se relations with me, and I must have been
much worse but for her. Of my godfathers, one was a Scotch episcopalian,
Mr. Fraser of ----, whom I hardly ever saw or heard of; the other a
presbyterian, Mr. G. Grant, a junior partner of my father's.' The child
was named William Ewart, after his father's friend, an immigrant Scot
and a merchant like himself, and father of a younger William Ewart, who
became member for Liverpool, and did good public service in parliament.

Before proceeding to the period of my childhood, properly
so-called, I will here insert a few words about my family. My
maternal grandfather was known as Provost Robertson of Dingwall, a
man held, I believe, in the highest respect. His wife was a
Mackenzie of [Coul]. His circumstances must have been good.

Of his three sons, one went into the army, and I recollect him as
Captain Robertson (I have a seal which he gave me, a three-sided
cairngorm. Cost him 71/2 guineas). The other two took mercantile
positions. When my parents made a Scotch tour in 1820-21 with, I
think, their four sons, the freedom of Dingwall was presented to us
all,[1] with my father; and there was large visiting at the houses
of the Ross-shire gentry. I think the line of my grandmother was
stoutly episcopalian and Jacobite; but, coming outside the western
highlands, the first at least was soon rubbed down. The provost, I
think, came from a younger branch of the Robertsons of Struan.

On my father's side the matter is more complex. The history of the
family has been traced at the desire of my eldest brother and my
own, by Sir William Fraser, the highest living authority.[2] He has
carried us up to a rather remote period, I think before Elizabeth,
but has not yet been able to connect us with the earliest known
holders of the name, which with the aid of charter-chests he hopes
to do. Some things are plain and not without interest. They were a
race of borderers. There is still an old Gledstanes or Gladstone
castle. They formed a family in Sweden in the seventeenth century.
The explanation of this may have been that, when the union of the
crowns led to the extinction of border fighting they took service
like Sir Dugald Dalgetty under Gustavus Adolphus, and in this case
passed from service to settlement. I have never heard of them in
Scotland until aft