verbs one day, when he suddenly appeared before his mother in tears, and besought her to chastise him. Surprised at a request so extraordinary, she enquired the cause of it, when he exclaimed, "O mother! he that spareth the rod hateth the child!" It forms "a noticeable illustration," perhaps, as one biographer remarks, "of the vivid impression that his reading made." But another* may be nearer the truth, when he suggests that FERGUSSON had already developed his talent for mimicry and humour, and that he was playing tricks with his pious mother. His High School master, Mr. John Gilchrist, is described by Henry Mackenzie, "The Man of Feeling," as "a goodhumoured person with a good deal of comedy about him." FERGUSSON, no doubt, proved an apt pupil in comic matters as well as in construing Latin. With regard to the High School curriculum of those days, The Man of Feeling" says: The scholars went through the four classes taught by the under-masters, reading the usual elementary Latin books-for at that time no Greek was taught in the High School--and so on up to Virgil and Horace, Sallust, and parts of Cicero. The hours of attendance were from . 66 7 to 9 a.m., and, after an hour for breakfast, from 10 to 12: then, after an interval of two hours for dinner, the scholars returned for two hours in the afternoon." This was pretty stiff daily work for an ailing boy, and it certainly required to be lightened by a little "comedy." In those days the High School lads were a disciplined republic, sometimes given to taking the law into their own hands. When the "blackguards' * Alexander Gordon, in The Gentleman's Magazine for October, 1894. of the Cowgate broke out into open attack, the "puppies "-that is to say, the High School bull-dogs -were wont to arise in their wrath and growl down the attack. Many a battle was thus fought, chronicled by no muse: and the "puppies," though the superior animals, did not always get the best of it. FERGUSSON was too young, and possibly too weak, to take part in these pitched battles, but he must frequently have heard the stones rattle, and seen the fists do their work. And even if he did not take part in the fighting himself, he was no doubt familiar with those who had been taught, as Darsie Latimer was by Alan Fairford, to "smoke a cobbler, spin a lozen, head a bicker, and hold the bannets "-in other words, to break a window, head a skirmish with stones, and hold the bonnet or handkerchief which used to divide High School boys when fighting. During his term at the High School, it is interesting to learn that Master FERGUSSON in 1758 paid 18., and in 1761 28. 6d., to the School Library Fund-the former being the ordinary amount, and the latter so exceptional that only a Scottish nobleman is entered for a like payment. The fact reveals not more the boy's than the parents' love for, and belief in the value of books. Besides, the lad being "quick to learn and wise to know," his father had concluded to make a scholar of him: yea, father and mother together had resolved that one day he should wag his pow in a poopit"; and they were prepared, doubtless, to make the necessary sacrifices, such as so many poor parents in Scotland did before their day, and have done since. Happily, the Fergussons were to be helped. Through the kindness of Lord Finlater, whose factor Mrs. Fer gusson's brother was in Aberdeenshire, a presentation to a bursary, or scholarship, was obtained in favour of ROBERT at the Grammar School of Dundee. This scholarship came from a mortification, or benefaction, founded by the Rev. David Ferguson, parish minister of Strathmartine, near Dundee, in the year 1695, which assigned 6,000 merks" for the use, maintenance, and education of two poor male children, not under the age of nine years at their admission, nor above the age of fourteen years while they are at school." The quaint and austere conditions of this Ferguson bequest, as I learn from a copy of the deed quoted by Mr. A. H. Millar, the historian,* are that the recipients are to be of my own surname, and nearest of blood to me; whilk failing, any other two poor male children, begotten of good and honest parents, in ane lawful marriage." These children were to be “maintained, educated, and brought up in the Grammar School of Dundee, and to be lodged and boarded with one of the surname of Ferguson, in case there be any can do the same; and to furnish the said children with sufficient clothes and necessaries for their bodies, head, and feet-their coats being always of a grey colour, lined, with blue sleeves." The patrons had power to send such children as showed aptitude and learning to S. Leonard's College, St. Andrews, for four years; or, if they inclined to be tradesmen, to apprentice them to learn some trade, paying their apprentice fees out of the proceeds of the fund. By an express stipulation the patrons are empowered "to deprive and exclude from this Mortification such as are children *Roll of Eminent Burgesses of Dundee (1887). |