1761-62; and it is on the whole most likely that this is the very
young nobleman whom Dr. Alexander Carlyle met in company with Smith at
a large supper party in April 1763, and concerning whom he mentions
that he himself whispered after a little to Smith that he wondered how
he could set this young man so high who appeared to be so foolish, and
Smith answered, "We know that perfectly, but he is the only lord in
our College."

It will be observed that Lord Buchan says Smith _read_ private
lectures to him. Smith's public lectures he was not accustomed to read
in any of his classes, but he seems to have found it more convenient
in teaching a single pupil to read them, and interpose oral comments
and illustrations as he went along. Others of Smith's old students
besides Lord Buchan express their obligations to the conversations
they were privileged to have with him. Dugald Stewart, Brougham
informs us, used to decline to see his students, because he found them
too disputatious, and he disliked disputing with them about the
correctness of the doctrines he taught. But Smith, by all accounts,
was extremely accessible, and was even in the habit of seeking out the
abler men among them, inviting them to his house, discussing with them
the subjects of his lectures or any other subject, and entering
sympathetically into their views and plans of life. John Millar,
having occasion to mention Smith's name in his _Historical View of the
English Government_, takes the opportunity to say: "I am happy to
acknowledge the obligations I feel myself under to this illustrious
philosopher by having at an early period of life had the benefit of
his lectures on the history of civil society, and enjoying his
unreserved conversation on the same subject."[39]

Millar, it may be added, was one of Smith's favourite pupils, and
after obtaining the chair of Jurisprudence in his old College, one of
his chief associates, and Smith held so high an opinion of Millar's
unique powers as a stimulating teacher that he sent his cousin, David
Douglas, to Glasgow College for no other purpose but to have the
advantage of the lectures and conversation of Millar. Jeffrey used to
say that the most bracing exercises a student in Glasgow underwent in
those days were the supper disputations at Professor Millar's house,
and that, able and learned as his works are, "they revealed nothing of
that magical vivacity which made his conversation and his lectures
still more ful