248 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.
some abstruse point, which the Doctor has apparently at his “finger-ends.”
The small figure with the tai2, in the back-ground, is in allusion to Monboddo’s
eccentric notions as to the original state of the human species.
No. c.
DAVID ROSS, LORD ANKERVILLE.
LORD ANKERVILLE, son of David Ross of Inverchasley, was born in 1727.
After following the usual routine of studies, he was admitted to the bar in
1751. In 1756 he obtained the office of Steward-Depute of Kirkcudbright ;
and, in 1763, was appointed one of the Principal Clerks of Session. This situation
he continued to fill with all due credit till 1776, when, on the death of
Lord Alemore, he was promoted to the bench by the title of Lord Anlierville.
He sat on the bench for twenty-nine years, during which long period we are
not aware that he was distinguished for any thing very extraordinary, either in
the line of his profession or out of it. There was, to be sure, one characteristic
which he possessed in common with the most profound of his legal brethrenwe
mean his unswerving devotion to the ‘‘ pleasures of the table,” and claret he
preferred above any other species of wine j nay, so anti-national was his taste,
that his own mountain Glenlivet, even when presented in the alluring medium
of a flowing bowl, and prepared in the most approved manner of the ‘‘ land 0’
cakes,” held only a secondary place in his estimation.
Every year Lord Ankerville travelled north to his seat of Tarlogie, near Tain,
in Ross-shire. This long journey be performed in a leisurely manner, by short
and easy stages ; and, as he dined and slept all night at the end of each, his
hosts of the Highland road were careful always to have a select portion of their
best claret set apart for their guest.
To choose the line of road-to regulate the distance of each day’s progress,
so that he might bivouac to best advantage in the evening, had been an object
of great consequence to the judge ; and, it may be supposed, of some difficulty
at that time in the north. The acute judgment and good generalship, however,
of the propounder of law, after a few experimental journeys, soon enabled him
to make the most satisfactory arrangements,
The annual migration of the judge from north to south, and from south to
north, thus became a matter of as nice regularity as the cuckoo’s song in spring ;
and as well did the Highland innkeeper, at half-a-mile’s distance, know the
rumbling, creaking chaise of the one, as he did the monotonous note of the
other. The quantity of claret drank by his lordship on these annual journeys
has been variously estimated ; and, although no satisfactory statement has ever
been given, all agree in saying that it must have been immense.
The old judge’s love af claret did not abate with his increase of years. A
