Tabby and I have been both frightened in our return by sea from the coast of Fife. She was afraid of drowning, and I of catching cold, in consequence of being drenched with sea-water; but my fears, as well as hers, have been happily disappointed. She is now in perfect health; I wish I could say the same of Liddy. Something uncommon is the matter with that poor child; her colour fades, her appetite fails, and her spirits flag.

She is become moping and melancholy, and is often found in tears. Her brother suspects internal uneasiness on account of Wilson, and denounces vengeance against that adventurer. She was, it seems, strongly affected at the ball by the sudden appearance of one Mr. Gordon, who strongly resembles the said Wilson; but I am rather suspicious that she caught cold by being overheated with dancing. I have consulted Dr. Gregory, an eminent physician of an amiable character, who advises the highland air, and the use of goat-milk whey, which, surely, cannot have a bed effect upon a patient who was born and bred among the mountains of Wales. The doctor’s opinion is the more agreeable, as we shall find those remedies in the very place which I proposed as the utmost extent of our expedition—I mean the borders of Argyle.

Mr. Smollett, one of the judges of the commissary court, which is now sitting, has very kindly insisted upon our lodging at his country-house, on the banks of Lough-Lomond, about fourteen miles beyond Glasgow. For this last city we shall set out in two days, and take Stirling in our way, well provided with recommendations from our friends at Edinburgh, whom, I protest, I shall leave with much regret. I am so far from thinking it any hardship to live in this country, that, if I was obliged to lead a town life, Edinburgh would certainly be the headquarters of

Yours always,
MATT. BRAMBLE.

To Sir Watkin Phillips, Bart. of Jesus college, Oxon.

Argyleshire, Septr. 3.

DEAR KNIGHT,

I AM now little short of the Ultima Thule, if this appellation properly belongs to the Orkneys or Hebrides. These last are now lying before me, to the amount of some hundreds, scattered up and down the Deucalidonian sea, affording the most picturesque and romantic prospect I ever beheld. I write this letter in a gentleman’s house, near the town of Inverary, which may be deemed the capital of the West Highlands, famous for nothing so much as for the stately castle begun, and actually covered in by the late duke of Argyle, at a prodigious expence. Whether it will ever be completely finished is a question.

But, to take things in order. We left Edinburgh ten days ago; and the further North we proceed, we find Mrs. Tabitha the less manageable; so that her inclinations are not of the nature of the loadstone; they point not towards the pole. What made her leave Edinburgh with reluctance at last, if we may believe her own assertions, was a dispute which she left unfinished with Mr. Moffat, touching the eternity of hell torments. That gentleman, as he advanced in years, began to be sceptical on this head, till, at length, he declared open war against the common acceptation of the word eternal. He is now persuaded, that eternal signifies no more than an indefinite number of years; and that the most enormous sinner may be quit for nine millions, nine hundred thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine years of hell-fire; which term or period, as he very well observes, form but an inconsiderable drop, as it were, in the ocean of eternity. For this mitigation he contends, as a system agreeable to the ideas of goodness and mercy, which we annex to the supreme Being. Our aunt seemed willing to adopt this doctrine in favour of the wicked; but he hinted, that no person whatever was so righteous as to be exempted entirely from punishment in a future state: and that the most pious Christian upon earth might think himself very happy to get off for a fast of seven or eight thousand years in the midst of fire and brimstone. Mrs. Tabitha revolted at this dogma, which filled her at once with horror and indignation. She had recourse to the opinion of Humphry Clinker, who roundly declared it was the popish doctrine of purgatory, and quoted scripture in defence of the fire everlasting, prepared for the devil and his angels. The reverend mester Mackcorkendale, and all the theologists and saints of that persuasion were consulted, and some of them had doubts about


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