I think I have pretty nearly exhausted all that I had to tell you of myself. Of public concerns, Ireland only gives us any uneasiness. And that not so much from apprehending any immediate danger of an explosion there (for there is none, I verily believe), as from the apparent and utter hopelessness of ever bringing that unhappy Country to a settlement.

'It never was in such a state of prosperity-never. Land pays its rent; Commerce increases rapidly; Manufactures are planted in parts of the kingdom where never before Capital ventured to trust itself; Justice is administered with a more even hand than ever before, and is acknowledged by the people to be so; and even the sore Evil of tythes has, by an Act of last year (one of the wisest ever passed by a legislature), been in all instances lessened, and in many entirely removed.

But in the midst of all these blessings (for such they are) the demon of religious discord rages with a fury hitherto unknown. The Catholick Demagogues fear that the equitableness of Lord Wellesley's administration should put Catholick Emancipation out of sight; and the old Protestant faction take advantage of the indiscretions and violences of the demagogues, to spread an alarm of rebellion; to decry Lord Wellesley's system of leniency and impartiality, and to call for the return of the "iron times." Such is the real history of the factions which now agitate Ireland. But I hope, and I believe, the storm will pass away without bursting. As to any practical good to be done in respect to the Catholicks, they have made that hopeless for years to come. This Country is once more united as one man against them.

The new feature in the case of Ireland at present is the interest which Foreign Powers take in it. France, and more especially the Jesuit and propagandist party in France, certainly have their eyes. fixed upon the struggle; and if the Foreign Ministers thought (as they most undoubtedly did), and wrote to their Courts in 1818 and 1821, that England was about to be swallowed up by a Revolution, it is not wonderful that they should now be inspiring fears (or in some instances, perhaps, hopes) of the like Catastrophe in Ireland.

But they will be disappointed. A few unpleasant nights in Parliament we shall have; but six months hence Mr. O'Connell and the Catholick Association will be with Spa-fields and Manchester; and the Protestant fanaticks and polemicks will, I hope, have shrunk back into their shell.'

It was almost the last letter which he wrote to the friend of his boyhood. Pitt's heir, like Pitt himself, was struck down in the midst of his work. To him, as to Holbein's labourer in the field, the summons came to lie down beside the uncompleted furrow:

"It's a long field," says Death, "but we'll get to the end of it to-day-you and I.""

ART.

ART. VI.-The Annals of Banff. Compiled by William Cramond, M.A., LL.D. Printed for the New Spalding Club. Aberdeen, 1893.

XTREMES illustrate and resemble one another; and to

EXTR

English Channel.

illustrate and, we will first launch upon the

Sixty years ago a voyager from London to the West of England, to avoid the tedious and fatiguing way throughout by road, would go by coach to Portsmouth, and by steamboat to Torquay and further down the coast. The scene on entering Dartmouth Harbour, always beautiful, was in those days, when building was restricted, one to be remembered for a lifetime. The surrounding lower hills, clothed to the water's edge with hanging woods reflected in the calm and gently undulating sea; the richly verdant, dominating heights; the scattered, halfembowered houses, forts, and churches, quaint and old; the brilliant atmosphere of a fine summer's Sunday morning, with the sound of many service bells; the plentiful display of coloured flags; and half the population strolling through the woods to church, all gaily dressed, as was the custom before our people sank into their present sumptuary gloom, composed a scene or picture that could scarcely be rivalled of its kind.

Then, Dartmouth was a small and semi-mediæval town, of some four thousand people; its main thoroughfares, in places almost precipitous, were so narrow that one coach would wholly stop the way. The trade was chiefly with Newfoundland and Labrador, and news from London came almost as foreign news. The place was very individual and self-contained. Civilization, it was said, stopped at the Dart; and Dartmouth was beyond the river. Communication by land was difficult; but though off the leading turnpike road, midway between the practically distant towns of Exeter and Plymouth, Dartmouth is on the border of a hilly undulating country, called 'the South Hams,' in parts of which, some sixty years ago, wheeled vehicles were scarcely seen, and sledges were still used; and it became the metropolis of this most secluded part of Devonshire, with its own well-defined and residential aristocracy.

Apart from the beauty of its site, this little Devonshire town may, in size, character, and history, be compared with Banff; a seaport also, and a county town, but on the northern coast of Britain. Each is placed on the hill-slope and shore, and where a Dart or a Deveron cuts through a range of high land to the sea. As was the case at Dartmouth, the commercial way to Banff was formerly by water. Roads there

were

were none before the time of General Wade, but brigantines and smacks plied regularly along the coast to Aberdeen and Leith. A century ago the course from Deptford took a week, or possibly a fortnight; and congratulations were abundant when the French were scarce. The ship Friendship,' Captain William Milne, a descendant of King' Milne, who carried Charles II. ashore at Speymouth, made the voyage each way once a month; and on arrival at Banff harbour there were suitable festivities, still happily on record, at the inn.

·

But now the general approach is by the railway; and from the station on Doune hill the view of Banff is very striking. Not a combination, as at Dartmouth, of commingled woods and buildings; but in the foreground Deveron, with its graceful bridge, in architectual grouping with the Duke of Fife's park gates and lodges; then to the left the park itself, surrounding the 'noble-looking structure' built by Adams for the Earl of Fife a century and a half ago, and woodlands reaching to the bridge of Alvah amid scenery not to be surpassed by any in the kingdom for romantic beauty. Half a mile away the town covers the hill-side, at the eastern end of a long down, of which the summit is called Gallow-hill; and to the right is the North Sea, blue as the Mediterranean. Each of these features, river, park, and town, and sea, is sharply defined; and the effect on a bright early morning in the month of August, with a climate never to be matched in Southern Scotland, is at once remarkable and attractive.

Banff is not a changeful or expanding town; its population. of about four thousand people does not greatly rise or fall in number. Midway between Aberdeen and Elgin, but, like Dartmouth, off the nearer road, it also had its local aristocracy. It was a place of social eminence, a real county capital, and separate from the greater world. A century ago a new arrival from the South of England described it as a large place, with a great number of ships in the port; dear for provisions, as so many people of small fortunes come to reside there. Hundreds of smart people are out walking on a Sunday, and all well dressed and well behaved.' Compact and regularly built, with spacious streets, but no outstretching suburbs, Banff was entirely different in style and character from agricultural towns. Its old houses had a rude and simple stateliness; and county people of gentility would migrate from the country to their little capital, and spend the larger portion of the year in Banff. The main streets, High, and Low, High Shore, and Low Shore, range in succession one below the other down the eastern brae. North

are

are the harbour and the suburb of Seatown; and a few transverse streets and paths up the steep hill complete the plan.

This short description, and the general comparison with Dartmouth, may suffice to introduce our subject to those readers who have not invaded Scotland further than the Grampians and the Dee; and we can now proceed to search in Dr. Cramond's admirable volumes for such records of the history and burghal life of Banff as may reveal the social and material progress during four centuries of this secluded yet important little town.

Situated in the neighbourhood of fertile fields, at the mouth of a productive river, and with a bar erected by the friendly co-operation of river and sea, and thus forming a harbour of refuge well suited to the wants of early navigation, the burgh could scarcely fail in very early times to attract settlers, and must have been one of the first places in the north to be endowed with burghal rights and privileges. It was, we know, one of the northern Hanse; and for centuries it has been one of the line of northern burghs that stretches from Aberdeen to Inverness, at singularly regular distances; forming an outpost of defence against foes, and a centre of civilization to a wide district around.'

The existing records of the burgh begin in the twelfth century. King David was at Banff in 1124; and in 1189 the Bishop of Moray had a garden there; so that the place was duly recognised by Church and State. In 1264 Banff had a sheriff, and in 1290 a castle, marking a distinct advance in civilization, which in 1296 was emphasized by the arrival there of Edward I. of England, with some portion of his thirty thousand military men; and the visit was repeated in 1298. The existing walls of the ruined castle appear to be the remains of the last stronghold of the English north of the Grampians. King Robert, in 1372, granted to Banff a charter, which is still in good preservation. For 50 merks, 331. 6s. 8d., annually, the inhabitants secured all the burgh, with the provostship lands, the cruives and fishings on Deveron, mills, petty customs, pastures, &c. Originally each burgher was a Crown vassal, paying for his tenement a fixed yearly rent, which was collected by officers of the Crown. But about the beginning of the fourteenth century the burgesses took from the chamberlain short leases, out of which grew feu farm, with absolute right.

The mediaval trade of Banff was chiefly with the Low Countries. In 1424, wool, hides, and salmon were the exports; the trade in salmon being about a seventh of that from the whole of Scotland. In 1483, however, Banff and Elgin each paid only 31. annually in taxes. Probably coined cash was

scarce in Banffshire

Banffshire in those days, and bartering was not unusual. In 1551, the Commissioners of the town let certain fishings, that the church and tolbooth might be restored by the tenant, and the church bells rehung; and in 1555, in consideration of a piece of common land, the burgh secured the permanent services of a cook and baker; testifying to a proper public taste for hospitable entertainment. Still more recently there was considerable trade with Norway; and, as national finance developed, smuggling was said to bring much wealth and business to the burgh.

:As its little harbour was the chief cause of the prosperity and even of the existence of Banff, it claims precedence in our history. The earliest known reference to the hythe of Banff is in an indenture dated 4th of March, 1471. The original harbour, the estuary of the Deveron, was so frequently choked by the bar or shingle bank, which formed its protection from the sea, that the inconvenience was felt by a large area of the north of Scotland. It was consequently proposed to construct a harbour or hythe outside the bar; and, to encourage the burgh of Banff, the Convention of Royal Burghs granted, in 1615, one hundred pounds towards the harbour works. But in 1642, after a failure of voluntary contributions, the council of Banff agreed to an imposition upon all the burgesses and inhabitants of the burgh, according to the ability of each to pay, for the construction of the harbour. Yet in 1683 the water was only from four to ten feet deep; and consequently on at least furth of every familie' was required to help haul in the ships belonging to the place, and also strangers.'

Such was their national importance that, in 1697, Parliament called upon all the churches in Scotland for voluntary contributions to the harbour works; and eighteen months later the Convention of Burghs again gave help; the Burgh having represented that sixteen of their vessels had been wrecked, or taken by the French, during King William's wars. In 1701, the Scottish Parliament allowed a further contribution from the churches; and in 1726, the work was found to be so urgently required that Commissioners were appointed by the Convention of Burghs to visit Banff and survey the harbour. They found that 'as the trade of Banff is increasing, and all the merchants have a very enterprising genius for trade,' 11007. should be spent at Guthrie haven, as the harbour was then called. Ten years later, however, the Town Council had to call on each family by turns to furnish a man for one day to clean out the harbour; and this went on for more than thirty years.

At length the magistrates, assisted by the Convention of Burghs,