thing so very striking in his appearance, that I wonder I did not take notice of it in an earlier letter. His face is quite thin and extenuated, and he has lost most of his teeth; but instead of taking away from the vivacity of his countenance, these very circumstances seem to me to have given it a degree of power, and fire of expression, which I have very rarely seen rivalled in the countenance of any young man whatever. The absence of the teeth has planted lines of furrows about the lower part of his face, which convey an idea of determination and penetration too, that is not to be resisted; and the thin covering of flesh upon the bones of his cheeks, only gives additional effect to the fine, fresh, and healthful complexion which these still exhibit. As for his eyes, they are among the most powerful I have seen. While in a musing attitude, he keeps his eye-lids well over them, and they peep out with a swimming sort of languor; but the moment he begins to speak, they dilate, and become full of animation, each grey iris flashing as keenly as a flint. His forehead is full of wrinkles, and his eye-brows are luxuriant; and his voice has a hollow depth of tone about it, which all furnish a fine relief to the hot and choleric style in which he expresses himself, and, indeed, to the very lively way in which he seems to regard every circumstance of every case that is brought before him. Although very hasty and impatient at times in his temper and demeanour, and not over-scrupulous in regard to the limits of some of his sarcasms, this old Judge is a prodigious favourite with all classes who frequent the Courts, and, above all, with the Advocates, at whose expense most of his spleen effervesces. He is a capital lawyer, and he is the very soul of honour; and the goodness of his warm heart is so well understood, that not only is no offence taken with any thing he says, but every new sarcasm he utters endears him more, even to the sufferer. As for the younger members of the profession,-when he goes a circuit, you may be sure, in whatever direction he moves, to meet with an extraordinary array of them in the train of Lord Hermand. His innocent peculiarities of manner afford an agreeable diversity to the surface of the causes carried ou under his auspices, while the shrewdness and diligence of his intellect completely provide for the safety of their essential merits. And then, when the business of the Court is over, he is the very "prince of good-fellows, and king of old men;" and you are well aware what high delight all young men take in the company of their seniors, when these are pleased to enter, bona fide, into the spirit of their convivialities. He has an infinite fund of dry, caustic, original humour; and, in addition to this, he cannot fail to possess an endless store of anecdotes; so that it is no wonder his company should be so fascinating to the young jurisconsults. In him they are no doubt too happy to have an opportunity of seeing a noble living specimen of a very fine old school, which has now left little behind it but the tradition of its virtues, and its talents, and its pleasantries;—a school, the departure of many of whose peculiarities was perhaps rendered necessary in a great measure by the spirit of the age, but of which it may be suspected not a little has been allowed to expire, which might have been better worth preserving than much that has come in its place. It is not, I assure you, from W alone that I hear lamentations over the decay of this antique spirit. It is sighed over by many that witnessed its manifestations ere they had yet come to be rare, and will long be remembered with perhaps still greater affection by those who have seen the last of its relics in the person of this accomplished gentleman and excellent judge. There would be no end of it, were I to begin telling you anecdotes about Lord Hermand. I hear a new one every day; for he alone furnishes half the materials of conversation to the young groupes of stove-school wits, of which I have already said a word or two in describing the Outer-House. There is one, however, which I must venture upon. When Guy Mannering came out, the Judge was so much delighted with the picture of the life of the old Scottish lawyers in that most charming novel, that he could talk of nothing else but Pleydell, Dandie, and the High Jinks, for many weeks. He usu ally carried one volume of the book about with him, and one morning, on the bench, his love for it so completely got the better of him, that he lugged in the subject, head and shoulders, into the midst of a speech about some most dry point of law; nay, getting warmer every moment he spoke of it, he at last fairly plucked the volume from his pocket, and, in spite of all the remonstrances of all his brethren, insisted upon reading aloud the whole passage for their edification. He went through the task with his wonted vivacity, gave great effect to every speech, and most appropriate expression to every joke; and when it was done, I suppose the Court would have no difficulty in confessing that they had very seldom been so well entertained. During the whole scene, Mr. W S was present, seated, indeed, in his official capacity, close under the Judge. Like almost all the old Scottish lawyers, Lord Hermand is no less keen in farming than in law, and in the enjoyment of good company. Formerly it was looked upon as quite inconsistent with the proper character of an Advocate, to say nothing of a Judge, to want some piece of land, the superintendence of the cultivation of which might afford an agreeable, no less than profitable relaxation, from the toils of the profession. In those days, it was understood that every lawyer spent the Saturday and Sunday of every week, in the milder part of the year, not in Edinburgh, but at his farm, or villa; and the way they went about this was sufficiently characteristic. In order that no time might be lost in town after the business of the Court on Saturday, the lawyers had established themselves in the privilege of going to the Parliament-House, on that morning, in a style of dress, which must have afforded a most picturesque contrast to the strictly legal costume of full-dress black suits, in which, at that time, they made their appearance there on the other mornings of the week. They retained their gowns and wigs, but every other part of their equipment was in the very extreme of opposition to the usual integuments worn in company with these -riding-coats of all the splendid hues, not then as now aban doned to livery-servants, bright mazarine blue, pea-green, drummers' yellow, &c. &c., but always buckskin breeches, and top-boots and spurs. The steeds to be forthwith mounted by these embryo cavaliers, were meantime drawn up in regular lines or circles, under the direction of serving-men and cadies in the Parliament-Close; and no sooner did the Judges leave the bench, than the whole squadron got rid of their incumbrances, and were off in a twinkling—some to their own estates-others to the estates of their friendsbut every one to some place or other out of Edinburgh. Although all this parade has long since dropt into disuse and oblivion, the passion for farming has by no means deserted its hold of the Scotch lawyers. Among many others, as I have said, Lord Hermand keeps up the old spirit with infinite zeal. It is not now in the power of professional people to leave Edinburgh at the end of every week; but the moment any session of the Court is over, and a few weeks of intermission are put in his power, he quits the city on the instant, and buries himself among his woods, and corn-fields, and cattle, till necessity compels him once more to exchange these for the "pulvis, strepitusque Romæ." Even in the city, there is in his dress and gait a great deal that marks his Lordship's rural attachments and habits. His stockings are always of the true farmer's sort, with broad stripes alternately of black and white worsted-and his shoes are evidently intended for harder work than pacing the smooth granite of the streets of Edinburgh. I confess that my eye lingers with very singular delight, even upon these little traits in the appearance of one, that may well be considered, and therefore cannot fail to be honoured, as the last representative of so fine a class. P. M. LETTER XL. TO THE SAME. 1 THINK YOU will allow me no inconsiderable share of cre dit for the cordial manner in which I have lauded the excellencies of the Scottish Barristers, when I tell you, that those whom I have particularly described to you, are each and all of them Whigs-most of them fervent, nay, bigotted Whigs, or, as Dr. Parr would say, 27. Nor will it diminish the merits of my liberality, when I inform you, that the friend, under whose auspices my inspection of Edinburgh has been chiefly conducted, so far from regarding these eminent men with the same impartial eye of which I have made use, has well nigh persuaded himself into a thorough conviction, that their talents and attainments are most extravagantly over-rated in common opinion; and has, moreover, omitted no opportunity of detracting from them in private, when he may have heard me expatiate upon their praises. There are only two exceptions to this-Mr. Cranstoun and Mr. Jeffrey. The former he cannot help admiring and loving for the beautifully classical style of his eloquence, and, indeed, of all his attainments; but I think it forms no small in-: gredient both in his love and admiration, that Mr. Cranstoun happens to be sprung from one of the greatest of the old Border families, and so, it may be supposed, to have been nourished in infancy, with the same milk of romantic and chivalrous tradition, of which he himself imbibed so largely then, and with the influences of which even now his whole character and conversation are saturated and overflowing; for I have already said enough to satisfy you, that few men can quote the words of the poet with more propriety than Mr. W "The Boy is Father of the Man, |