merchants is a much better thing for the
common people of a place than the residence of a court.

Now it was those spirited merchants who had then so much to do with
the making of Glasgow that had also something to do with the making of
Adam Smith. Plain business men of to-day sometimes smile at the
"Virginian Dons" and "tobacco lords" of last century as they picture
them gathering to the Glasgow Plainstanes at the hour of Change in the
glory of scarlet cloaks, cocked hats, and gold-headed canes, and the
plain citizens of that time all making way for their honours as they
passed. But there was much enlightenment and sagacity concealed under
that finery. Mrs. Montagu, who visited Glasgow in 1767, wrote Sir A.
Mitchell, the Ambassador, that she was more delighted with it than
with any other commercial town she had seen, because gain did not
usurp people's whole attention, but "the sciences, the arts, and the
love of agriculture had their share."[65] Their fortunes were small
compared with the present standard. Sir John Dalrymple, speaking of
three of the foremost merchants of Glasgow (one of them, John
Glassford, the richest man in the city), computes that they had a
quarter of a million between the three, and Dr. Reid, explaining the
anxiety caused in Glasgow by the American troubles in 1765, says
Glasgow owners possessed property in the American plantations
amounting to L400,000. But these figures meant large handling and
large dealings in those times, and perhaps more energy, mind, and
character than the bigger figures of the present day; and we are told
that commercial men in Glasgow still look back to John Glassford and
Andrew Cochrane as perhaps the greatest merchants the Clyde has seen.

Andrew Cochrane was Smith's particular friend among them, and Dr.
Carlyle tells that "Dr. Smith acknowledged his obligations to this
gentleman's information when he was collecting materials for his
_Wealth of Nations_; and the junior merchants who have flourished
since his time and extended their commerce far beyond what was then
dreamt of, confess with respectful remembrance that it was Andrew
Cochrane who first opened and enlarged their views."[66] Dr. Carlyle
informs us, moreover, that Cochrane founded a weekly club in the
"forties"--political economy club--of which "the express design was to
inquire into the nature and principles of trade in all its branches,
and to communicate knowledge and ideas on that subject to each other