ward, in his own time, of either profit or renown, and whose labours only begin to attract attention when the grave forbids him to answer his traducers. It would be easy to refute Mr. Tytler's criminations, did the industrious historian himself not afford ample materials, in his own pages, for showing how little they affected his own reliance upon Lord Hailes; and we shall therefore take the liberty of summoning himself as a witness, to testify how diligently he must have read, and how exactly he copied, the 66 vague and inaccurate" lucubrations of the man who unhorsed Edward Gibbon, and against whom even he did not sneer.

In describing the miseries to which Baliol was subjected by the tyranny of Edward, Lord Hailes said, that "to make the King of Scots a party in every appeal from his courts (to England,) whether for injustice done, or for justice delayed, was a grievous burden. To require his personal attendance at the trial of every appeal, was intolerable.”—(1 Hailes, 277.) The same reflection occurred to Mr. Tytler. "The first was a grievous, the last an intolerable burden, to which no one, with even the name of a

king, could long submit."-(1 Tytler, 103.) In the next page, where the sad description of Baliol's humiliation is continued, and the violent proceedings against him of the English Parliament detailed, with reference to the resolution to which they came, of compelling him to surrender the three principal castles of Scotland, Lord Hailes remarks, that it is probable Edward "considered the resolutions of his Parliament as impolitically violent, and that that part of the sentence, which adjudged the custody of three principal castles to him, could not be made effectual unless by force of arms."—(1 Hailes, 282.) Mr. Tytler came to the same conclusion—" It was evident that the resolutions of the Parliament were unnecessarily violent, and could not have been carried in effect, without the presence of an army in Scotland."-(1 Tytler, 105.) If Lord Hailes, in describing the seizure of Bruce's castle by Comyn Earl of Buchan, makes the remark, that "in a fierce age such an injury could never be forgiven,”—(p. 292, vol. i.)—so Mr. Tytler adopts it, with a little variation, by no means tending to its improvement," an injury which, in that fierce age, could never be forgotten." (1 Tytler, 107.) "Thus ended the

short and disastrous reign of John Baliol," says Lord Hailes, (p. 293.) "Thus ended the miserable and inglorious reign of John Baliol," echoes Mr. Tytler, (p. 119, vol. i.) On the dethronement of Baliol, and the subjection of Scotland, we have a description of the public feeling of the nation and the character of its governors from both historians, of which there is no difference in the ideas, and only this change in the language, that Mr. Tytler has re-arranged the sentences, so as to put what was said last in the middle, and what was explained in regard to the general feeling of the nation, at the beginning rather than at the end. "Warrenne the governor," says Lord Hailes, "took up his abode in the north of England for the recovery of his health. Cressingham the treasurer was a voluptuous, selfish, ecclesiastic,—proud, ignorant, and opinionative." (p. 298.) "Warrenne the governor," Tytler tells us, "had, on account of ill health, retired to the north of England. Cressingham the treasurer was a proud, ignorant ecclesiastic."-(p. 126.) "The temper of Scotland," says Hailes, "at that season required vigilance, courage, liberality, and moderation in its rulers. The ministers of Edward displayed

none of these qualities."-(298, Hailes.) "The repressing of a rising spirit of resistance," observes Mr. Tytler, "required a judicious union of firmness, gentleness, and moderation. Upon the part of the English, all this was wanting." -(1 Tytler, 125.) With reference to the conduct of Bruce, in retaliating with cruelty upon the English, Lord Hailes observed, that “it was not strange that, in a fierce age, one who had seen the ruin of his private fortunes, the captivity of his wife and only child, and the tortures and executions of his dearest relatives and tried friends, should have thus satisfied his revenge."—(Hailes, vol. ii. p. 41.) Tytler copies the sentiment in these terms:-" In Robert, whose personal injuries were so deep and grievous-who had seen the captivity of his queen and only child, and the death and torture of his dearest relatives and friends, we are not to be surprised, if revenge became a pleasure, and retaliation a duty."-(Vol. i. p. 284, Tytler.)

Writing of this kind might be passed over uncensured, were it not for the assumption with which the history greets us. No complaint is made against Mr. Tytler for having narrated the same facts in the same manner, and often in the

same language. It was impossible to avoid the resemblance of transcription here, as there is no scope for originality or invention. Anxious for the honour of our literature, we complain of Mr. Tytler for his injustice to men, whose specu lations their own peculiar property-he has copied without acknowledgment, having no apology for doing so, in the barrenness of his subject. The romantic adventures of Wallace, and the glorious reign of Bruce, gave room for vigorous reflection. We have there all the virtues in contrast to all the vices: unshaken fidelity and loftiest patriotism, in juxtaposition with treachery and mean submission to a foreign domination;-selfishness unbounded, with generosity that never changed with any change of fortune;-pride, jealousy, revenge, and all the base passions of fallen human nature, allowed to run riot with everything that religion had made sacred and humanity loved, exhibited in the same land with the cheerful sacrifice of self, and the devotion of means, of influence, of unceasing labour, and of life itself, in the cause of virtue :-nobles without the nobility of nature;-priests whose kneeling was religion, and who practised the opposite of what