nd
when we buy Donaldson's collection, we pay as dear for the poems of Mr.
Lauchlan MacPherson, as we do for those written by the incomparable
Captain Andrew.

[Footnote 53: "If I were as tedious as a king, I could find it in my
heart to bestow it all of your worship."--"Much Ado about Nothing." Act
iii., scene 5.--ED.]

You are in Edinburgh, I imagine, by this time, if the information of Mr.
Alexander Donaldson may be depended upon. I shall be in town one night
soon on my way to Kelly, for the H----s of D---- threaten an invasion
upon this peaceful abode. Farewell.

Yours sincerely,

ANDREW ERSKINE.

* * * * *

LETTER XXXV.

Edinburgh, June 19, 1762.

Dear ERSKINE,--You have upon many occasions made rather too free with my
person, upon which I have often told you that I principally value
myself. I feel a strong inclination to retaliate. I have great
opportunity, and I will not resist it. Your figure, Erskine, is
amazingly uncouth. The length of your body bears no manner of proportion
to its breadth, and far less does its breadth bear to its length. If we
consider you one way, you are the tallest, and if we consider you
another way, you are the thickest man alive. The crookedness of your
back is terrible; but it is nothing in comparison of the frightful
distortions of your countenance. What monsters have you been the cause
of bringing into the world! not only the wives of sergeants and
corporals of the 71st regiment, but the unhappy women in every town
where you was quartered, by looking at you have conceived in horror.
Natural defects should be spared; but I must not omit the large holes in
your ears, and the deep marks of the iron on your hands. I hope you will
allow these to be artificial. Nature nails no man's ears to the
pillory. Nature burns no man in the hand. As I have a very sincere
friendship for you, I cannot help giving you my best advice with regard
to your future schemes of life. I would beseech you to lay aside all
your chimerical projects, which have made you so absurd. You know very
well, when you went upon the stage at Kingston in Jamaica, how
shamefully you exposed yourself, and what disgrace and vexation you
brought upon all your friends. You must remember what sort of treatment
you met with, when you went and offered yourself to be one of the
fathers of the inquisition at Macerata, in the room of Mr. Archibald
Bower;[54] a project which could enter into the