assure you, he always dearly remembers his own Cowly.

"I begin now to draw indifferently: I am studying Botany with Doctor Butt, so I will bring you home drawings of all the curious plants, &c., &c., and everything that I see. I have sent Mama home a land turtle, to walk about Walcot garden; it is very pretty, particularly its back, which is all divided into square lozenges, and the shell is as hard as a coat of mail. If

you have got anything that you wish to send me, you need only direct it to Dr. Butt in the same manner you direct letters, and put it into a merchantman bound for the West Indies, and it can't fail coming safe. Doctor Butt desires his best compliments to you, and will be obliged to you, if you will send him out such a profile of you as you copied from Mr. Hoar's. Pray give my compliments to all, and know and believe me to be, my dear Cardross,

"Your affectionate brother,

"THOMAS ERSKINE."

Both these letters evince an affectionate, studious, and active disposition, and, from the young sailor's having been made an acting-lieutenant by Sir John Lindsay, it is only reasonable to suppose that he did not abandon his profession on account of either inefficiency or insubordination: this decided step was, however, taken by Erskine soon after Sir John was relieved by Commodore Johnson, and the cause which led to it was said to be the harsh conduct of his new commander.

CHAPTER XXI.

Lord Erskine Enters the Army-His Slow Promotion-Leaves the Service -Enters at Cambridge-His great Admiration and Friendship for Fox-Lines written by him at Oatlands on receiving from the Duchess of York a Lock of that Statesman's Hair-Lord ByronTwo Fragments of his Unpublished Poetry-Stanzas on the Murder of Mr. Weir, by the Rev. J. Mitford-The Younger Brother's Claim -Les Mille Colonnes-Epigrams.

AFTER his return home, young Erskine tried the sister service, and on the Ist of September 1768 obtained an Ensign's commission in the second battalion of the First, or Royal Regiment of Foot, most of the officers of which corps, as well as the Colonel, John Duke of Argyle, were his countrymen. In this regiment he remained seven years, having been promoted in 1770, at the early age of twenty, to the rank of Benedict, and to a lieutenancy on the 21st of April 1773.

It was possibly this slow promotion which induced Lieutenant Erskine to quit the army two years after, added to the encomiums that his talents elicited from clever and intellectual men; which possibly encouraged the idea, that he might distinguish himself in an arena more suited to his genius. Dr. Johnson, when on his tour in Scotland, and at the time sixty-three years of

age, dined at Sir Alexander Macdonald's, where, as Boswell says, "was a young officer in the regimentals of the Scots Royals, who talked with a vivacity, fluency, and precision so uncommon, that he attracted particular attention; he proved to be the Honourable T. Erskine, youngest brother to the Earl of Buchan, who has risen into such brilliant reputation at the bar of Westminster Hall. Erskine told us," says Boswell, "that when he was in the island of Minorca, he not only read prayers, but preached two sermons to the regiment;" on which Mr. Croker observes, "Lord Erskine was fond of this anecdote; he told it to me the first time that I had the honour of being in his company, and often repeated it, with an observation that he had been a sailor and a soldier, was a lawyer and a parson; the latter he affected to think the greatest of his efforts, and to support that opinion would quote the prayer for the clergy in the Liturgy, from the expression of which he would (in no commendable spirit of jocularity) infer, that the enlightening them was one of the greatest marvels 'which could be worked.""

This anecdote completes the illustration of the line,

"Tom Erskine sat last-sailor, soldier, and lawyer,"

with the addition of another profession; and as Lord Erskine, in his letter to his brother, says that he "studied botany with Dr. Butt, the PhysicianGeneral," it is not impossible that he practised under him, and took a degree. This would establish his

credit to a very extraordinary claim-that of having belonged to all the "liberal professions," and would account very satisfactorily for his having so heartily espoused the Whig cause.

After retiring from the army, Mr. Erskine went to Cambridge, and was called to the bar in 1778; in 1783 he was made King's Counsel, and in 1806 appointed Lord-Chancellor. The change of his uniform for a silk gown did not, however, annihilate his military feelings, for during the war he was Colonel of the Law Association Volunteers; and it was while in command of this distinguished corps, at a review in Hyde Park, that he gave one of the many amusing proofs of his talent for repartee. It was the King's birthday, and the royal cavalcade having passed down the line, the Duke of Cambridge fell back and spoke to Erskine, saying, "How well your corps behaves! are they all lawyers?" "Yes, sir," he replied; "and some of them very good lawyers too." "And good soldiers," said the Duke; "for how silent they are!" "Yes," said Erskine; "but does your Royal Highness recollect that we have no pay?"

Lord Erskine had not lost his military spirit at the age of sixty-five, for, in one of his letters, written. from the Continent in July 1815, he observes, “As soon as I return you shall have an account of my tour with the army in France, and going with it to Paris we shall have peace at last." "Neither Lord Erskine's conversation," writes Mr. Croker, “(though, even to the last, remarkable for fluency and vivacity)