The Commission met, doubtless, in that "little roome of [off] the East

Church" of St Giles, which Baillie describes as having been "verie

handsomelie dressed for our Assemblies in all time coming,"[111] and

from which, three years later, the English officers, under Cromwell's

order, ejected the members of the General Assembly. The Commission on

that day, when our author appeared before them, consisted of twenty-four

members--the most distinguished divines and politicians in Scotland of

the Covenanting party. The moderator, or chairman, was Robert

Douglas,[112] "a great State preacher," who had been chaplain to the

Scots troops in the service of Gustavus Adolphus, and had won the esteem

of that monarch, and who in little more than six months' time would

officiate at the coronation of Charles II., for whom Sir Thomas Urquhart

had prematurely drawn the sword. Beside him was Samuel Rutherford, the

Principal of St Andrews, whose fervid piety has found no lack of

admirers in every generation since his time. Robert Baillie, the writer

of the _Letters_ which contain so many vivid pictures of events in that

stirring period; David Dickson, Professor of Divinity in Glasgow, whose

name we have heard as one of the deputation to persuade the people of

Aberdeen to take the Covenant; and James Guthrie, who died as a martyr,

the year after the Restoration, were present there that day. The

contrast between these grave, dignified, saintly Covenanting leaders,

and the brilliant Cavalier, Sir Thomas Urquhart, is one which, by its

picturesqueness, strongly impresses the imagination.

The Commission, after hearing the petitioner's statements, did not,

apparently; treat the matter as of very serious moment. The dangerous

crisis was over, and they could afford to be merciful. They seem to have

condoned the political offence, but referred Sir Thomas to Mr John

Annand, minister of Inverness, one of their number, "that he might

confer with him concerning some dangerous opinions which, as was

informed, he had sometimes vented." If these could be explained away,

and no further complicity in disloyal schemes were brought home to him,

Mr Annand was empowered, acting at all times under the advice of the

Presbytery of Inverness, to receive his public "satisfaction" in the

church of that city. How the matter ended we do not know. But there is

very little doubt that Sir Thomas's nebulous heterodoxy proved no bar to

his being freed from ecclesiastical censure, and that, in due course,

according to the custom of that time, he stood, as a penitent, before

the congregation of the Parish Church, in that city the walls of which

he had assisted to assault and overthrow.

A fortnight after Sir Thomas Urquhart's appearance before the Commission

of the General Assembly, Charles II. landed in Scotland, and was

accepted, though at first not without deep misgivings, as "covenanted

King." The party to which our author belonged was for a time excluded

from all share in public life; and even the army, which was to defend

the sovereign against the English sectaries, was carefully sifted, to

remove those whose presence might bring a curse upon it. So that, though

the land resounded with war and the rumour of war, Sir Thomas remained

in an enforced quietude in his castle at Cromartie. The effect of the

battle of Dunbar (3rd September) was to depress the faction which had

excluded the Royalist partisans from the army, and kept the King himself

in something very like bondage. Charles II., indeed, is said to have

given thanks to God for the victory of Cromwell over the Covenanting

forces at this battle, and the only difficulty in the way of believing

this statement lies in the fact that he so seldom gave thanks for

anything.

The Royalist party now began to rally about their sovereign. Charles II.

was crowned at Scone on the 1st January, 1651, and in due time an army,

which included many of the so-called Malignants, was ready for trying

conclusions once again with the terrible English General. And now for

the third time our author took up arms on behalf of the Stuarts. After

some months of endless marchings and counter-marchings, in which

Cromwell evidently endeavoured to provoke his enemies into a repetition

of the blunder by which they had lost the battle of Dunbar, the Scottish

forces found an opportunity of marching into England.

The latter, under David Lesley, had taken up a strong position on the

height of the Tor Wood, between Stirling and Falkirk, from which they

refused to be drawn out to battle; and Cromwell resolved to take up his

post on the other side of the Royalist army. Accordingly, he crossed the

Forth at Queensferry, and, after defeating an attempt to intercept him

at Inverkeithing, reached and occupied Perth. The way to England was now

open, and the Scottish army swiftly and silently entered upon it,

resolved to stake everything upon a great battle.

Sir Thomas Urquhart left his castle of Cromartie, and took part in this

expedition, though apparently he held no position of command in the

army, and was very much out of sympathy with many of those who journeyed

with him. Indeed, his unfortunate prejudices against the Presbyterian

and Covenanting party come out in the statement he makes, that many of

those who started out to smite "the Midianites and Philistines," when it

came to the push, managed to make their way home, "being loth to hazard

their precious persons, lest they should seem to trust to the arm of

flesh."[113] The mass of those, however, who formed the Scottish army

were of very different mettle, and the battle in which they staked and

lost everything was one of the fiercest in the whole of the great Civil

War.

The course of their journey southward was through Biggar and Carlisle,

and then through Lancashire. To their disappointment, they received no

great accession of Royalists, nor of any others who were inclined to

join them in the attempt to overthrow the Commonwealth. "They marched,"

says the historian, "under rigorous discipline, weary and uncheered,

south through Lancashire; had to dispute ... the Bridge of Warrington

with Lambert and Harrison, who attended them with horse-troops on the

left; Cromwell with the main army steadily advancing behind. They

carried the Bridge at Warrington; they summoned various Towns, but none

yielded; proclaimed their King, with all force of lungs and heraldry,

but none cried, God bless him. Summoning Shrewsbury, with the usual

negative response, they quitted the London road; bent southward towards

Worcester, a City of slight Garrison and loyal Mayor; there to entrench

themselves, and repose a little."[114] Yet but slight opportunity for

this was given them. The course taken by Cromwell was through York,

Nottingham, Coventry, and Stratford-on-Avon, and when he arrived at

Worcester with his army from Scotland, and with the county militias, who

had risen at his summons, his forces numbered over thirty thousand men

as against the enemy's sixteen thousand.

Meantime Sir Thomas Urquhart had taken up his quarters in Worcester, in

the house of a Mr Spilsbury, "a very honest sort of man, who had an

exceeding good woman to his wife." His luggage, which was stored in an

attic, consisted, besides "scarlet cloaks, buff suits, and arms of all

sorts," of seven large "portmantles," three of which were filled with

unpublished works in manuscript, and other valuable documents--the

amount of which he gives us in quires and quinternions, but which need

not be repeated here. "Peace hath her victories no less renowned than

war," sang Milton in his sonnet to the Lord General Cromwell; and

perhaps Sir Thomas Urquhart hoped, after achieving victory in war, to

win a second set of laurels by means of the contents of the three

"portmantles."

On the evening of the 3rd September, the anniversary of the battle of

Dunbar, and afterwards to be the date of Cromwell's own death, the

battle of Worcester was fought, and the Royalist cause utterly

shattered. "The fighting of the Scots," says Carlyle, "was fierce and

desperate. 'My Lord General did exceedingly hazard himself, riding up

and down in the midst of the fire; riding, himself in person, to the

Enemy's foot to offer them quarter, whereto they returned no answer but

shot.' The small Scotch Army, begirdled with overpowering force, and cut

off from help or reasonable hope, storms forth in fiery pulses, horse

and foot; charges now on this side of the River, now on that;--can on no

side prevail. Cromwell recoils a little, but only to rally and return

irresistible. The small Scotch Army is, on every side, driven in again.

Its fiery pulsings are but the struggles of death: agonies as of a lion

coiled in the folds of a boa. 'As stiff a contest,' says Cromwell, 'for

four or five hours as ever I have seen.'"[115]

The conquered lost six thousand men, and all their baggage and

artillery; and Charles only with difficulty, and after many romantic

adventures, succeeded in escaping to the Continent when the fight was

over. Ten thousand prisoners, including eleven of the Scottish nobility,

were taken. The sufferings of many of these brave men were severe in the

extreme. Some perished from want of food and from gaol diseases, and

large numbers of the survivors were shipped for the plantations, and

sold as slaves.

Sir Thomas Urquhart, and, apparently, more than one of his brothers,

were among the prisoners, but appeared to have fared better than many of

their companions in arms. The greatest of the misfortunes that fell upon

him was, in his estimation, the sad fate that overtook his precious

manuscripts. The whole story, related in his own inimitable style, may

be read in Chapter VI. It is enough to say here that a party of

marauders broke into his quarters in search of valuables, that they

forced open the "portmantles" and turned their contents out upon the

floor, and afterwards carried off the papers to use them for wrapping up

articles of plunder, and for lighting their pipes. Fortunately some

bundles of these papers were afterwards picked up in the streets and

brought back to him, and in due time found their way to the printer's.

After the battle of Worcester, Sir Thomas Urquhart and some of the other

Scottish gentlemen who had been taken prisoners there were confined in

the Tower of London. He seems to have speedily gained the favour of his

captors, and to have been treated with remarkable leniency. Indeed, he

speaks in terms of affectionate respect of various officers of the

Parliamentary army from whom he had received kindness, and acknowledges

courtesies extended towards him by the Lord General himself. Thus he

places on record his indebtedness to a "most generous gentleman, Captain

Gladmon," for speaking in his favour to the Protector. And of another,

whom he calls the Marshal-General, in whose charge he had been placed,

he has set down the praise in the following elaborate sentence:--"The

kindly usage of the Marshal-General, Captain Alsop, whilst I was in his

custody, I am bound in duty so to acknowledge, that I may without

dissimulation avouch, for courtesies conferred on such as were within

the verge of his authority, and fidelity to those by whom he was

intrusted with their tuition [oversight of them] in that restraint, that

never any could by his faithfulness to the one and loving carriage to

the other bespeak himself more a gentleman, nor in the discharge of that

military place acquit himself with a more universally-deserved applause

and commendation."[116]

The severity of his imprisonment was soon abated; and he was removed

from the Tower to Windsor Castle,[117] and not long after, by the orders

of Cromwell, was paroled _de die in diem_.[118] The comparative liberty

he now enjoyed enabled him to repair the loss of his manuscripts after

the battle of Worcester, and he set himself to make the best of the

fragments he had recovered, and to prepare them for publication, as well

as to compose new material. A paragraph in the Epilogue of one of his

works, in which he describes his warm appreciation of the measure of

freedom he now enjoyed, is worth quoting. "That I, whilst a prisoner,"

he says, "was able to digest and write this Treatise, is an effect

meerly proceeding from the courtesie of my Lord General Cromwel, by

whose recommendation to the Councel of State my parole being taken for

my true imprisonment, I was by their favour enlarged to the extent of

the lines of London's communication; for had I continued as before,

coopt up within walls, or yet been attended still by a guard, as for a

while I was, should the house of my confinement have never been so

pleasant, or my keepers a very paragon of discretion, and that the

conversation of the best wits in the world, with affluence of all manner

of books, should have been allowed me for the diversion of my minde, yet

such all antipathie I have to any kinde of restraint wherein myself is

not entrusted, that notwithstanding these advantages, which to some

spirits would make a jayl seem more delicious then [than] freedom

without them, it could not in that eclipse of liberty lie in my power to

frame myself to the couching of one sillable, or contriving of a fancie

worthy the labour of putting pen to paper, no more then [than] a

nightingale can warble it in a cage, or linet in a dungeon."[119]

Another friend whom Sir Thomas Urquhart found in the time of need was

the celebrated Roger Williams, the apostle of civil and religious

liberty, and the founder of the settlement of Providence, Rhode Island,

and missionary to the Indians. In the Epilogue to the _Logopandecteision_

he thus acknowledges his obligations to him: "[I cannot] forget my

thankfulness to that reverend preacher Mr Roger Williams of Providence,

in New England, for the manifold favours wherein I stood obliged to him

above a whole month before either of us had so much as seen other, and

that by his frequent and earnest solicitation in my behalf of the most

especial members both of the Parliament and Councel of State; in doing

whereof he appeared so truely generous, that when it was told him how I,

having got notice of his so undeserved respect towards me, was desirous

to embrace some sudden opportunity whereby to testifie the affection I

did owe him, he purposely delayed the occasion of meeting with me till

he had, as he said, performed some acceptable office worthy of my

acquaintance; in all which, both before and after we had conversed with

one another, and by those many worthy books set forth by him, to the

advancement of piety and good order, with some whereof he was pleased to

present me, he did prove himself a man of such discretion and

inimitably-sanctified parts, that an Archangel from heaven could not

have shown more goodness with less ostentation."[120]

The years 1652 and 1653 form a period of astonishing literary activity

on the part of our author, for no fewer than five separate works were

then published by him, two of which were of very considerable bulk. The

motive that had led him to bring out his two former works--the

_Epigrams_ and _The Trissotetras_--had been a desire to benefit mankind

and to advance the glory of his native land. But now he had to consider

his own interests, and to exert himself to promote them. Accordingly,

his present aim was to convince his captors of his extraordinary merits

and gifts, and of the incomparable glory of that family which he had the

honour of representing.

In 1652 he issued his PANTOCHRONOCHANON; _or, a Peculiar Promptuary

of Time_, of which a detailed description is given in Chapter V. The

object of this treatise is to show the Protector and the English

Parliament that the family of the Urquharts could be traced back, link

by link, to the red earth out of which Adam was made, and to suggest how

lamentable it would be, if the ruling power extinguished a race which

had successfully resisted the scythe of Time, and was capable of

rendering great services to the State.

This small treatise was closely followed by a more important production,

upon which Sir Thomas's fame as an author largely rests--his

EKSKYBALAURON; _or, The Discovery of a most Exquisite Jewel_. The

title of this work is intended to be an abbreviation of a Greek

phrase--"_Gold from a dunghill_"--and contains an allusion to the fact

that the first half of it was, in its manuscript form, one of the

bundles of paper which the soldiers treated with such disrespect after

the battle of Worcester, and which, indeed, was found next day in a

kennel of one of the streets of that city. This book, a fuller account

of which we give later on, consists of an introduction to a work on a

Universal Language, to which is added a rhapsodical panegyric on the

Scottish nation, and an account of his fellow-countrymen who had been

famous as scholars or soldiers during the previous fifty years.

In the course of the early part of 1652 Urquhart had in some way excited

the suspicions of the Government, and in the month of May his papers

were seized by the authorities. Nothing treasonable, however, was found

among them, and probably the harmless character of his pursuits, which

was thus brought to light, made a favourable impression upon the Council

of State. For, a few weeks later, he was allowed, in answer to a

petition which he presented to the Council, and which was referred to

Cromwell, to return to Scotland to arrange his private affairs, and to

be absent for five months.[121] The only condition imposed upon him was

that during this time he should do nothing to the prejudice of the

Commonwealth.

Sir Thomas Urquhart's creditors had been told that he had been killed

at the battle of Worcester, and, as he says in his own characteristic

way, "for gladness of the tidings [they] had madified [moistened] their

nolls to some purpose with the liquor of the grape,"[122] and had

possessed themselves of all his property. When they were assured by

letters from himself that he was still alive, they claimed payment for

debts which had been long discharged, under the impression that the

receipts had perished along with other papers after the battle. They

even plotted, we are assured, to arrest our author in London, after he

had been liberated upon parole. By the thoughtful discretion of a

Captain Goodwin, of Colonel Pride's regiment, the receipts in question

had been saved out of the spoil of Worcester, and Sir Thomas Urquhart

was able to display them to the unjust creditors. "And when," he says,

"they saw that those their acquittances ... were produced before them,

they then, looking as if their noses had been ableeding, could not any

longer for shame retard my cancelling of the aforesaid bonds."[123]

In the midst of so many complaints of the iniquity of creditors, it is

gratifying to find Sir Thomas acknowledging that there was one of that

class who treated him with forbearance and even with kindness. His

thankfulness at discovering this green oasis in the arid desert in which

so much of his life had been passed, is expressed in his own

characteristic way. "But may," he says, "William Robertson of Kindeasse,

or rather _Kindnesse_ (for so they call this worthy man), for his going

contrary to that stream of wickedness which carryeth head-long his

fellow-creditors to the black sea of un-christian-like dealing, enjoy a

long life in this world, attended with health, wealth, a hopeful

posterity, and all the happiness conducible to eternal salvation; and

may his children after him, as heires both of his vertues and means,

derive [transmit] his lands and riches to their sons, to continue

successively in that line from generation to generation, so long as

there is a hill in Scotland, or that the sea doth ebbe and flow. This

hearty wish of mine, as chief of my kinred [kindred], I bequeath to all

that do and are to carry the name of Urquhart, and adjure them, by the

respect they owe to the stock whence they are descended, for my father's

love and mine to this man, to do all manner of good offices to each one

that bears the name of Robertson."[124]

His old enemy, Lesley of Findrassie, endeavoured in vain to persuade the

officers of the English garrison, then stationed in Urquhart's house at

Cromartie, to arrest him as a prisoner of war, and keep him in

confinement "till he [Lesley] were contented in all his demands."[125]

An attempt was also made to apprehend him at Elgin; but he escaped all

these machinations, and, after travelling in safety through many of the

principal towns of Scotland, returned to London within the specified

time, and gave himself up to the Council of State.

In the course of the year 1653 Sir Thomas Urquhart published the last of

his original works--his _Logopandecteision_, and the translation of the

first two books of Rabelais, in connection with which his name is best

known. The object of the former of these was to suggest a wonderful

scheme for a universal language, with the idea of being restored by the

Government to the full possession of his liberty, and of being

reinstated in the position of power and wealth, which he maintained was

his by hereditary right, in order to carry out the scheme. His hopes and

anticipations of success in this appeal to the English Government were

not daunted by the fact that to do what he required would need several

legislative changes, a reversal of proceedings in Scottish courts of

law, and a substantial grant from the Treasury. This, after all, he

considered, was a very small price to pay for the benefits he would

thereby confer upon the world. That the appeal was not successful needs

scarcely be told. Probably in no country in the world, and at no period

in history, could any be found more likely to turn a deaf ear to such

requests, than such men as Cromwell, Fleetwood, and Overton. Men like

these were too practical, and of too hard a nature, to be impressed by

any such visionary schemes as those which their prisoner delighted in

constructing.

A veil of obscurity hangs over the closing years of our author's life.

His last appearance before the public was in the issuing of the books

above mentioned. The only further record of him is in the continuation

of the Pedigree of the Urquharts, which is contained in the Edinburgh

edition of his Tracts. In this we read that "he was confined for several

years in the Tower of London; from whence he made his escape, and went

beyond seas, where he died suddenly in a fit of excessive laughter, on

being informed by his servant that the King was restored."[126] If this

account of matters be true, it would seem that Sir Thomas had forfeited

some of those privileges which he had won so soon after he had become a

State prisoner. It is quite possible that this was in consequence of

having joined in some Royalist plot against the Commonwealth and for the

restoration of Charles II.

In the preface to the second book of Rabelais, Sir Thomas promises very

speedily to translate the three remaining books of that author, so that

the whole "Pentateuch of Rabelais," as he calls it, might be in the

hands of English readers. But this design was never completed. The

translation of the third book was found among his papers, and was

published in 1693 by Pierre Antoine Motteux, but it is probable that the

editor himself had some share in the work as issued to the public.

Sir Theodore Martin considers that there is a strong presumption against

the truth of the above account of Sir Thomas's death, in his entire

silence during the long period which elapsed between the publication of

his last work and 1660, the date of the Restoration of Charles II.

"Men," he says, "so deeply smitten with the _cacoëthes scribendi_ as

Urquhart was, do not thus readily cast the pen aside; nor was the lack

of a publisher likely to have stood in the way of his literary career.

His writings, if for no other cause but the number of his friends, must

always have been a safe speculation for a printer, at a time when

printing was cheap and readers numerous. But the imperfect state of his

translation of Rabelais is perhaps the best evidence of the inaccuracy

of the current belief.... Motteux says that Urquhart's version 'was too

kindly received not to encourage him to English the three remaining

books, or at least the third, the fourth and fifth being in a manner

distinct, as being Pantagruel's voyage. Accordingly he translated the

third book, and would have finished the whole, had not death prevented

him.' This bears hard against the supposition of that event having

occurred upwards of six years after the two first books had been given

to the world. It is probable that he died much sooner, a victim in all

likelihood to that fiery restlessness of spirit,

'Which o'er-informs its tenement of clay,

And frets the pigmy body to decay.'"[127]

This conjecture is, however, improbable. A petition from our author's

brother, Sir Alexander Urquhart, is still in existence, in which he asks

for a new commission of hereditary Sheriffship of Cromartie to be made

out for him, on the ground of his being the eldest surviving son of the

Sir Thomas Urquhart who died in 1642.[128] Though this document is

undated, it is assigned by the editor of the volume of State Papers in

which it is to be found, to August of 1660. If this date be

trustworthy, we may be almost sure that the traditional statement as to

the year of our author's death is correct.

The cause of his giving up his literary labours, and of omitting to

carry through the work of translation on which he had entered, is, of

course, unknown to us. His health, physical or mental, may have become

seriously impaired, or his spirits may have been too much depressed by

the misfortunes that crowded upon him, to allow him to engage in

literary work. Indeed, the alleged cause of death from violent agitation

of feeling caused by hearing of the Restoration of Charles II., argues

in itself a previous condition of great physical weakness.

There seems at first, a certain grotesqueness in such a fatal exuberance

of joy in connexion with such an event as Charles II. regaining the

crown which his father had lost, and of which in another generation all

of his blood were to be deprived. But we have to keep in mind that Sir

Thomas was not alone in his folly, if folly it were; for a great wave of

exultation swept over the three kingdoms at that time. Our author had,

like many of his fellow-Royalists, staked and lost everything he

possessed in the defence of the House of Stuart, and one can have little

difficulty in understanding how the announcement of the triumph of the

cause, which was so dear to him, should have agitated him

profoundly.[129]

Sir Alexander Urquhart failed to recover possession of either the barony

or the Sheriffship of Cromartie, and a year after the supposed date of

his petition, he is said to have ratified his cousin's rights,[130] and

in 1663 he formally "disponed" the estate (_i.e._ his title to it) to

Sir John.[131] The new possessors were, however, as unfortunate as

their immediate predecessors, for in no very long time they were

overwhelmed by distresses like those which had burdened and embittered

the lives of our author and his father. In 1682 the celebrated Sir

George Mackenzie, whose name, like that of Queen Mary of England, is

usually associated with an unenviable epithet, as that of a cruel

persecutor,[132] "apprized" the estate from Sir John's[133] son,

Jonathan.[134]

No one who knows what this means[135] will be surprised to hear that it

soon afterwards passed into his possession. On his elevation to the

peerage (1685) as Viscount Tarbat, first Earl of Cromartie, he put his

third-born son, Sir Kenneth, into possession of the estate, with the

view of establishing a branch of his family to be known as the

Mackenzies of Cromartie. This plan was doomed to be defeated, for Sir

Kenneth's son George had no family, and sold the estate to Captain

William Urquhart of Meldrum in 1741.[136] The lands were again sold to

Patrick, Lord Elibank,[137] in 1763, and by him to George Ross of

Pitkerrie, nine years afterwards. Mr Ross had amassed a large fortune in

England as an army agent,[138] and part of this he expended in the

purchase of the estate, and in the extensive improvements which he

effected in it. One wishes he had not thought it desirable to pull down

the picturesque old castle, which had stood on the mote-hill of

Cromartie for three hundred years, and which had sheltered so many

generations of the Urquhart family. Let us now, however, return to our

author.

In telling the story of Sir Thomas Urquhart's life, some of his most

striking peculiarities have been displayed and illustrated, so that no

one who has read the foregoing pages is altogether dependent upon what

may now be said for forming an estimate of his character. His vanity is

perhaps the most striking trait in it; but only a very hard-hearted

moralist would call it a vice in his case, for it is as artless as it is

boundless, and is combined with so much kindness of heart and generosity

of feeling, that we are more entertained by it than indignant at it. No

one who looks into his works can doubt the intensity of his patriotism.

Indeed, his passionate longing after personal fame is in all cases

combined with the wish to confer additional glory upon the land of his

birth. His devotion to the Royalist cause[139] is of the purest and most

heroic type, and the general tone of his character, as revealed to us in

his books, is elevated and noble. At the same time there is an element

of the grotesque in it, so that in his disinterested and chivalrous

disposition he reminds us of Don Quixote,[140] while in his frequent

allusions to struggles with pecuniary difficulties, as well as in his

use of magniloquent language, he distinctly recalls Wilkins Micawber. A

lively fancy, a strain of genuine erudition beneath his pedantry, and

some sparks of insanity, are other elements in his fantastical

character. Only a mind like his own could trace the maze of its windings

and turnings, and fathom the depths of its eccentricity. In his thoughts

"truth is constantly becoming interfused with fiction, possibility with

certainty, and the hyperbolical extravagance of his style only keeps

even pace with the prolific shootings of his imagination."[141]

It is perhaps expected that one should, in a measure, apologize for the

eccentricities of Urquhart's character and literary style, by explaining

that he was a humourist. But, unfortunately, humour is a quality in

which Urquhart was lacking, unless we understand by the word mere

fantastical quaintness of thought and speech. In one passage of his

works he speaks with contempt of "shallow-brained humourists,"[142] and

we should wrong his ghost by putting him among those whom he abhorred.

Not a single trace of that subtle, graceful play of fancy and of feeling

which enters into our conception of humour is to be found in his

works.[143] His readers may smile as they turn over his pages, but he

is always in deadly earnest. The quality of wit he occasionally

manifests in the form of keen sarcasm, when he gives full vent to his

feelings of scorn and contempt; as when, for example, he describes those

who went out to fight, "but did not hazard their precious persons, lest

they should seem to trust to the arm of flesh."[144]

He can never give a simple statement of matters of fact. Thus in his

account of the Admirable Crichton, instead of saying that the rector of

the university addressed a few complimentary sentences to Crichton, and

that the latter replied in the same vein, he says: "In complements after

this manner, _ultro citroque habitis_, tossed to and again, retorted,

contrerisposted, backreverted, and now and then graced with a quip or a

clinch for the better relish of the ear, being unwilling in this kind of

straining curtesie to yeeld to other, they spent a full half-hour and

more."[145] Everything must be dressed up "with divers quaint and

pertinent similes" before it is fit to be introduced to the reader's

notice. To quote again from the most accomplished literary critic who

has written upon him: "History, philosophy, science, literature are

ransacked for illustrations of the commonest subject. His fancy is ever

on the alert, and you are constantly surprised by some incongruous

image, begotten in its wanton dalliance with knowledge the most

heterogeneous. He has always an eye to effect. His own learning must be

brought into play, rhetorical tropes must flourish through his periods,

'suggesting to our minds two several things at once,' and, of course, as

diverse as possible, that 'the spirits of such as are studious in

learning may be filled with a most wonderful delight.'"[146] His style

reacts upon and controls his thoughts, and often carries him, as

Ariosto's Hippogriff carried Astolfo, up into the skies, whither those

are unable to follow him who are mounted on humbler animals, or have no

other means than those with which they were born for plodding along the

dusty roads of earth.

If we can trust the two engraved portraits of Sir Thomas Urquhart which

have come down to us, he was a man of handsome presence, and accustomed

to deck himself in all the splendour of costume to which so many of his

brother-cavaliers were addicted. George Glover, the famous engraver,

drew both the portraits of him which are extant. One of these appears as

a frontispiece to the _Epigrams_ and to the _Trissotetras_. It is a

small whole-length, and represents Sir Thomas in rich dress,[147]

holding out his hand to receive from some allegorical personage a

laurel wreath "for Armes and Artes."[148] On a table beside him are his

hat and embroidered cloak. In the vacant spaces on each side of the

upper part of the figure are his name and titles: "S^r Thomas Urchard,

Knight, of Bray and Udol, etc., Baron of Ficherie and Clohorby, etc.,

Laird Baron of Cromartie and Heritable Sheriff thereof, etc." The

portrait is described as taken from the life, and engraved in 1641;[149]

and beneath it is a couplet by W. S., as follows:

"Of him whose shape this Picture hath design'd,

Vertue and learning represent the Mind."

Who W. S. was we do not know. The date forbids our identifying him with

the Bard of Avon. He was probably one of those mysterious personages,

who were always at hand to write epistles of commendation to works by

Sir Thomas, and to testify on their "book-oath" to his gifts and graces.

The second engraved portrait is of great rarity, and only one impression

of it is known to be in existence. It was probably meant to be a

frontispiece to the unpublished volume of Epigrams described on p. 116,

the title of which was to have been _Apollo and the Muses_, but which

never found its way into print. In this engraving Sir Thomas is depicted

as seated with great complacency upon Mount Parnassus, in the midst of

the Muses, seven of whom are pressing upon his attention wreaths of

laurel of which he is worthy, "for Judgment, Learning, witt, Invention,

sweetness, stile." At his feet is the sacred fountain of Castalia or

Hippocrene, into the waters of which the other two Muses are sportively

dipping "sprinklers" or asperges. One of them seems inclined to give Sir

Thomas a sprinkling, but refrains, either because it was unnecessary or

for fear of spoiling his nice clothes. In the background, the winged

horse Pegasus is flying sufficiently low down to allow a woman to pluck

a couple of feathers from his wings.[150] These are no doubt intended

to provide pens for Sir Thomas's next literary undertaking. In the

further distance are several feathered creatures, which are probably

meant for poetical swans, but which bear a painful likeness to prosaic

geese. At the foot of the picture in one corner we have Apollo, playing

on his lyre; and on the ground in front are a half-starved dragon and a

snake, writhing in impotent rage, as they witness the triumph of Sir

Thomas. We can hardly be mistaken in concluding that these last are

symbolical representations of envious and carping critics.

[Illustration: The Poet surrounded by the Muses.]

FOOTNOTES:

[97] _Antiquarian Notes_, by C. Fraser-Mackintosh, p. 156.

[98] _Antiquarian Notes_, pp. 155-158; _History of the Clan Mackenzie_,

by Alex. Mackenzie.

[99] The enactment in question runs as follows:--"It being thought

expedient by the said Committee that the house of Cromartie be put in a

posture of defence, and that for the doing thereof it is requisite some

faill [turf] be cast and led, the said Committee ordains all Sir James

Fraser's tenants within the parochins [parishes] of Cromartie and

Cullicudden, together with those of the Laird of Findrassie, within the

parochin of Rosemarkie, to afford from six hours in the morning to six

hours at night, one horse out of every oxengait [= about 13 Scotch

acres] daily for the space of four days to lead the same faill to the

house of Cromartie." Of this enemy, Sir James Fraser, our author

remarked at a later time with regrettable bitterness, that he knew only

one good thing about him, and that was that he was dead.

[100] _Acts of the Parliament of Scotland_, vi. 392.

[101] _General Assembly Commission Records_, 1648-49, p. 220.

[102] _General Assembly Commission Records_, 1648-49, pp. 249, 250.

[103] _General Assembly Commission Records_, 1648-49, pp. 252-262.

[104] Strangely enough, in Hope's _Anastasius_, a Tatar messenger

travelling through Asia Minor to Constantinople is described as acting

in the same insolent manner. "He would not," says Anastasius, "even

after the daintiest meal in the world, forego the douceur he expected

for what he used to call the wear and tear of his teeth" (ii. 320).

[105] An account of the battle is given in a letter addressed by the

victorious generals, Ker, Halket, and Strachan, to the Moderator of the

Commission of Assembly, dated 9th May, 1649. In it they say: "We were in

Innernes vpon Sunday at night, when we received intelligence that the

enemie were come from Torespay to Balvine, presently to discusse ws

(_sic_). We could not hear from the Livetennent-Generall [Lesley], and

the enemy was making himselfe strong in many severall quarters in [the]

countrie. We conceived it better to suppresse nor [than] to be

suppressed. We in our weak maner beged the Lords direction, that His

blissing might wait His owne and our labours, and, with great freedome

concluded to march with all expedition to Torispay, intelligence having

come certaine that they were lyeing in Balveine at a wood, where we

engaged with them; and there the Lord delivered them vnto our hands. We

were not abone six score fighting horsemen and tuelfe muskiteires. We

had some more, but they were wearied. We have at this tyme about 800

prisoners, betuixt 3 or 4 scoir killed, and tuo or thrie hundred fled.

My Lord Rae and all the officers are, according to the capitulatioun,

prisoners; the rest are to be conveyed to their countrey, after we

receive order from the publick; and therefore we shall expect such

further directions from you as you shall thinke fit, for securing and

obliging, by oath, such as shall returne to their countrey" (_General

Assembly Commission Records_, 1618-49, p. 263). There is a genuine

Cromwellian ring about the phrases "beged the Lord's direction," and

"the Lord delivered them vnto our hands," which we cannot help admiring;

and there is a beauty of its own in the phrase "with great freedome" in

the connection in which it stands.

[106] Wardlaw MS.

[107] The Commission of the General Assembly is each year nominated by

that body, and is responsible to it, and is empowered to dispose of all

items of business remitted to it, and to act in the interests of the

Church during the months between the meeting of the Assembly which

nominated them, and that to which they report their proceedings. They

are authorised to meet on certain specific days, and oftener, when and

where they think fit. The next General Assembly may reverse their

sentences, if they have exceeded their powers, or have acted in any way

which is considered prejudicial to the interests of the Church.

[108] _General Assembly Records_, 1648-49, p. 264.

[109] _General Assembly Records_, 1648-49, p. 270. The instructions

given to the Commissioners suggest the process known to us in modern

times as "rubbing it in" (the phrase is a technical one).

[110] In March of the following year, 1650, occurred the descent of

Montrose on the north of Scotland, which ended so disastrously for him.

After spending a few weeks in the Orkneys, where he collected a few

recruits, he landed in Caithness, and proceeded into Sutherland, where

he suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Strachan and Halket, the

generals who had successfully suppressed the insurrection in the north

in the previous year. Montrose was taken prisoner, and was executed in

Edinburgh, on Tuesday, 21st May, 1650.

[111] Baillie's _Letters_ (Edinburgh, 1841), ii. 84.

[112] Robert Douglas (1594-1674) had been chaplain to a brigade of

Scottish auxiliaries, sent with the connivance of Charles I. to the aid

of Gustavus Adolphus, in the Thirty Years' War. He was minister of the

second charge of the High Church, Edinburgh, and then of the Tolbooth

Church, and was five times Moderator of the General Assembly (1642,

1645, 1647, 1649, and 1651). Wodrow says, "He was a great man for both

great wit, and grace, and more than ordinary boldness and authority and

awful majesty appearing in his very carriage and countenance." Burnet

affirms that he had "much wisdom and thoughtfulness, but was very silent

and of vast pride" (_Dictionary of Nat. Biog._ xv. 347).

[113] _Works_, p. 279.

[114] Carlyle's _Oliver Cromwell_, iii. 148.

[115] Carlyle's _Oliver Cromwell_, iii. 154.

[116] _Works_, p. 408.

[117] _Cal. State Papers, Dom._

[118] _Ibid._

[119] _Works_, p. 408.

[120] _Works_, p. 419. Roger Williams (c. 1600-c. 1684) was himself a

remarkable man. He was a native of Wales, was educated at Oxford, and

entered into holy orders; but his aversion to the government and

discipline of the Church of England led him to seek for greater freedom

in America. He was a strenuous asserter of religious toleration at a

time when it was little understood and less practised anywhere. His

liberty of thinking and speaking led to his being banished from

Massachusetts; and, thereupon, he purchased a tract of land from the

Indians, and founded a settlement, which he named Providence. At the

time when he generously interceded in favour of Sir Thomas Urquhart, he

was residing in London as the agent of the new settlement, of which he

was afterwards chosen president. He was on intimate terms with Cromwell,

Milton, and other leading Puritans, and consequently would be in a

position to render great service to his friend Urquhart.

[121] The leave granted was for five months from the 14th of July, 1652.

Before the expiration of this time, Sir Thomas asked for liberty to stay

for six weeks longer in Scotland, and this was granted (_Acts of

Parliament_, vol. vi. pt. 2, p. 748_b_).

[122] _Works_, p. 377.

[123] _Ibid._ p. 378.

[124] _Works_, p. 384.

[125] _Ibid._ p. 380.

[126] P. 37.

[127] _Rabelais_, p. xiv.

[128] _Cal. State Papers, Domestic_, 1660-61, p. 237.

[129] In the preface to a new translation of Rabelais by W. F. Smith,

Esq., Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge, some doubt is cast upon

the above narrative of Sir Thomas's death. Mr Smith remarks, "This looks

something like an imitation of Rabelais in his account of the death of

Philemon." The reference is to the following passages in Rabelais, who

alludes to the story no fewer than three times. In Book i. 10, we read:

"Just so the heart with excessive joy is inwardly dilated, and suffereth

a manifest resolution of the vital spirits, which may go so farre on,

that it may thereby be deprived of its nourishment, and by consequence

of life itself, by this Pericharie or extremity of gladnesse, as Galen

saith ... and as it hath come to passe in former times ... to Philemon

and others, who died with joy." In chap. xx. some more particulars are

given of the case: "As Philemon, who, for seeing an asse eate those

figs, which were provided for his own dinner, died with force of

laughing." But in Book iv. 17, we are told the whole story: "[Neither

ought you to wonder at] the death of Philomenes, whose servant, having

got him some new figs for the first course of his dinner, whilst he went

to fetch wine, a straggling ... ass got into the house, and, seeing the

figs on the table, without further invitation, soberly fell to.

Philomenes coming into the room, and nicely observing with what gravity

the ass eat its dinner, said to his man, who was come back, 'Since thou

hast set figs here for this reverend guest of ours to eat, methinks it

is but reason thou also give him some of this wine to drink.' He had no

sooner said this, but he was so excessively pleased, and fell into so

exorbitant a fit of laughter, that the use of his spleen took that of

his breath utterly away, and he immediately died." The story is taken

from Lucian (makrobiui, c. 25) or from Valerius Maximus (ix. 12), in

which in the Paris folio edition (1517) the name is given as Philomenes.

There is undoubtedly a resemblance between the account of Philemon's

death and that of our author, but we think it can only be accidental.

The editor of the Edinburgh edition of the Tracts is, as I have said,

our only authority for the story of Urquhart's death; but there is no

adequate reason for doubting it. He seems to have been well versed in

the history of the Urquhart family, which he brings up to date, and must

have derived his information from some members of it. It would be

strange if in little more than a century after our author's death, an

utterly mythical account of it should have sprung up and found a place

among the details of family history. According to Lowndes's

_Bibliographer's Manual_, the editor of the volume was David Herd, the

well-known antiquary. If this statement be correct, we have all the more

reason to rely upon the supplementary information the volume contains,

as Herd's acquaintance with Scottish history and biography was very

extensive and accurate. In one of the _Notes Ambrosianæ_ (_Blackwood's

Magazine_, September, 1832), a highly extravagant version is given of

Urquhart's death. It is intended to be humorous, but is merely flat and

silly. Only those can smile at it who have been trained up to believe

that the _Notes_ contain exquisite humour, and who have, therefore, been

accustomed to welcome passages from it as mirth-inspiring. The statement

made in this mention of Urquhart, that his death was caused by excessive

alcoholic celebration of the happy event of the Restoration, is utterly

baseless and offensive; and it is a pity that in Allibone's _Dictionary_

and in the _Dictionary of National Biography_ this article in

_Blackwood's Magazine_ should be referred to as one of the sources of

information concerning Urquhart. The author of it had not access to any

other account of Sir Thomas's death than that given in the

above-mentioned edition of the Tracts.

[130] _Acts of Parliament_, vii. 70.

[131] _Inverness Sasines._ The date when Sir Alexander Urquhart received

knighthood seems to be approximately fixed by the fact that in a grant

under the Privy Seal of 5th March, 1661, he is called Alexander, and in

a notice of him of the 29th of the same month and year he appears as Sir

Alexander (_Acts of Parliament_, vii. 93). From the fact that in this

year the succession to the estates and hereditary Sheriffship of

Cromartie were entered upon by his cousin Sir John Urquhart of

Craigfintray, it was taken for granted by the editor of the Tracts

(Edinburgh, 1774) that Sir Alexander had died. This error is repeated by

Hugh Miller, and by most of those who have made any reference to him. He

was still alive in 1667, for during that year he sold his salmon

fishings in Over-rak and the King's Water to John Gordon (see also _Acts

of Parliament_, vii. 537). He is spoken of as _quondam_ in a charter of

certain lands which had belonged to him, 19th June, 1668. His cousin,

Sir John Urquhart, received knighthood about the same time; at least he

appears in Parliament as Sir John, 1st January, 1661 (_Acts of

Parliament_, vii. 4).

[132] "There was the Bluidy Advocate Mackenyie, who, for his worldly wit

and wisdom, had been to the rest as a god" ("Wandering Willie's Tale"

_Redgauntlet_, chap. xi.).

[133] There is said to have been some tragedy in connection with the

death of this Sir John Urquhart. According to Wodrow, as quoted by Hugh

Miller, after having posed as an ultra-Presbyterian, he became the

friend and counsellor of the Earl of Middleton, Charles II.'s

Commissioner for Scotland, under whom Presbyterianism was overturned and

Episcopacy set up in its place (1661). Tradition says that "about eleven

years after the passing of the Act, he fell into a deep melancholy, and

destroyed himself with his own sword in one of the apartments of the old

castle. The sword, it is said, was flung into a neighbouring draw-well

by one of the domestics, and the stain left by his blood on the walls

and floor of the apartment was distinctly visible at the time the

building was pulled down" (_Scenes and Legends of the North of

Scotland_, p. 111). Tradition is wrong, however, in saying eleven years

after 1661; for on August 7th, 1677, Sir John, along with others,

received a commission "for putting the laws against conventicles and

other disorders into execution" (_Wodrow_, ii. p. 366).

[134] On the death of Jonathan's son, Colonel James Urquhart, in 1741,

the shadowy honour of the headship of the family passed to the Urquharts

of Meldrum, who were descended from the Tutor of Cromartie by a third

marriage with Elizabeth Seton, only daughter of Alexander Seton of

Meldrum, and ultimately heiress of that estate. The last male

representative of this line was Major Beauchamp Colclough Urquhart, who

closed a promising career by a heroic death at the battle of Atbara, in

the Sudan, on 8th April, 1898. His sister, Isabel Annie, is wife of

Garden Alexander Duff, Esq., Hatton Castle, Turriff.

[135] See p. 58.

[136] Pococke, in his _Tour through Scotland_ (1761), says of the castle

of Cromartie: "It has fallen into the hands of one Mr Urquhart, who had

commanded a Spanish Gally, and died a Convert to Popery; which slip his

son, now eighteen years old, has in some degree recovered, by conforming

to the Church of England" (p. 176; _Scottish History Society_).

[137] In the old Statistical Account of Cromartie, and in the preface to

the Maitland Club edition of Urquhart's Works, the estate is said to

have passed into the hands of Sir William Pulteney.

[138] Mr Ross is mentioned in the _Letters_ of Junius (see those of 29th

November and 12th December, 1769). He was succeeded by his nephew, from

whom the present proprietor of Cromartie, Major Walter Charteris Ross,

is descended.

[139] Our Sir Thomas's memory should be cherished by defenders of the

name and fame of Mary Queen of Scots, for he goes so far as to say that

"ignorance, together with hypocrisie, usury, oppression, and iniquity,

took root in these parts [Scotland], when uprightness, plain-dealing,

and charity, with Astroea, took their flight with Queen Mary of Scotland

into England." Probably few of her admirers would be so daring as to

assert this, though many of them doubtless would be glad to hear the

assertion made.

[140] We take the liberty of extracting those few sentences from the

letter of a friend, who has taken great interest in the execution of

this work;--"Sir Thomas would have been an original character in almost

any surroundings--a kind of literary Quixote, with what may be called a

'parenthetical' genius, branching off at every comma into the fresh

images furnished by a teeming imagination. He was more than a translator

of Rabelais--he seems to have been a kind of Rabelais himself."

[141] Sir Theodore Martin, _Rabelais_, p. xix.

[142] See p. 28.

[143] A different opinion is expressed in the preface to W. Harrison

Ainsworth's capital novel of _Crichton_. "Sir Thomas," he says, "is a

joyous spirit--a right Pantagruelist; and if he occasionally

'Projicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba,'

he has an exuberance of wit and playfulness of fancy that amply redeem

his tendency to fanfaronade." Our readers have abundance of material

before them for coming to a decision upon this question.

[144] See p. 85.

[145] _Works_, p. 226.

[146] Sir Theodore Martin, _Rabelais_, p. xx.

[147] In Granger's _Biographical Dictionary_ (1779), this portrait is

described erroneously, as Sir Thomas Urquhart is said in it to be

dressed in armour. Probably the description was given from memory. In

the second volume of Bohn's edition of _Rabelais_, the frontispiece is a

half-length portrait of the translator, evidently reproduced from the

above. The effect, however, is highly disagreeable, and the likeness

must have produced an unfavourable opinion of our author in the minds of

most of those who have looked upon it.

[148] In this engraving, which is our frontispiece, the Greek

inscription runs thus: toist se pempsasiu kai prostatasiu eicharisto, and

means, "_I thank those who sent you and gave the order_." These words

are, of course, addressed to the messenger who has been commissioned by

the Muses to convey the wreath to Sir Thomas. Above the wreath itself is

an obscure phrase--Mousary[m] stolost--which is evidently a mixture of

Latin and Greek, musarum stolost (=apostolost?), "_messenger of the

muses_." It may, however, be that stolost is to be taken as "_equipment_"

or "_decoration_," as referring to the wreath. The courage with which

Greek and LaMousary[m] stolosttin forms are mixed up, and an old word

despatched on its way with a new meaning, of which this brief phrase

gives evidence, is highly characteristic of Cromartian Greek. For

further illustration of the peculiarities of this local variety or

Hellenic speech, see p. 149.

[149] Sir Thomas, therefore, claims by anticipation the titles of Baron

and Sheriff, which were afterwards to be his.

[150] This use of the quills is referred to in the following passage in

Sir Thomas Urquhart's _Epigrams_ (MS.):--

"The Invocation to Clio.

Book 2.

Wench wholly martial, to whose inspiration

The Colophonian Pöet ow'd his skill:

Let my verse merit no Lesse estimation,

Then [than] if the point of a Pegasid quill,

Dip'd in the sacred fontain Caballine,

Character'd the Impression of each Line."

The "Colophonian Poet" is--"not to put too fine a point upon it"--Homer,

who, according to some, was born at Colophos, in Asia Minor. The phrase

"Pegasid quill" in this passage strengthens our opinion that this second

portrait of Sir Thomas, which we give here, was intended to be a

frontispiece to a second volume of poems. The similarity of diction

between this "Invocation" and the speeches of Ancient Pistol is very

great.

CHAPTER IV

EPIGRAMS: DIVINE AND MORAL, AND THE

TRISSOTETRAS

In 1641, Sir Thomas Urquhart published his first work--a volume of

poems, entitled "EPIGRAMS: DIVINE AND MORAL,"[151] and dedicated to the

Marquis of Hamilton. The poems are divided into three books, two of

which contain forty-five epigrams, while the third contains forty-four.

Most of them are in iambic pentameters, and are for the greater part

sextets in form; but though the versification is occasionally smooth,

these compositions do little credit to the Muse who inspired them. They

are, without an exception, pointless; and an epigram without a point is

about as useless and exasperating as a needle without one.[152] It is

somewhat remarkable that in his prose compositions the imagination of

Sir Thomas seems quite unfettered, while in his poems it is under some

such restraining influence as a strait-waistcoat is said to exercise

upon a certain class of patients.

A wild legend, the origin of which is unknown, but which is utterly

baseless, asserts that Urquhart "was laureated poet at Paris before he

was three and twenty years of age."[153] We could hardly conceive of any

responsible authorities being so far "left to themselves" as to do a

deed like this. The story may be either the misapplication to Urquhart

of some vague tradition of one of the feats of his hero, the Admirable

Crichton, or of what he himself has actually recorded of the poet,

Arthur Johnston.[154]

A modern critic, who has given Urquhart a full measure of praise, finds

himself unable to say a word in favour of his poems. "This slender

volume," he remarks, "gives not the slightest promise of talent. Its

stanzas are indistinguished and indistinguishable. There is no reason

why anyone should have written them, but, on the other hand, there is no

reason why anyone should not. They express the usual commonplaces: the

inevitableness of death, and the worth of endeavour. A mildly Horatian

sentiment is dressed up in the tattered rags of Shakespearianism, and

the surprise is that the author, whose prose is restrained by no

consideration of sound or sense, should have deemed it worth while to

print so tame a collection of exercises."[155]

A favourable specimen of the _Epigrams_ is the following from the first

book:--

"HOW DIFFICULT A THING IT IS TO TREAD IN THE PATHES

OF VERTUE.

"The way to vertue's hard, uneasie, bends

Aloft, being full of steep and rugged alleys;

For never one to a higher place ascends,

That always keeps the plaine, and pleasant valleyes:

And reason in each human breast ordaines

That precious things be purchased with paines."

Or take this from the opposite page:--

"WHEN A TRUE FRIEND MAY BE BEST KNOWNE.

"As the glow-worme shines brightest in the darke

And frankincense smells sweetest in the fire;

So crosse adventures make us best remarke

A sincere friend from a dissembled lyer;

For some, being friends to our prosperity,

And not to us, when it failes, they decay."

The fault of obscurity, of which the poet Browning has been accused,

could not be laid to the charge of Sir Thomas Urquhart. Nor can it be

said of him that he neglects truths that are obvious, and occupies

himself in discovering and bringing forward those that are recondite.

The sentiments to which he gives utterance seem those which

spontaneously occur to the average mind; on reading the subject of the

poem, as given in the title, and then the poem itself, we think

"A said whot a owt to 'a said,"

and we come away without any feverish mental agitation or accelerated

movement of pulse.[156]

The sentiments which, from his own account, had, on more occasions than

one, filled his mind, are expressed in the piece entitled "THE GENEROUS

SPEECH OF A NOBLE CAVALLIER AFTER HE HAD DISARMED HIS ADVERSARY AT THE

SINGLE COMBAT." They are as follows:--

"Though with my raper, for the guerdon

Your fault deserveth, I may pierce ye,

Your penitence in craving pardon,

Transpassions my revenge in mercy;

And wills me both to end this present strife,

And give you leave in peace t' enjoy your life."

Another Epigram, which one critic regards as Urquhart's _chef d'oeuvre_

in this kind of composition, is the following:--

"Take _man_ from _woman_, all that she can show

Of her own proper, is nought else but _wo_."[157]

In a letter of commendation prefixed to his next work, _The

Trissotetras_, Sir Thomas Urquhart says of himself: "This Mathematicall

tractate doth no lesse bespeak him a good Poet and Orator, then [than]

by his elaboured poems he hath showne himselfe already a good

Philosopher and Mathematician." This self-criticism is all that could be

desired. A work on mathematics that proves an author's possession of

poetical and rhetorical gifts, and a volume of poetry which leads one to

think that the singer is an accomplished mathematician, are gifts with

which the world is but seldom favoured, and as it is likely that their

merits will not instantly be observed, the zeal of the author in calling

our attention to them is by no means unnecessary. But when he goes on to

say, still speaking of himself in the third person, "The Muses never yet

inspired sublimer conceptions in a more refined stile then [than] is to

be found in the accurate strain of his most ingenious Epigrams," we feel

that he is less felicitous. His first shot has hit the blank, but the

second is wide of the target altogether.

In his dedication of the volume to "the Marquis of Hamilton, Earle of

Arren and Cambridge, etc.," he describes its contents as "but flashes of

wit." A modern reader will probably, however, be inclined to think that

this modest opinion of them is far too flattering. At times there is a

faint suggestion of a possible gleam of brightness, but this is

instantly followed by Egyptian darkness, and one is reminded of a

revolving light that has somehow gone wrong.

The volume closes with the somewhat liturgical formula, "Here end the

first three Bookes of Sir Thomas Vrchard's Epigrams," and with a

doxology, the latter being almost the only trace of matter in it to

justify the use of "Divine" in the title. The author was evidently

prepared to go on with more "bookes" of the kind, if he got any

encouragement from publishers or public, but, probably, both thought it

about time for him to stop. The fact that, in five years after this

volume of poems had appeared, a second edition should apparently have

been brought out, would seem at first to indicate that there must have

been some little run upon the _Epigrams_. But the truth of the matter

is, that one "William Leake" had evidently got the "remainder," and

issued them in 1646 with a new title-page.

In the Introductory Notice to Sir Theodore Martin's edition of Rabelais,

some information is given concerning a folio volume of unpublished

Epigrams by Urquhart, which is still in existence.[158] It consists of

ten books, called after Apollo and the Muses, each containing 110

Epigrams, except the last, which has 113. The MS. is dedicated to the

Marquis of Hamilton; but, in addition to this, each book has a separate

dedication to some one of the author's political associates or friends.

The persons thus honoured are the Marquis of Huntly, the Earl of

Arundel, the Earl of Northumberland, the Earl of Pembroke, the Earl of

Dorset, the Earl of Holland, the Earl of Newcastle, the Earl of

Stafford, Lord Craven, and Lord Gaurin (Gowran). According to the custom

of that time, the reader finds his progress barred by several prefaces,

respectively named, in this instance, as the "Isagoge," or

"Introduction," the "Premonition," and the "Prolog," and cannot get away

without a "Corollarie," an "Animadversion," several extra leaves of

verses, "A Table for the more easie finding out of such Epigrams as

treat of one subject," an "Index," and a "List of proper names." For one

of these latter he has reason to be grateful to Sir Thomas, for the

"Index" is a glossary of "the harshest and most difficult words

contained in the preceding Epigrams."

[Illustration: Fac-simile of Sir Thomas Urquhart's handwriting

considerably reduced.]

The general character of the unpublished Epigrams does not seem to be

higher than that of those which have seen the light of day, and

consequently there is little likelihood of any anxiety being expressed

by the general public for a sight of them. Some of them also are of a

sportive turn, and are more in accordance with the standard of taste and

manners which prevailed in the middle of the seventeenth century than

with that, of our own day. From the "Animadversion" it seems that

Urquhart "contryved, blocked, and digested these eleven hundred epigrams

in a thirteen weeks tyme." This surely breaks the record in the matter

of speed in producing epigrams. Had the results been better, one would

have had more pleasure in supporting Sir Thomas against all-comers.

The second literary venture made by Sir Thomas Urquhart was the

publication of a scientific work, entitled "THE TRISSOTETRAS"[159]--a

treatise which professed to simplify trigonometry. Yet, notwithstanding

the statement on the title-page that the new method of working problems

in that department of mathematical science would be found invaluable by

soldiers, sailors, architects, astronomers, and others, the volume seems

to have dropped at once into the depths of oblivion, without even having

produced a ripple upon the surface of the waters. No one is known to

have read it or to have been able to read it. Lord Bacon, indeed, says

that things solid and weighty are drowned in the river of time, while

things that are light and blown-up are carried down by its current.[160]

A very comfortable theory would this be for those of us who write books

that are found unreadable and drop at once out of notice, if only some

trustworthy person could be found who would certify to the truth of Lord

Bacon's assertion.

The editor of the Maitland Club edition of Sir Thomas Urquhart's Works

has some qualms of conscience about reprinting this treatise. With a

touch of humour, which only true Philistines will fully appreciate, he

says that some apology may appear necessary, _even to an Antiquarian

Club_,[161] for reprinting a work apparently so unintelligible and

useless; and accordingly he shelters himself behind the opinion of Mr

Wallace, the Professor of Mathematics in the University of Edinburgh at

that time (1834). "I have," says Mr Wallace, who had been asked to

examine the work, "looked at Sir Thomas Urquhart's _Trissotetras_, but I

hardly know what to think of it. The book is not absolute nonsense, but

is written in a most unintelligible way,[162] and so as never book was

written before nor since. On this account it is truly a literary

curiosity. There appears to have been a perverted ingenuity exercised in

writing it, and I imagine that, with some patience, the author's plan

might be understood, but I doubt if any man would take the trouble; for,

after he had overcome the difficulty, there is nothing to reward his

labour. I presume the object of the author was to fix the rules of

Trigonometry in the memory, but no writer since his time has adopted his

invention. Indeed, I do not observe the least mention of his book in the

history of mathematical science. Yet, for his time, he seems not to have

been a bad mathematician. Urquhart speaks in terms of great praise of

Napier, yet not greater than he deserved. I infer from this that he was

well acquainted with the subject as then known. The book in question is

certainly a _curious_, if not a valuable relic of Scottish genius in

the olden time, and it is a good specimen of the pedantry and fantastic

taste of the Author. If, therefore, by reprinting his works, it be

intended to give a true portraiture of him, _The Trissotetras_ should on

that account, and I see no better reason, again pass through the

press."[163]

The volume is dedicated "To the right honourable and most noble lady, my

dear and loving mother, the Lady Dowager of Cromartie." The "Epistle

Dedicatory" is couched in the high-flown language which others would

have had difficulty in concocting, but which seems to flow with ease

from the lips of Sir Thomas. "Thus, Madam," he says, "unto you doe I

totally belong; but so as that those exteriour parts of mine, which by

birth are from your Ladiship derived, cannot be more fortunate in this

their subjection, notwithstanding the egregious advantages of bloud and

consanguinity thereby to them accruing, then [than] my selfe am happy,

as from my heart I doe acknowledge it, in the just right your Ladiship

hath to the eternall possession of the never-dying powers of my soule."

The following passage from the same "Epistle" reminds one of the

adulatory terms in which Sir Walter Raleigh and Spenser addressed Queen

Elizabeth: "By vertue of your beloved society, your neighbouring

Countesses, and other great dames of your kindred and acquaintance,

become more illustrious in your imitation [_i.e._ in imitation of you];

amidst whom, as Cynthia amongst the obscurer planets, your Ladiship

shines, and darteth the angelick rayes of your matchlesse example on

the spirits of those who by their good Genius have been brought into

your favourable presence to be enlightened by them." The concluding

passage in his Dedication is still more remarkable: "I will here," he

says, "in all submission, most humbly take my leave of your Ladiship,

and beseech Almighty God that it may please his Divine Majesty so to

blesse your Ladiship with continuance of dayes, that the sonnes or those

whom I have not as yet begot, may attaine to the happinesse of

presenting unto your Ladiship a braine-babe of more sufficiencie and

consequence."[164]

The ordinary reader who looks into the volume cannot fail to be appalled

by the new and mysterious terms with which its pages are crowded. Words

like "proturgetick," "quadrobiquadræquation," "sindiforall,"

"eathetobasall," "loxogonosphericall," and "zetetick," are freely used,

and many others equally hard and thorny. Even the author himself finds

it necessary to append to the work a glossary, containing an explanation

of a number of the words of which he had made use. "Being certainly

perswaded," he says, "that a great many good spirits [_i.e._ worthy

souls] ply Trigonometry that are not versed in the learned tongues, I

thought fit for their encouragement to subjoyne here the explication of

the most important of those Greek and Latin termes, which for the more

efficacy of expression I have made use of in this Treatise."[165]

In some cases, however, the "explication," instead of dispelling the

darkness, only renders it more visible, as when, _e.g._, we are told

that "_cathetobasall_ is said of the concordances of loxogonosphericall

moods, in the datas of the perpendicular and the base, for finding out

of the maine quæsitum." "_Inversionall_," we are told, "is said of the

concordances of those moods which agree in the manner of their

inversion; that is, in placing the second and fourth termes of the

analogy, together with their indowments, in the roomes of the first and

third, and contrariwise." Probably only those who are able to follow the

statement that "_oppoverticall_ is said of those moods which have a

catheteuretick concordance in their datas of the same cathetopposites

and verticall angles," will be qualified to give an intelligent assent

to the statement that "_sindiforall_ is said of those moods the fourth

terme of whose analogie is onely illatitious to the maine

quæsitum."[166]

Besides the Epistle of Dedication to the author's mother, there are two

Epistles and some Latin verses addressed to the reader. The former of

these last-mentioned Epistles is signed by Sir Thomas, and consists of a

glowing tribute of respect to Napier, the inventor of logarithms. "To

write of Trigonometry," he says, "and not make mention of the

illustrious Lord Neper[167] of Marchiston, the inventer of Logarithms,

were to be unmindfull of him that is our daily benefactor; these

artificiall numbers by him first excogitated and perfected, being of

such incomparable use,[168] that by them we may operate more in one day,

and with lesse danger of errour, then [than] can be done without them in

the space of a whole week; a secret which would have beene so precious

to antiquity that Pythagoras, all the seven wise men of Greece,

Archimedes, Socrates, Plato, Euclid, and Aristotle, had, if coævals,

joyntly adored him, and unanimously concurred to the deifying of the

revealer of so great a mystery." He concludes with the splendid sentence

that Napier's "immortall fame, in spite of time, will out-last all ages,

and look eternity in the face."[169]

The second Epistle to the reader is of a very startling kind. It

professes to be by some one whose initials are J. A., and it is written

in commendation of the book and its author, but there can be no doubt

that it is the production of Sir Thomas himself. He could no more

disguise his style of writing than Sir Piercie Shafton could lay aside

his Euphuistic English. After reading the laudatory sentences bestowed

upon the inventor of logarithms, it is very amusing to find J. A.

remarking of Sir Thomas Urquhart, that "the praise he hath beene pleased

to confer on the learned and honourable Neper, doth, without any

diminution, in every jot as duly belong unto himselfe."[170] As all our

author's eulogies are constructed on a vast scale, it is not surprising

to read that the new method of measuring triangles, as compared with the

old, is like the sea-journey between the Pillars of Hercules ("commonly

called the Straits of Gibraltar"), as compared with the land-journey

from the one to the other. In the one case, we have a short voyage of

not more than six hours' sail; in the other case, a walk of some seven

thousand long miles. The two concluding paragraphs of the Epistle are

so extraordinary and so characteristic of our author, that we must be

allowed to quote them at length.

"The secret unfolded in the following book," says J. A., "is so

precious, that [the author's] countrey and kindred would not have been

more honoured by him had he purchased [procured] millions of gold, and

severall rich territories of a great and vast extent, then [than] for

this subtile and divine invention, which will out-last the continuance

of any inheritance, and remaine fresh in the understandings of men of

profound literature, when houses and possessions will change their

owners, the wealthy become poor, and the children of the needy enjoy the

treasures of those whose heires are impoverished. Therefore, seeing for

the many-fold uses thereof in divers arts and sciences, in speculation

and practice, peace and war, sport and earnest, with the admirable

furtherances we reape by it in the knowledge of sea and land, and heaven

and earth, it cannot be otherwise then [than] permanent, together with

the Author's fame, so long as any of those endure; I will, God willing,

in the ruines of all these, and when time it selfe is expired, in

testimony of my thankfulnesse in particular for so great a benefit, if

after the resurrection there be any complementall [complimentary]

affability, expresse myselfe then as I doe now, The Author's most

affectionate, and most humbly devoted servant, J.A."[171]

Why our author should have resorted to this device for recommending

himself and his book, we cannot tell. Perhaps he felt that some strong

affirmations were needed in the case. Probably he agreed with the old

saying that, if you wish work to be thoroughly done, you had better do

it yourself. The moral aspect of the matter we leave in the hands of our

readers for discussion.

In five Latin elegiac couplets of a very neat and polished kind,

Alexander Ross[172] recommends _The Trissotetras_ to the reader, and

assures the author that Scotia, whom by his writings he was exalting to

the stars, looked down upon him with a benignant smile. Ross himself is

now only known to most of us from the mention made of him in _Hudibras_,

in the well-known passage--

"There was an ancient sage philosopher

Who had read Alexander Ross over."

It is to be feared that Alexander Ross had not performed the same feat

with regard to Sir Thomas Urquhart's treatise; for his verses[173] would

have been equally appropriate if the subject of them had been a

flying-machine or a water-tricycle invented by his friend.

At the end of the glossary in which the hardest words in _The

Trissotetras_ are explained, the author addresses a word in season to

the persons into whose hands his book may fall. He expects that "learned

and judicious mathematicians" will welcome it, and he promises them more

of the same kind. His dignified attitude towards carping critics is very

impressive. "But as for such," he says, "who, either understanding it

not, or vain-gloriously being accustomed to criticise on the works of

others, will presume to carp therein at what they cannot amend, I pray

God to illuminate their judgments and rectifie their wits, that they may

know more and censure lesse; for so by forbearing detraction, the venom

whereof must needs reflect upon themselves, they will come to approve

better of the endeavours of those that wish them no harme."[174]

FOOTNOTES:

[151] "EPIGRAMS: DIVINE AND MORAL. _By Sir Thomas Urchard, Knight._

London: Printed by Barnard Alsop and Thomas Fawcet, in the Yeare 1641."

[152] It is only fair, however, to Urquhart to remember that his idea of

an Epigram was probably different from ours. In modern times point or

"bite" is regarded as essential to such kind of compositions. The

original idea of them was that they should contain a single distinct

thought, and be brief enough to serve as inscriptions.

[153] Granger's _Biographical History_, iii, 160.

[154] _Works_, p. 263.

[155] Charles Whibley, _New Review_, July 1897.

[156] A school-girl once wrote in a copy of _Moral Tales_, which she

used for her Italian lessons, that they were "moral to the last degree."

The same may be said of Sir Thomas Urquhart's _Moral Epigrams_.

[157] This reminds one of Alice's subtraction sum. "Take a bone from a

dog. What remains?... The dog's temper would remain" (_Through the

Looking-Glass_, chap. ix.). A somewhat different and more sombre turn of

thought than the above was suggested to Southey's Dr Dove by the

resemblance between the words. "_Woman_," he says, "evidently meaning

either _man's woe_--or abbreviated from _woe to man_, because by woman

was woe brought into the world" (_The Doctor_, chap. ccviii.).

[158] The title is as follows:--"_Ten Books of Epigrams: the Curiositie

whereof, for Conception, stile, instruction, and Other mixtures of show

and substance, being no lesse fruitfull then [than] pleasing to the

diligent Peruser, are entitled_ APOLLO _and the_ MUSES. _Written by the

Right Worshipfull_ SIR THOMAS URCHARD, _Knight_." The volume is now in

the possession of Professor Ferguson, of Glasgow University. From it our

specimen of his handwriting is taken.

[159] The title-page, according to the custom of the time, gives a

somewhat elaborate account of the contents of the volume. It runs as

follows:--"THE TRISSOTETRAS; Or, _A most Exquisite Table_ for Resolving

all manner of Triangles, whether plain or sphericall, Rectangular or

Obliquangular, with greater facility, then [than] ever hitherto hath

been practised: Most necessary for all such as would attaine to the

exact knowledge of Fortification, Dyaling, Navigation, Surveying,

Architecture, the Art of Shadowing, taking of Heights and Distances, the

use of both the Globes, Perspective, the skill of making Maps, the

Theory of the Planets, the calculating of their motions, and all other

Astronomicall Computations whatsoever. Now lately invented, and

perfected, explained, commented on, and, with all possible brevity and

perspicuity, in the hiddest and most researched mysteries, from the very

first grounds of the Science it selfe, proved, and convincingly

demonstrated. By Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromartie, Knight. Published for

the benefit of those that are mathematically affected. _London_, Printed

by James Young. 1645."

[160] _Advancement of Learning._

[161] The italics are ours.

[162] Sir Theodore Martin remarks that this conclusion nearly resembles

that of Socrates, upon being asked his opinion of the book of Heraclitus

the Obscure. "Those things," he said, "which I understood were

excellent; I imagine so were those I understood not; but they require a

diver of Delos" (_Rabelais_, p. xviii.).

[163] _Works_, p. xvi.

[164] _Works_, pp. 55-57.

[165] _Ibid._ p. 131.

[166] The author of the above sentences is one of the very few persons

in history or fiction known to us who would have been qualified to join

in the conversation of the pleasant company in Illyria, when they began

"to speak of Pigrogromitus, and of the Vapians passing the equinoctial

of Queubus" (_Twelfth Night_, Act II. Sc. iii.)--the allusion to which

has caused so many German commentators on Shakespeare to spend sleepless

nights in their libraries.

[167] John Napier, of Merchiston (1550-1617), who published his

invention in 1614. Our author calls him Lord Napier, but we are to

understand the title as simply equivalent to "_laird_." He calls himself

on one of his title-pages _Baro Merchistonii_, but that phrase is merely

the designation of the superior of a barony, or lord of a manor. In the

old Scottish Parliament men of this rank sat as "_lesser barons_."

[168] The subject of logarithms is perhaps one of those things which the

ordinary render might safely be presumed to know something about. In

these days of higher education for women, it would be an act of

impertinence to provide information on this point for that class of our

readers. The following explanations are, therefore, intended for those

members of the inferior sex whose education on the mathematical side has

been neglected. The idea of logarithms arose in the mind of Napier from

the wish to simplify the processes of multiplication and division, by

making addition and subtraction take their place. To effect this,

connect together a series of numbers increasing by arithmetical

progression with a series increasing by multiplication or by

mathematical progression.

Thus: 0. 1. 5. 32. 10. 1024.

1. 2. 6. 64. 11. 2048.

2. 4. 7. 128. 12. 4096.

3. 8. 8. 256. 13. 8192.

4. 16. 9. 512. 14. 16384.

To multiply, say, 64 by 256, that is to find the products of the 6th and

8th powers of 2, we must take the (6+8)th or 14th power, which from the

table is 16384. To divide 8192 by 256, or the 13th power of 2 by the

8th, we must take the (13-8)th or 5th power, which from the table is 32.

By means of this principle calculations can by made by persons whose

business it is to do so, and stored up apart for use. The vast saving to

mental labour by this simple and beautiful adjustment of numbers may be

estimated by a glance at any collection of tables of logarithms. In a

science like astronomy, progress would be terribly impeded if

calculations had to be conducted by the ordinary methods.

[169] _Works_, p. 59.

[170] _Ibid._ p. 61.

[171] _Works_, p. 63.

[172] Alexander Ross (1590-1654) was a believer in centaurs and

griffins, in nations of giants and pygmies, and also, of course, in

witches. In short, a pretty accurate statement of his intellectual creed

might be constructed by turning into the articles of a confession of

faith the list of "Vulgar Errors" controverted by Sir Thomas Browne. It

is interesting to know that he was probably the last person in Scotland

who heard the voice of the water-kelpie. "One day," he says, "travelling

before day with some company near the river Don in Aberdeen, we heard a

great noise and voices calling to us. I was going to answer, but was

forbid by my company, who told me they were spirits, who never are heard

there but before the death of somebody; which fell out too true, for the

next day a gallant gentleman was drowned, with his horse offering to

swim over" (Quoted in _Lives of Eminent Men of Aberdeen_, by J. Bruce).

[173] They begin--

"Si cupis ætherios tutò peragrare meatus,

Et sulcare audes si vada salsa maris," etc.

A friend, who knows

"Himself to sing and build the lofty rhyme,"

has given me the following metrical translation of Ross's verses:--

"Wouldst thou in safety trace ethereal ways,

Or plough with daring keel the briny deep;

Shouldst thou earth's wide expanses long to span,

Come hither, make this learned book thine own.

By it, without Dædalian wings, canst fly,

And without Neptune, through the depths canst swim;

By it thou canst subdue the Lybian heat,

And bear the cruel cold of Scythian skies.

On, Thomas! Scotia, whom unto the stars

Thy writings raise, will yet rejoice in thee."

[174] _Works_, p. 146. _N.B._--The attention of professional critics is

respectfully directed to the above passage.

CHAPTER V

PANTOCHRONOCHANON, OR THE PEDIGREE

One of the most characteristic of Sir Thomas Urquhart's works is his

PANTOCHRONOCHANON: or, A Peculiar PROMPTUARY of TIME.[175] This contains a

complete pedigree of the Urquhart family from the creation of the world

down to the year A.D. 1652. Prefixed to it is a letter to the reader by

"a well-wisher," whose initials are G. P., into whose hands the pedigree

had fallen by mere chance, and who had thought himself bound in duty to

the public to see it safely through the press. According to the

statements of this disinterested philanthropist, the work in question

was but one of a large number of papers of very great importance,

forming part of the author's baggage, which he had to abandon after the

battle of Worcester. It is the habit, we know, of impecunious and

importunate wayfarers to carry about with them documents of interest to

which they solicit attention; but why a man in Sir Thomas Urquhart's

position should have gone on a campaign, encumbered by various

unpublished works in manuscript, it is difficult to say. Perhaps the

simplest explanation is that he was different from other people.

The soldiers of Cromwell, we were told, made but light of this portion

of the enemy's baggage, after "the fatal blowe given to the Royal party

at Worcester"; indeed, but for "a surpassing honest and civil officer of

Colonel Pride's regiment," the pedigree of the Urquharts would have been

used by "a file of musquettiers to afford smoak to their pipes of

tobacco."[176]

The fame of Sir Thomas as an author and as a soldier moved G. P., as he

tells us, to commit this treatise to the press. With considerable

ingenuity he remarks that, though the author is now in prison as a

Royalist, he understands that his position is by no means "so desperate

as that he thereby will be much endangered." If any doubt up to this

point existed as to who G. P. might be, it is set at rest by the terms

in which he pleads for favourable conditions being granted to the

prisoner. "It is humbly desired," he says, "and, as I believe, from the

hearts of all that are acquainted with him, that the greatest State in

the world stain not their glory by being the Atropos to cut the thred of

that which Saturne's sithe hath not been able to mow in the progress of

all former ages, especially in the person of him whose inward abilities

are like to produce effects conducible to the State of as long

continuance for the future."[177] Only Sir Thomas Urquhart himself had

the secret of what we may call the "spacious" manner of self-eulogy,

which by its very grandeur seems lifted up above all such petty feelings

as pride or vanity.

The concluding passage in the address to the reader is also worth

quoting, as it illustrates the magnanimous spirit in which the captive

deprecates severity towards himself on the ground of the injury which

would thereby redound to the State. "Considering," it says, "how

formerly he hath been a Mæcenas to the scholar, a patron to the

souldier, a favourer of the marchant, a protector of the artificer, and

upholder of the yeoman, it were a thousand pities that by the austerity

of a State, which dependeth in both its _esse_ and _bene esse_ upon the

flourishing of these worthy professions, effects so advantagious

thereto, should, by not conferring deserved courtesies on him, be

extinguished in the very brood."[178]

In the _True Pedigree and Lineal Descent of the Most Ancient and

Honourable Family of the Urquharts in the House of Cromartie_, we have a

brief but surprisingly complete history of the family from the time of

Adam[179] down to A.D. 1652. The line runs through the Sethite and not

the Cainite branch of the human race, and, among the sons of Noah, it

passes through Japhet. The story is told of a marginal note being found

in the history of some ancient Highland family, to the effect that

"about this time the Flood took place." Something like this is to be

found in the document before us, for, under the date B.C. 2893, Sir

Thomas adds to a mention of his ancestor Noah, a remark to the effect

that "the Universal Deluge occurred in the six hundreth yeer compleat of

his age."

The good fortune of his ancestors in their inheritances, marriages, and

friendships is very remarkable. To one of them, Japhet, fell the

inheritance of "all the regions of Europe"; Japhet's grandson Penuel was

"a most intimate friend of Nimrod, the mighty hunter and builder of

Babel"; while his great-grandson Tycheros was chosen by "Orpah, the

daughter of Sabatius Saga, Prince of the Armenians, to be her husband,

because of his gallantry and good success in the wars."[180]

The name Urquhart came into use at the comparatively late period of B.C.

2139, when the family had been in existence for over eighteen hundred

years. It was first borne by Esormon. "He," we are told, "was soveraign

Prince of Achaia. For his fortune in the wars, and affability in

conversation, his subjects and familiars surnamed him ourochartost, that

is [to] say, fortunate well-beloved. After which time, his posterity

ever since hath acknowledged him the father of all that carry the name

of Urquhart.[181] He had for his arms, three banners, three ships, and

three ladies, in a field _d'or_, with a picture of a young lady above

the waste, holding in her right hand a brandished sword, and a branch of

myrtle in the left, for crest; and for supporters, two Javanites, after

the souldier-habit of Achaia, with this motto in the scroll of his

coat-armour, tauta ta tria axiotheata; that is, These three are worthy to

behold. Upon his wife Narfesia, who was soveraign of the Amazons, he

begot Cratynter."[182]

The habits of the Urquharts to form alliances and friendships with

persons afterwards famous in sacred and secular history is very marked.

Thus, one of them, Phrenedon Urquhart, "was in the house of the

Patriarch Abraham at the time of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha."

At a later period, another, named Hypsegoras Urquhart, married a

daughter of Herculus Lybius; while a descendant of theirs, Pamprosodos

Urquhart, married Termuth, "who was that daughter of Pharaoh Amenophis

which found Moses among the bulrushes, and brought him up as if he had

been her own childe."

Another ancestor, Molin Urquhart (_c._ B.C. 1534), married Panthea, "the

daughter of Deucalion and Pyrrha, of whom Ovid maketh mention in the

first of his Metamorphoses." The genealogist goes on to say that "in

that part of Africk which, after his name, is till this hour called

Molinea, by cunning and valour together he killed in one morning three

lions;[183] the heads whereof, when in a basket, presented to his lady

Panthea, so terrified her, that (being quick with childe) for putting

her right hand to her left side, with this sudden exclamation, O

Hercules, what is this? the impression of three lions' heads was found

upon the left side of the childe as soon as he was born." In consequence

of this incident, the three banners, three ships, and three ladies in

the Urquhart arms were exchanged for three lions' heads.

A century later, we find that Propetes Urquhart married Hypermnestra,

"the choicest of Danaus' fifty daughters." This must have been some time

after the little affair happened for which forty-nine of her sisters

were condemned to draw water in sieves; for, as every schoolboy knows,

the fifty daughters of Danaus were married to their cousins, the fifty

sons of Ægyptus, and all of them, but one, at the bidding of their

father, murdered their husbands on the evening of the marriage-day.

Hypermnestra, however, had pity upon her cousin and husband, Lynceus,

and spared him.[184] He must have died shortly after, probably from

natural causes, as it is recorded in the work before us that she married

Propetes Urquhart, and became the mother of Euplocamos Urquhart.

The thought of what the family to which Hypermnestra belonged were

capable when their blood was up, must, one would think, have cast a

slight shadow of apprehension upon the married life of Propetes

Urquhart. A more cheerful tone must have pervaded that of his descendant

Cainotomos Urquhart, for he, we are told, "took to wife Thymelica, the

daughter of Bacchus, in recompense of his having accompanied him in the

conquest of the Indies." Further interesting particulars, which are not

elsewhere recorded, are related of this ancestor of Sir Thomas. On his

return from the expedition in which he assisted Bacchus to conquer

India, he "passed through the territories of Israel, where, being

acquainted with Debora the Judge and Prophetess, he received from her a

very rich jewel, which afterwards by one of his succession was presented

to Pentasilea, that Queen of the Amazons that assisted the Trojans

against Agamemnon."

Their son Rodrigo Urquhart (_c._ B.C. 1295) was, we are told, invited

over by his kindred the Clanmolinespick,[185] the principal clan in

Ireland, and "bore rule there with much applause and good success"--the

one solitary instance of the kind, we suppose, which is to be found in

the history of that "most distressful country." "From him," it is said,

"is descended the Clanrurie,[186] of which name there were twenty-six

rulers and kings of Ireland before the days of Ferguse the first, King

of Scots in Scotland."

A slight degree of uncertainty hangs about the identity of the wife of

Mellessen Urquhart (_c._ B.C. 1049). Her name was Nicolia, and before

her marriage she "travelled from the remote Eastern countries to have

experience of the wisdom of Solomon, and by many[187] is supposed to

have been the Queen of Sheba." Her husband, however, must have

considered that, though she loved wisdom, she had not acquired much of

it, or, at any rate, of the kind which is needed for bringing up a young

family; for the historian goes on to say that "Mellessen Urquhart

nevertheless sent some of his children to Ireland and Britain, to be

brought up with the best of his own father and mother's kindred."

Amongst other celebrated persons who had the honour of being enrolled

amongst the ancestors of Sir Thomas Urquhart are Pothina, a niece of

Lycurgus; Æquanima, the sister of Marcus Coriolanus; Diosa, the daughter

of Alcibiades; and Tortolina, the daughter of King Arthur. It is

observable that for a good many generations immediately preceding the

author's time, the ladies who figure in the genealogy are of

comparatively lowly birth--seldom, indeed, do they reach the rank of

an earl's daughter. Either the supply of princesses was by this time

somewhat exhausted, or the demands of the Urquharts were less

exorbitant. The high-spirited character of the most remarkable scion of

the family who drew up the genealogy forbids us to think that, with the

lapse of time, they had suffered any diminution of courage. It rather

seems as though the world had entered upon a less heroic stage. Perhaps,

like Sir Thomas Browne in a later age, they had concluded that "it was

too late to be ambitious, for the great mutations of the world were

acted."

[Illustration: SCULPTURED STONE AT KINBEAKIE HOUSE]

In the time of Vocompos (A.D. 775) a further change took place in the

arms of the Urquharts, which gave them their final form. "Vocompos," we

learn, "was the first in the world that had the bears' heads to his

arms, being induced to exchange, by the instigation of King Solvatius,

his arms of three lions' heads, for the three bears' heads, razed,

because of the great exploit, in presence of the King, done by him and

his two brothers, in killing, one morning, three wild bears, in the

Caledonian forrest: the supporters were also changed into two

greyhounds: the crest and impress remaining still the same as it was

since the days of Astioremon."[188]

An alleged ancestor of our author, William de Monte Alto (Mouat),[189]

took part in the patriotic resistance of Scotland against English

oppression which is associated with the names of Bruce and Wallace, and

the faint local traditions of that time partly corroborate Urquhart's

statements. "This William," he says, "caried himself so lovingly towards

King Robert, that when almost all Scotland was possest by King Edward's

faction, and his lands at Cromartie altogether overrun by them, and his

house garrisoned and victualed with three yeers provision of all

necessaries for one hundred men, he by a stratagem gained the castle,

and with the matter of fourty men, keept it out against the forces of

Edward for the space of seven yeers and a half, during which time all

his lands there were totally wasted, and his woods burnt; so that,

having nothing then he could properly call his own but the mote-hill

onely of Cromartie, which he fiercely maintained against the enemies, he

was agnamed _Gulielmus de Monte Alto_. At last William Wallace came to

his relief, but, as I conceive, it was the brother's son of the renowned

William, who in a little den [or hollow] within two miles of Cromartie,

till this hour called Wallace Den, killed six hundred of King Edward's

unfortunate forces. Afterwards, raising the siege from about the

mote-hill of Cromartie by the assistance of his namesake the other

William, the shire of Cromarty was totally purged of the enemy."[190]

Tradition, according to Hugh Miller, is silent respecting the siege, but

relates many details of the battle. The Scottish forces lay in ambuscade

in the ravine or hollow which is still, or was until recently, called by

Wallace's name, and attacked a large body of English troops on their way

to join some of their countrymen, who were encamped on the peninsula of

Easter Ross. The English were surprised and panic-struck, and left six

hundred dead on the field of battle. The survivors were unacquainted

with the country, and were under the impression that there was

continuous land between them and their countrymen on the opposite shore.

"They were only undeceived," we are told, "when, on climbing the

southern Sutor, where it rises behind the town, they saw an arm of the

sea more than a mile in width, and skirted by abrupt and dizzy

precipices, opening before them. The spot is still pointed out where

they made their final stand; and a few shapeless hillocks, that may

still be seen among the trees, are said to have been raised above the

bodies of those who fell; while the fugitives, for they were soon beaten

from this position, were either driven over the neighbouring

precipices, or perished amidst the waves of the Firth."[191]

Sir Thomas does not let us off easily. After subjecting our credulity to

a severe strain by one kind of statement, he unexpectedly increases the

tension by another. Thus he says that an ancestor in the fifteenth

century, Thomas Urquhart, had by his wife Helen Abernethie, daughter of

Lord Salton, five-and-twenty sons, who grew up to manhood, and eleven

daughters, all of whom found husbands. It would only have been kind of

him to have reduced these numbers a little. But on one point he has

spared us: we are not asked to believe that there were others who died

in infancy.

In a postscript Sir Thomas Urquhart explains that he has just given his

readers a sketch of the history of his family, but hopes to furnish them

with a complete narrative as soon as he obtains his release from his

parole, and is at liberty to attend to this and to other matters of

greater importance. The thought of the delightful book in store for

mankind is so attractive to him that he cannot help dilating upon it.

"In the great chronicle of the House of Urquhart," he continues, "the

aforesaid Sir Thomas purposeth, by God's assistance, to make mention of

the illustrious families from thence descended, which as yet are in

esteem in the countries of Germany, Bohemia, Italy, France, Spain,

England, Scotland, Ireland, and several other nations of a warmer

climate, adjacent to that famous territory of Greece, the lovely mother

of this most ancient and honourable stem."[192] He also intends not to

omit the name of any family with which at any time the aforesaid house

has contracted alliance.

The concluding paragraph is very amusing; for in it our author promises

to give proof of the statements he has made, by quoting from the works

of respectable chroniclers of past ages, though the degree of certainty

which the reader may thereby expect to reach falls short of that given

by Holy writ or the works of Euclid. "And finally," he says, "for

confirmation of the truth in deriving of his extraction from the Ionian

race of the Prince of Achaia, and in the deduction of all the

considerable particulars of the whole story, [the author] is resolved to

produce testimonies of Arabick, Greek, Latin, and other writers of such

authentick approbation, that we may boldly from thence infer

consequences of no less infallible verity then [than] any that is not

grounded on faith by means of a Divine illumination, as is the story of

the Bible, or on reason, by vertue of the unavoidable inference of a

necessary concluding demonstration, as that of the Elements of Euclid;

which being the greatest evidence that in any narration of that kinde is

to be expected, the judicious reader is bid farewel, from whom the

Author for the time most humbly takes his leave."[193]

It is needless to say that the scheme of filling out the sketch of the

history of the Urquhart family was never carried out, if ever it had

been seriously entertained by Sir Thomas; and we are left in ignorance

of the names of the Arabic, Greek, Latin, and other authors on whose

testimony our belief in the authenticity of the narrative was to have

been firmly based. In the absence of this our judgment is left in

suspense, unless, indeed, we conclude that, as the genealogy begins and

ends with the names of actual persons,[194] the intermediate part is not

likely to have been a mere fabrication. If the links are sound in the

places where we can test them, it requires no very great exercise of

credulity to believe that they are the same throughout.

Matthew Arnold on one occasion laid down the principle, that a book

should either "edify the uninstructed," or "inform the instructed." Sir

Thomas Urquhart's "PANTOCHRONOCHANON" certainly justifies its existence

according to this standard of judging literature; for if it does not

serve to edify the uninstructed, it _does_ inform the instructed, since

the information it contains is not to be found in any other

quarter.[195]

One's faith in the credibility of his narrative is, however, a little

shaken by finding that in the second book of his favourite author,

Rabelais, the genealogy of the giant Pantagruel is carried up to a

period far beyond the Flood. It may be a mere coincidence, but it is one

of those coincidences that make us very thoughtful.[196]

At the time when Sir Thomas Urquhart wrote, Scotland was supposed to

have had a dynasty of kings and a connected political history dating

far back before the birth of Christ. The impudent fictions of Hector

Boece, whose history of Scotland was published in 1526, had been

accepted by the public, and were regarded as genuine facts even by such

literary personages as Erasmus and Paulus Jovius. Perhaps Sir Thomas

thought that a credulity which had endured the considerable strain which

Boece had put upon it might be trusted to bear a still greater weight.

Indeed, he interwove the story of his family with that which was current

as the genuine history of his native land.

According to the mythical history of Scotland, Gathelus, a Grecian

prince, having quarrelled with his father Miol, took refuge in Egypt,

and married Scota, a daughter of the Pharaoh who perished in the Red

Sea. The young people came west and founded Portugal (_i.e._ Port of

Gathelus), and then journeyed north to Scotland, bringing with them, as

part of their baggage, the coronation-stone yet to be seen in

Westminster Abbey. Their descendant Fergus, "the father of a hundred

kings," was the founder of the Scottish monarchy. These shadowy persons

appear again, "with the moonlight streaming through them," and play

their parts in the genealogy of the Urquharts.

Some have thought that Sir Thomas believed devoutly in the genealogy

himself, and was the dupe of his own imagination. One would be sorry to

form so low an opinion of his mental endowments. If the book in question

were not an elaborate joke, it can only have been intended to impose

upon the English people by convincing them of the extraordinary dignity

and grandeur of their captive. If this were indeed the case, he must

have had an humbler opinion of the intellectual faculties possessed by

the average Englishman than even the majority of his fellow-countrymen

entertain.

A very amusing reference to this book of Sir Thomas Urquhart's is to be

found in the Decisions of the Court of Session, under date of 23rd to

25th January, 1706.[197] In that year an action was brought by the Earl

of Sutherland against the Earls of Crawford, Errol, and Marischal, to

determine the question of precedency in the rolls of Parliament. The

pursuer asserted that he was lineally descended from an Earl of

Sutherland living in 1275, while his opponents' ancestors were not Earls

till about 1399. The pursuer laid stress upon the fact that, in 1630, a

formal inquiry into this matter had been held at Inverness, and that the

decision had been in his favour. The persons who conducted the inquiry

were, he said, of undoubted credit, and well versed in the particulars

investigated, and "might have had good information from old men and

writs, which in the course of time and through accidents had long

disappeared." The advocate for the defenders replied that the

"Chancellor of the Inquest" had been Sir Thomas Urquhart, who might have

traced the pursuer's descent from Noah, as he had deduced his own

genealogy from Adam, and that the decision arrived at was of no more

value than "his fanciful derivation of his own pedigree. For the members

of the Inquest seemed to have sworn rashly upon matters of greater

antiquity than they could certainly know." "It is true," was the

pursuer's reply, "the defender in his gaiety objects against Sir Thomas

Urquhart as an ill genealogist; and it is owned that his derivation from

Adam and Noah was fantastic enough, and indeed but _lusus ingenii_; but,

after all, the defender's criticism will not hinder him to pass for a

most knowing gentleman." The case was decided in favour of the Earl of

Sutherland, so far as some of his contentions were concerned. But it is

somewhat curious that his advocate overlooked the fact that the Sir

Thomas Urquhart of 1630, who had been the "Chancellor of the Inquest,"

was not the author of the book containing the genealogy of the

Urquharts, but that it was written by his son. It is quite possible,

however, that it was a matter of notoriety that the elder Sir Thomas had

been a believer in the long pedigree which his more famous son had,

years after, elaborated and published.[198]

FOOTNOTES:

[175] The full title of the work is as follows:--PANTOCHRONOCHANON: or, A

Peculiar PROMPTUARY of TIME; Wherein (not one instant being omitted

since the beginning of motion) is displayed A most exact DIRECTORY for

all particular _Chronologies_ in what Family soever: And that by

deducing the true Pedigree and Lineal descent of the most ancient and

honourable name of the VRQVHARTS, in the house of CROMARTIE, since the

Creation of the world, until this present yeer of God, 1652. London,

Printed for Richard Baddeley, and are to be sold at his shop, within the

Middle-Temple-Gate, 1652.

[176] _Works_, p. 151.

[177] _Works_, p. 152.

[178] _Ibid._ p. 152.

[179] Poor Sir Thomas thought that he was going back to the beginning

when he traced his descent up to Adam, or, to be more exact, to the red

earth of which the "protoplast" was made. The late Charles Darwin

carried back the pedigree of man a prodigious length, though he lowered

its quality. There can be little doubt that our author would have

disdained to accept what used to be called "the lower animals" as, in

any sense, ancestors of mankind, or, at any rate, of the dignified

family of Urquhart.

[180] _Works_, p. 156.

[181] In one respect, at any rate, we have legitimate ground of triumph

over our ancestors--we spell better than they did. Charles Lamb once

lent a volume of the old dramatists to a friend, and asked him his

opinion of it. The reply was that it contained a considerable amount of

bad spelling! The name Urquhart, as thus written, occurs here in Sir

Thomas's "Pedigree," and is, doubtless, the correct form of the name. In

the Latinised shape of Urquhardus it occurs on the register of the

University of Aberdeen, at which our author studied. Yet Urchard seems

to have been

"The name our valiant Knight

To all his challenges did write."

The unbridled licence in the matter of spelling prevalent at that period

is still further illustrated by the historian Gordon, who wrote the

_History of Scots Affairs_, and who gives us the name in the form of

Wrqhward! This, one would think, was as far as it was possible to get in

the way of bad spelling, without altogether taking leave of the sounds

to be expressed by alphabetical signs. After it the spelling Wrwhart, as

we find it in an Act of Parliament of 1663, seems rather poor.

[182] _Works_, p. 156.

[183] _Works_, p. 159.

[184] Horace gives us the speech in which she told Lynceus of his

danger, and urged him to make his escape--

"'Wake!' to her youthful spouse she cried,

'Wake! or you yet may sleep too well:

Fly--from the father of your bride,

Her sisters fell:

They, as she-lions bullocks rend,

Tear each her victim: I, less hard,

Than these, will slay you not, poor friend,

Nor hold in ward:

Me let my sire in fetters lay

For mercy to my husband shown:

Me let him ship from hence away,

To climes unknown.

Go; speed your flight o'er land and wave,

While Night and Venus shield you; go

Be blest: and on my tomb engrave

This tale of woe.'"

_Odes_, iii. 11 (Conington's Translation).

Her sad forebodings concerning her own fate, it is satisfactory to know,

were not fully realised. Perhaps she was shipped away to Cromartie, or

Ireland, or Portugal, or Africa, or wherever it was that the head of the

Urquhart family was then reigning. Instead of Lynceus having the

melancholy satisfaction of putting an inscription on her tombstone, it

is probable that she performed that office for him.

[185] Clanmolinespick is, we believe, more correctly

_clann-maol-an-easbuig_ (the last pronounced _cspick_), and means "the

clan" or "family of the servant of the bishop." They are probably the

Irish ancestors of the Macmillans of Knapdale in Argyleshire. The word

"_maol_," "a tonsured servant," occurs in Malise (_maol-Josa_), "a

servant of Jesus," a family name of the old Earls of Strathearn; and

_easbuig_ in Gillespie or Gillespic, "a servant" or "gillie of the

bishop."

[186] Clanrurie is "the clan" or "family of Roderick." These are the

Macrories and Fullartons, their eponym having been Rory or Roderick, one

of the two sons of Reginald, whose father in almost prehistoric times

was Somerled, Lord of the Isles. They settled in Bute and Arran, and

about Ardnamurchan and the islands there.

[187] This phrase--"by many"--is very delightful.

[188] _Works_, p. 168. A curious stone lintel now at Kinbeakie gives a

representation of the Urquhart coat of arms, such as it was in Sir

Thomas's own time. It was no doubt executed at his orders and under his

direction, for inscribed on it are the names of some of those worthies

who appear in the above genealogical history. The representation which

we give of this stone is from a photograph specially taken for the

illustration of this work. As the porch in the wall of which the slab is

set is very narrow, it was impossible, even with the use of a wide-angle

lens, to get a more satisfactory photograph than that which is here

reproduced. Our readers will therefore kindly excuse the distortion of

shape which is only too apparent, and accept as a measure of

compensation the vividness with which the details of the engraved stone

are brought out. "This singular relic," says Hugh Miller, "which has,

perhaps, more of character impressed upon it than any other piece of

sandstone in the kingdom, is about five feet in length by three in

breadth, and bears date A.M. 5612, A.C. 1651. On the lower and upper

edges it is bordered by a plain moulding, and at the ends by belts of

rich foliage, terminating in a chalice or vase. In the upper corner two

knights in complete armour on horseback, and with their lances couched,

front each other, as if in the tilt-yard. Two Sirens playing on harps

occupy the lower. In the centre are the arms--the charge on the shield

three bears' heads, the supporters two greyhounds leashed and collared,

the crest a naked woman holding a dagger and palm, the helmet that of a

knight, with the beaver partially raised, and so profusely mantled that

the drapery occupies more space than the shield and supporters, and the

motto MEANE WEIL, SPEAK WEIL, AND DO WEIL. Sir Thomas's initials, S. T.

V. C., are placed separately, one letter at the outer side of each

supporter, one in the centre of the crest, and one beneath the label;

while the names of the more celebrated heroes of his genealogy, and the

eras in which they flourished, occupy in the following inscription the

space between the figures:--ANNO ASTIOREMONIS, 2226; ANNO VOCOMPOTIS,

3892; ANNO MOLINI, 3199; ANNO RODRICI, 2958; ANNO CHARI, 2219; ANNO

LUTORCI, 2000; ANNO ESORMONIS, 3804. It is melancholy enough that this

singular exhibition of family pride should have been made in the same

year in which the family received its deathblow--the year of Worcester

battle" (_Scenes and Legends of the North of Scotland_, chap. vii.). The

arms of the Urquhart family in their later form, as associated with

those of the Meldrum and Seton families, are given in the 1774 edition

of the PANTOCHRONOCHANON, and are as follows:--"_Arms_, Or, three

Bears-heads, erazed, gules, langued azure. _Crest_, a demy Otter issuing

from the wreath sable, crowned with an antique Crown, or, holding

betwixt his paws a crescent gules. _Motto_ above, _Per mare et Terras_,

and below, _Mean, speak, and do well_. _Supporters_, two grayhounds,

proper collared gules, and leashed." There can be no doubt that the

Urquhart arms should be the three _bears'_ heads, though they are often

described as three _boars'_ heads. The records of 1742 and 1760 in the

Lyon Register make this quite certain. Probably the close resemblance

between the two words is the principal cause of the confusion with

regard to the matter which exists. In the sculptured coat of arms, of

which we give a representation, the heads certainly have a superficial

resemblance at least to those of boars. A correspondent who takes an

interest in this question remarks, however, that "though the heads have

tusks worthy of any boar, they (_i.e._ the heads) are set at right

angles to the necks in a way in which no boar could be represented." On

the other hand, the snouts of the animals have that distinctly

_retroussé_ shape which we associate with pigs, both wild and

domesticated. The question is, therefore, not so simple as at first

sight it appears, and can scarcely be adequately dealt with in a mere

footnote. Accordingly we leave our readers to discuss and settle the

difficulty.

[189] See p. 4, _supra_.

[190] _Works_, p. 170.

[191] _Scenes and Legends of the North of Scotland_, Hugh Miller, p. 48.

This battle is supposed to be mentioned by Blind Harry, who has

celebrated the achievements of Wallace in the following uncouth lines:--

"Wallace raid throw the northland into playne.

At Crummade feill Inglismen thai slew.

The worthi Scottis till hym thus couth persew.

Raturnd agayne and come till Abirdeyn,

With his blith ost apon the Lammess ewyn"

(vii. 1084-88).

[192] _Works_, p. 174.

[193] _Works_, p. 175.

[194] The editor of the 1774 edition of the Tracts of Sir Thomas

Urquhart says that he had compared the genealogy with the records kept

by the Lord Lyon of Scotland, which go back as far as the reign of

Alexander II. (A.D. 1214-1249), and had found it strictly correct from

that period. In Appendix I., which contains the lists of names of Sir

Thomas's ancestors, we have taken the liberty of indicating the names on

which reliance can be placed, by printing them in italics (see p. 211).

[195] Sir Thomas is said to have remarked about "_the Pedigree_," that

by the first generation of readers it would be received with scoffs,

that the second generation would have their doubts about it, but that

the third generation would be heavily inclined to believe it. Time has

moved somewhat more slowly, however, than he anticipated, and probably

but few of us have as yet got past the second stage.

[196] In the article on Crichton in the _Biographia Britannica_, Dr

Kippis subjects our author to grave censure (see p. 158). With respect

to Urquhart's present work he says: "Of his total disregard to truth

there is incontestible evidence in another work of his, entitled _The

True Pedigree_, etc. In this work it is almost incredible what a number

of falsities he has invented, both with respect to names and facts.

Perhaps a more flagrant instance of imposture and fiction was never

exhibited; and the absurdity of the whole pedigree is beyond the power

of words to express. It can only be felt by those who have perused the

Tract itself." It is to be feared that Dr Kippis was mentally akin to

the Irish bishop who remarked of _Gulliver's Travels_ when it appeared,

that "all was not gospel that was in that book."

Some one has said that the names of Urquhart's ancestors, at any rate on

the male side, are very likely those of the giants and heathen in the

_Amadis of Gaul_; and certainly Famongomadan, Cartadaque, Madanfabul,

Arcalaus, and Basagante remind one of chiefs and heroes of the Cromartie

line. In the female line the resemblance is much closer; for Asymbleta,

Eromena, and Gonima distinctly recall the Darioleta, Brisena, and

Madasima of the romance.

[197] Fountainhall, _Decisions_, ii. 265 and 315; Morrison, _Dictionary

of Decisions_, xxvii. 11304.

[198] In some ways the elder Sir Thomas reminds us of the pedantic and

undignified monarch, James VI., from whom he received knighthood. Both

were the first Protestants of their respective houses, both were

attached to prelacy rather than to Presbyterianism, and both were

wasteful and slovenly in money matters. If the above conjecture be well

founded, they had a further point of resemblance to each other, in their

interest in fabulous genealogies. And it may be said of them both that

they prepared a series of misfortunes for their chivalrous,

high-spirited sons.

CHAPTER VI

EKSKYBALAURON: or, THE JEWEL, and LOGOPANDECTEISION: or, THE UNIVERSAL

LANGUAGE.

Sir Thomas Urquhart's previous excursions into literature had been of a

somewhat tentative kind, and calculated to whet the desire of a

judicious reader for him to enter upon more serious undertakings. He had

appeared in the world of letters in several different aspects,--as a man

of science, and as the representative and poet, as historian of a family

which, for long descent and glorious achievements, could not be

rivalled, if his statements concerning it were to be credited,--but no

one could forecast, from what he had already published, the nature of

his next literary exploit.

The volume which followed the Pedigree of the Urquharts has the strange

name above printed,[199] but most of those who have occasion to mention

it more than once find it more convenient to call it "The Jewel."[200]

Its contents are of such a character that one who had read it carefully

would find it difficult to state off-hand or in a single sentence what

they were. A Scottish Divinity professor of somewhat erratic habits

began, on one occasion, a lecture in which he was to deal with several

miscellaneous items, with the words, "Gentlemen, my subject to-day will

be hotch-potch." This is an exact description of _The Jewel_, and those

to whom nature has given the mental apparatus needed for appreciating

Sir Thomas Urquhart will rejoice and not repine at the fact that the

feeding laid before them is of a confused character. Accordingly no

logical sequence will be allowed to mar the symmetry of this chapter in

which _The Jewel_ is described.

The main contents of the work are lists of the ancestors, male and

female, of the Urquhart family from the beginning down to the year 1652,

taken from the Pedigree; a narrative of the sad fate that overtook the

author's manuscripts after the battle of Worcester; some pages of one of

them which contained a scheme for a Universal Language; a denunciation

of the "unjust usurpation of the Presbyterian Clergy, and the judaical

practices of some merchants" by which discredit had been cast upon the

Scottish name; an account of Scotsmen famous for martial exploits or for

learning during the previous half-century; a statement of personal

wrongs inflicted upon the author by ministers of his own parishes;

arguments in favour of the union of Scotland and England; and apologies

for the simple and unadorned strain in which the work is written. All

through the volume Sir Thomas is spoken of in the third person, and the

signature of "Christianus Presbyteromastix" is attached to the preface,

or "the Epistle Liminary," as it is called, but there is scarcely any

attempt made to keep up the pretence of anonymity. The object of the

writer is to try to obtain for the prisoner of war restoration to

complete liberty and the enjoyment of his property, and he seeks to

correct the evil impression, which the conduct of certain persons in

Scotland had produced upon the English people, by narrating the martial

and literary achievements of more worthy representatives of his nation.

The rapidity with which the work had been produced is described by the

writer in the following terms. "Laying aside all other businesses," he

says, "and cooping my self up daily for some hours together, betwixt the

case and the printing press, I usually afforded the setter copy at the

rate of above a whole printed sheet in the day; which, although by

reason of the smallness of a Pica letter, and close couching thereof, it

did amount to three full sheets of my writing; the aforesaid setter,

nevertheless (so nimble a workman he was), would in the space of

twenty-four hours make dispatch of the whole, and be ready for another

sheet. He and I striving thus who should compose fastest, he with his

hand, and I with my brain; and his uncasing of the letters, and placing

them in the composing instrument, standing for my conception; and his

plenishing of the gally, and imposing of the form, encountering with the

supposed equi-value of my writing, we would almost every foot or so jump

together in this joynt expedition, and so neerly overtake other in our

intended course, that I was oftentimes, (to keep him doing), glad to

tear off parcels of ten or twelve lines apeece, and give him them, till

more were ready;[201] unto which he would so suddenly put an order,

that almost still, before the ink of the written letters was dry, their

representatives were, (out of their respective boxes), ranked in the

composing-stick; by means of which great haste, I writing but upon the

loose sheets of cording-quires, which, as I minced and tore them,

looking like pieces of waste paper, troublesome to get rallyed, after

such dispersive scattredness, I had not the leisure to read what I had

written, till it came to a proof, and sometimes to a full revise. So

that by vertue of this unanimous contest, and joint emulation betwixt

the theoretick and practical part, which of us should overhye other in

celerity, we in the space of fourteen working daies compleated this

whole book, (such as it is), from the first notion of the brain to the

last motion of the press; and that without any other help on my side,

either of quick or dead, (for books I had none, nor possibly would I

have made use of any, although I could have commanded them), then [than]

what, (by the favour of God), my own judgment and fancy did suggest unto

me."[202]