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"and copied, for your use, just as they oc"curred, without any regard to arrangement.

"BESIDES the letters and other papers which "I transmit for your assistance, I regret ex"ceedingly to say, that I saw a vast mass of "curious letters burnt, which had passed be"tween my father and Lord KAMES, Lord "HAILES, Lord ELIBANK, DAVID HUME, Dr "GILBERT STEWART, the Count de BUFFON, "Dr BLACKLOCK, ROBERT BURNS, and many "other eminent men. This happened when 66 my father was assorting some papers in an "old desk, not long before his death; and I "was then too young to be fully aware of their "value, or to be anxious to rescue them "from destruction; although I have often "perused many of them. I send you what "remains; and, as many of the originals "are decayed and torn, I have transcrib"ed most of them for your more ready 66 use. You may absolutely depend upon "the authenticity and accuracy of the whole "materials; and I leave to your prudence "and discretion to suppress whatever you may deem improper for publication. I

66

am, &c.

"ALEX, SMELLIE."

SINCE writing the foregoing letter, Mr ALEXANDER SMELLIE has recovered a very considerable mass of additional materials, principally consisting of letters which had passed between his father and many respectable characters of his time; all of which have been likewise used in drawing up these Memoirs. Owing to the nature of many of Mr SMELLIES letters, often copies without dates, and many of the originals having no date of the years in which they were written, the arrangement of this work has necessarily become more defective in regard to chronological order than was to have been desired. Many of these documents, likewise, either want dockets of the persons names to whom they were addressed, or are only uncertainly indicated by initial letters; and even a good many of the originals are unsigned. This has occasioned a defect in some places, which could only have been supplied conjecturally, but which motives of delicacy have prevented the indulgence of, lest the feelings of worthy persons might suffer injury.

Ir might reasonably be expected, that a full account of the life, writings, and corres

pondence of Mr SMELLIE, would comprise the literary history of the capital of Scotland, from about the year 1760, when he first began to take an active share in the literature of his country, to the year 1795, in which he died. It unfortunately happens, however, that materials for executing so complete a history of Scots literature, as connected with the life of Mr SMELLIE, are not now to be procured. From the circumstances already mentioned, the documents upon which this work are founded are much interrupted: Yet such as these are, and it has been an invariable rule to advance nothing in these Memoirs without authentic evidence, it is hoped that the following pages may be found not altogether unworthy of the persons and circumstances they are intended to commemorate, and to contain a considerable assemblage of interesting, curious, and instructive information.

THE whole original documents on which the following Work is founded, shall be arranged in a large volume, and deposited in the library of the Antiquarian Society of Scotland, as memorials of its authenticity. Every other paper, which has been deemed

improper for insertion, is carefully destroyed; because the son and the biographer of Mr SMELLIE are quite unambitious of gratifying the cravings of improper curiosity by the sacrifice of private feelings.

Of the composition of this Work, it becomes not the author to speak; except that he has anxiously endeavoured to follow, haud passibus aequis, some modern celebrated publications of a similar nature, yet without presuming to any pretensions of having attained to equality, far less to rivalry, with such excellent models of biographical composition: He hopes, however, to have succeeded in erecting a not entirely inadequate monument to the memory of a regretted literary friend, and so far to have fulfilled the wishes of a living friend whom he much respects.

WILLIAM SMELLIE, late printer in Edinburgh, was born in the Pleasance, one of the suburbs of the city of Edinburgh. The precise date of his birth cannot now be ascer

tained, either from the parish records of the time having been incorrectly kept, or because his father may have omitted to direct the registration, as he was a dissenter from the established church: But his eldest son distinctly remembers to have heard his father mention, that he was born in 1740; a year the most remarkable of any in the recollection of the oldest persons now alive in Scotland for an extraordinary dearth, almost amounting to famine.

MR SMELLIE was the youngest son of ALEXANDER SMELLIE, an eminent architect or master-builder and stone mason of Edinburgh; who appears to have been esteemed and respected among his brethren of the same profession, as he served the office of Deacon of the Masons in the united incorporations of Marys Chapel. For the information of English readers, it may be necessary to explain, that the office of Deacon of an Incorporation in Edinburgh, is almost precisely similar with that of Master of a Company in the city of London: With this difference, however, that all the fourteen deacons of trades in Edinburgh are constituent members of the common council of that