MR small's biographical SKETCH OF PROF. ADAM FERGUSON. 623 



" If I were not afraid of being too troublesome, I would desire you to inform 

 me by a line of the particulars of his present condition, as well as of his inten- 

 tions. I am, dear Sir, your most faithful and obedient servant, E. Gibbon."* 



To this letter of Gibbon, Ferguson returned the following answer : — 



" Edin., I8th April 1776. 



" Dear Sir, — I should make some apology for not writing you sooner an 

 answer to your obliging letter ; but if you should honour me frequently with 

 such requests, you will find that, with very good intentions, I am a very dilatory 

 and irregular correspondent. I am sorry to tell you that our respectable friend, 

 Mr Hume, is still declining in his health ; he is greatly emaciated, and loses 

 strength. He talks familiarly of his near prospect of dying. His mother, it 

 seems, died under the same symptoms ; and it appears so little necessary or proper 

 to flatter him, that no one attempts it. I never observed his understanding more 

 clear, or his humour more pleasant or lively. He has a great aversion to leaving 

 the tranquillity of his own house, to go in search of health among inns and 

 hostlers. And his friends here gave way to him for some time ; but now think 

 it necessary that he should make an effort to try what change of place and air, 

 or anything else Sir John Pringle may advise, can do for him. I left him this 

 ' morning in the mind to comply in this article, and I hope that he will be prevailed 

 on to set out in a few days. He is just now sixty-four, f 



* Dalzel's Hist, of the University of Edinburgh, vol. i. p. 22. 



f It was principally at the desire of Fer&uson that David Hume, a few days after the date of 

 this letter, was induced to undertake a journey to London, to try the effect of change of air in 

 i mitigating the severity of his disease. Ferguson had also written to their mutual friend Adam 

 ! Smith, giving him an account of Hume's critical state at this time ; and thus describes his condition 

 I — " David, I am afraid, loses ground. He is cheerful, and in good spirits as usual ; but I confess 

 that my hopes from the effects of the turn of the season towards spring have very much abated." 

 In consequence of this letter. Smith and John Home set out from London to visit Hume at Edin- 

 burgh, and accidentally met him at Morpeth on his way south. Home returned to London with 

 i Hume, and preserved a diary of the journey, which has been printed in his life, by Mackenzie. In 

 • this diary is the following interesting entry : — 



" Newcastle, Wednesday, 24:th April. 

 " Mr Hume not quite so well in the morning, — says that he had set out merely to please his 

 friends ; that he would go on to please them ; that Ferguson and Andrew Stuart (about whom 

 we had been talking) were answerable for shortening his life one week a-piece : for, says he, you 

 will allow XenophoQ to be good authority ; and he lays it down, that suppose a man is dying, 

 nobody has a right to kill him. He set out in this vein, and continued all the stage in his cheerful 

 and talking humour. It was a fine day, and we went on to Durham — from that to Darlington, 

 I where we passed the night." 



; The illness of Hume, feelingly alluded to in the above letters of Gibbon and Ferguson, was 



the cause of his death on the 25th of August in the same year. The following interesting letter 



(belonging to Mr David Laing), dated at Edinburgh, on the 9 th of July before his decease, is very 



I characteristic of the cheerfulness which he displayed up to his last moments. It is addressed to 



" John Hume at Kilduff, near Haddington :" — 



" My dear John, — I offered to give you a letter along with you, informing you how I should 

 be on Tuesday thereafter, viz., weaker and more infirm than when you saw me. This, indeed, would 

 ' have sav'd postage ; and I can do no more at present than confirm the same truth, only that the 

 matter seems now to proceed with an accelerated motion. I had yesterday a grand jury of phy- 

 sicians who sat upon me, the Doctors Cullen, Black, and Home. They all declare the opinion of 



VOL. XXIII. PART III. 8 F 



