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Kay's Originals Vol. 2

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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 241 A good many subscribers were procured for the l1 Retrospect ; ” the manuscript was nearly completed ; and arrangements for printing it so far entered into, that the Print by Kay was engraved as a frontispiece to the book.’ The death of the author, however, prevented the publication. He died on the 16th of September 1817, in the seventy-fourth year of his age, and the oldest Deacon of the fourteen Incorporated Trades of Scotland. The manuscript remained in the hands of his widow; but on her dea.th in 1832, his papers unfortunately were so much scattered and destroyed, that almost no vestige of the work remains. Mr. Sommers married, first, Joan Douglas, daughter of a glazier who resided in Libberton’s Wynd ; and, secondly, Jean or Jeanie Fraser, sister of the wife of Nathaniel Gow, the famous musician. The (‘ Retrospect ” probably contained much curious matter. No. CCLI. MR. FRANCIS ANDERSON, W.S., MR. JAMES HUNTER, AND HIS SON, MR. GEORGE HUNTER. THIS graphic scene appears from the Print to have occurred in the Parliament Square, and was probably witnessed by the artist from his own shop window. Mr. Hunter is in the act of inviting his friend Mr. Anderson to dinner -the excessive deafness of the latter accounting for the singular posture in which the parties are placed. MR. FRANCIS ANDERSON, brother to the banker of that name, was a Writer to the Signet, and held the appointment of Deputy-Auditor in the. Exchequer. He resided in George Street, and had his office in the Royal Exchange. His father, who lived at Stoneyhill,2 was factor to the Earl of Wemyss, to which situation the subject of our notice latterly BUGceeded. 1 It will be observed, in confirmation of this, that the volume displayed in the hand of the author contains an outline of the spire of St. Giles. Sornmen’ History was probably suggested by Creech’s Comparative View of Edinburgh in the yean 1763 and 1783, which wan subsequently brought down to 1793, The villa of Stoneyhill is situated on the river Esk, about half s mile above Mnaselburgh. It was formerly the residence of Sir William Sharp, son of Archbishop Sharp ; and more recently of the notorious Colonel Charteris. VOL. 11. 2 1
Volume 9 Page 322
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