ealment, we hope their present more
conspicuous form will not tend to diminish their merit. They have made
ourselves laugh; we hope they will have the same effect upon other
people.

LETTERS.

[In a Memoir of James Boswell,[6] by the Rev. Charles Rogers,
a short account is given of the Hon. Andrew Erskine,
Boswell's correspondent. He was the youngest son of
Alexander, fifth Earl of Kellie. He served in the army for
some years. After his retirement he settled at Edinburgh.
"His habits were regular, but he indulged occasionally at
cards, and was partial to the game of whist. Having sustained
a serious loss at his favourite pastime, he became frantic,
and threw himself into the Forth and perished." Burns,
writing to his friend Thomson, October, 1793, says--"Your
last letter, my dear Thomson, was indeed laden with heavy
news. Alas, poor Erskine! The recollection that he was a
coadjutor in your publication has, till now, scared me from
writing to you, or turning my thoughts on composing for you."
"He was," adds Dr. Rogers, "of a tall, portly form, and to
the last wore gaiters and a flapped vest." By this last
description Dr. Rogers's readers may be pleasantly reminded
of an anecdote that is given for the first time, I believe,
in his book. "Dr. Johnson used to laugh at a passage in
Carte's 'Life of the Duke of Ormond,' where he gravely
observed that 'he was always in full dress when he went to
Court; too many being in the practice of going thither with
double lapells.'" As poor Erskine "wore to the last his
gaiters and a flapped vest," no doubt he had them on when he
drowned himself.--ED.]

[Footnote 6: "Boswelliana: The Commonplace Book of James Boswell." With
a Memoir and Annotations, by the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D. London:
Printed for the Grampian Club, 1874.]

* * * * *

LETTER I.

Auchinleck, Aug. 25, 1761.

Dear ERSKINE,--No ceremony, I beseech you. Give me your hand. How is my
honest Captain Andrew? How goes it with the elegant gentle Lady A----?
the lovely sighing Lady J----? and how, O how does that glorious
luminary Lady B---- do? You see I retain my usual volatility. The
Boswells, you know, came over from Normandy, with William the Conqueror,
and some of us possess the spirit of our ancestors the French. I do for
o