“Mr. Alexander Murray,[238] said that the President Dundas upon the bench was like Lord Kelly playing in a concert—very quick, loud, and rumbling. Nothing can be a more lively representation of his manner than this, when you harangue a little with the president’s blustering tone and bounces of voice at intervals—‘I cannot agree to give you this cause against the Duke of Gordon, sitting here as judge on great revolution principles,’ &c.”
“I said that Mr. Charles Hay[239] and I, who studied Scotch law together, used to go to Mr. McLaurin,[240] when we found any difficulty, as to a mill to get it ground. ‘Yes,’ said Crosbie, ‘and he made you twenty difficulties out of one.’ ‘The observation,’ said I, ‘is just and witty. It reminds me of the fable of the lady, who when she was not pleased with her looks dashed the mirror in pieces, and so saw a multitude of ugly faces instead of one.’”
“26th June, 1774.—At a Sunday’s supper at Dr. Webster’s, when I was finding fault with a lady for going to visit a relation who had married a low man, the Doctor said that treating such people with mere civility was the best way to get the better of them. I answered, ‘I don’t want to get the better of them, I want to get rid of them: you may get the better of a sow by going into the mire and boxing it; but who would do it?’ My wife, who wanted to support Dr. Webster, though she had not much attended to the dispute, said something which was of pretty much the same import with my remarks. ‘Well,’ said I, ‘this is good enough. She thinks she is opposing me, and yet she agrees with me; she thinks she is riding a race with me and getting the better, and all the time she is behind me.’”
“My father told me that when he got his gown upon the resignation of the worthy Lord Dun,[241] he went and waited upon him, and said, ‘My lord, as I am to be your lordship’s unworthy successor I am come to ask your blessing.’ ‘Sir,’ said Lord Dun, ‘I held that office too long, for I was come to be but half a judge. Nay, what do I say? I was come to be worse, for I was able to give corporal presence but one-half of the year, and when I was present I could not have given that attention which every man ought to have who decides on the property of others. But to tell you the truth, I held my office from an apprehension that they might put in a man even worse than half a judge. However, sir, since you are to be my successor,’—(he then paid my father some genteel compliments); he added, ‘I have no title to give a blessing, but if my prayers can be of any service to you, while I live they shall never be wanting.’”
“29th June, 1774.—I said the business of the Court of Session went on as fast without the President[242] as with him, though with less noise, when he was absent the court was a plain girr (hoop), which ran smoothly and quietly; when he was there, it was a girr with jinglers.’”
“When Charles Townshend[243] read some of Lord Kames’[244] ‘Elements of Criticism,’ he said, ‘This is the work of a dull man grown whimsical,’—a most characteristical account of Lord Kames as a writer.”
Mr. George Wallace.[245]
“Mr. Andrew Balfour[246] said of Lord Kames, ‘He has the obstinacy of a mule and the levity of a harlequin.’”
Mr. Charles Hay.