(Vol. ix., p. 422.)
Something more than a partiality for the novelist takes me now and then to
the scene of the antiquary--Aberbrothock, or Arbroath. On one occasion, in
company with a few friends, we made a day of it in a ramble along the
romantic eastern coast of that burgh, and the scene of the perilous
incident related of Sir Arthur Lekiss Wardour, when rescued from the
incoming tide by being drawn up the face of the precipitous cliff by the
doughty Mucklebacket, under the superintendence of Oldbuck and young Lovel.
The fresh breeze from the German Ocean, and the excitement of the occasion,
imparted a keen relish for the locality and its associations; and by the
time we reached the hostelry of Mrs. Walker, at Auchmithie, a no less sharp
appreciation of the _piscatorial spread_ we had the foresight to bespeak
the previous day. Ushered into Lucky Walker's best dining-room, our
attention was immediately drawn to an aristocratic emblazonment of arms
which occupied one entire side of the room, with a ribbon, artistically
disposed over the same, upon which was inscribed Lord Rosehill, who was, we
were informed, the eldest son of the Earl of Northesk (Carnegie), a great
proprietor in that neighbourhood, and the special patron of our hostess and
her establishment.
With respect to the particular Lord Rosehill, alluded to by your
correspondent W. D. R., I beg to offer him the following brief notice from
Douglas' _Peerage_, by Wood, Edin. 1813:
"David L. Rosehill (son of Geo. 6th E. of Northesk) was born at Edin.,
5th April, 1749; had an Ensign's commission in the 26th Reg. Foot in
1765; quitted the army 1767, and went to America. He married in
Maryland, in Aug. 1768, Miss Mary Cheer, and died without issue at
Rouen, in Normandy, 19 Feb. 1788, æt. 39."
From a dear old lady, whom I always find a mine of Forfarshire anecdote of
the last century, I obtain some corroborative proof that the said David
{520} Lord Rosehill was the eccentric character we might infer from the
above, in the assurance that he was "a ne'er do weel, and ran away with the
tincklers (_i. e._ gypsies) in early life."
If I may farther travel out of the record, allow me here to recommend to
such of your readers as meditate the northern tour this summer, to diverge
a little from the beaten track, and visit the neighbourhood above alluded
to; your antiquarian friends, especially, will be delighted with that fine
old ruin, the Abbey of Aberbrothock, now that it is brushed up and fit to
receive visitors. The worthy Mr. Peter, in charge, has some curious relics
acquired at the last diggins, and possesses a fragment of a black-letter
Chronicle to satisfy the incredulous that in identifying the objects
exhibited, he has his warrant in Hector Boece. The man of progress, too,
will find in Fairport, or Arbroath, a hive of industry; but, I regret to
add, threatened with a check by this closing of the Baltic trade, which is,
if I may say so, both _woof_ and _warp_ in the prosperity of this and other
towns on the east coast of Scotland. And lastly, the lovers of ocean,
rocks, and caves, will be not less interested with the environs, and I
doubt not all would leave it exclaiming with Johnson, that if they had seen
no more of old Scotia than Aberbrothock, they would not have regretted
their journey.