our church did not, like thofe of England and France^ 

 offer endowments coniiderable enough to attradl the interefhed 

 or to excite the ambitious. In Scotland, however, the profefi- 

 fion of the law was adopted by the eldeft fons of the gentry, 

 rather as conferring a fort of fafhionable diflindlion, than as 

 one from which they looked for bufinefs or emolument. It led 

 to a learned, or at leafl a polite education, and gave a fort of 

 dignity beyond the mere idlenefs of a man of pleafure. Hence 

 perhaps there was in thofe times an elegance of manners, join- 

 ed with a degree of knowledge and information, among the 

 Faculty of Advocates in Scotland, not to be met with among 

 any fimilar body of men in any other country. I mention this 

 hijftorically, becaufe it does not perhaps exadlly fubfifl at pre- 

 fent, from caufes which may be held not to improve the man- 

 ners fo much as, in a political and commercial view, they may 

 be fuppofed to meliorate the fituation of a country. 



Mr Abercromby, with a view to the law, which his pro- 

 fpe^s made it neceffary for him to follow as a profeflion, re- 

 ceived the cuflomary education at the Univerlity of Edinburgh. 

 There the writer of this memoir firfl knew him. He had abi- 

 lities which qualified him for being more a fcholar, than the 

 3 vivacity 



