BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 277
No. CCLXII.
LORD BALMUTO.
C u m IRVINBEO SWELLL, ORDB ALMUTOwa, s born in 1742.’ His father,
John Boswell of Balmuto, dying when he was a mere infant, the care of his
education devolved on his mother, a woman of uncommon mental energy and
exemplary piety. She placed him, in his seventh year, with Mr. Barclay at
Dalkeith, then a celebrated master, under whose superintendence Henry Dundas,
afterwards Lord Melville, was at the time acquiring the rudiments of learning
; and an intimacy was formed between the two school-boys, which continued
till the death of Lord Melville in May 1 8 1 1 .’
Mr. Boswell finished his education at Edinburgh College, and passed advocate
on the 2d of August 1766. Some years afterwards he went abroad for
six months, visiting the court of Versailles, etc. In 1780 he was appointed
Sheriff-Depute of Fife and Kinross, and filled that responsible situation during
the trying period of 1793-4-5. In 1798 he was raised to the bench, where
he continued to sit till January 1822, when he resigned in favour of William
Erskine, Lord Kinedder.
In March of the same year, his friend and kinsman, Sir Alexander Boswell
of Auchinleck, was mortally wounded in a duel with James Stuart, Esq., younger
of Dunearn, about a mile from Balmuto ; and having been carried there to die,
Lord Balmuto received a shock from which he never fully recovered. His lordship
died on the 22d of July 1824, in the eighty-third year of his age, and in
the full exercise of that benevolence for which he was remarkable. He had
that day been out on horseback for many hours. He married, in 1783, Miss
Anne Irvine, who, by the death of her brother and grandfather, became heiress
of Kingussie.
Lord Balmuto left one son and two daughters.
His lordship and Lord Hermand were amongst the last specimens of the
Scottish judge of the last century. The former, a robust and athletic man,
was, during the period he held the situation of Sheriff of Fife, the terror of that
usually unmanageable set of persons-the Fife boatmen. He was: fond of
His lordship’s father, a writer in Edinburgh, the purchaser of Balmuto, waa a younger brother
of Lord Auchinleck, the grandfather of Sir Alexander Boswell.
Mr. Barclay was one of the most able and successful teaehers of hk day. The late Lord
Chancellor Loughborough, Lord Glencairn, and several others equally distinguished, were also his
pupils in early lie. It is not so very long since “Barclay’s scholars,” as they were called, had
their last convivial meeting. At their $mt, although forty years had elapsed since the death of
their worthy preceptor, it is rather remarkable that no fewer than twenty gentlemen, all moving in
the highest ranka of opulence, survived to pay the tribute of grateful respect to his memory.
278 BI 0 G R A P HI C AL SI< ET CHES.
alluding to his inferior office, when holding a higher one, and not unfrequently
prefaced his decisions by saying, “When I was Shirra’ of Fife,” a peculiarity
noticed in the celebrated Diamond-Beetle Case. He spoke with a strong Scotch
accent. He was fond of his joke, and sometimes indulged in it even on the
bench. On one occasion a young counsel was addressing him on some not very
important point that had arisen in the division of a common, or commonty (according
to law phraseology), when having made some bold averment, Balmuto
exclaimed-“ That’s a lee, Jemmie.” ‘( My lord ! ” ejaculated the amazed
barrister. “ Ay, ay, Jemmie : I see by your face you’re leeing.” (‘ Indeed,
my lord, I am not.” “Dinna tell me that ; it’s no in your memorial (brief)-
awa wi’ you ;” and, overcome with astonishment and vexation, the discomfited
barrister left the bar. Balmuto thereupon chuckled with infinite delight ; and,
beckoning to the clerk who attended on the occasion, he said, “Are ye no
Rabbie H-’s man 1” “Yes, my lord,” ‘(Was na Jemmie -l eeing 2”
“ 0 no, my lord.” “Ye’re quite sure 1” “ 0 yes.” Then just write out
what you want, and I’ll sign it ; my faith, but I made Jemmie stare.” So the
decision was dictated by the clerk, and duly signed by the judge, who left the
bench highly diverted with the fright he had given his young friend.
No. CCLXIII.
REV. JAMES HALL, D.D.,
OF TIlE SECESSION CHURCH, EROUGHTON PLACE, EDINBURGH.
THROUGHOtUhTe long period of his ministry in this city, few men enjoyed a
greater degree of popularity, or were more highly and generally esteemed, than
the Rev. gentleman whose Portrait is prefixed. He was born at Cathcart Mill,
a few miles west of Glasgow, on the 6th January 1756.’ His ancestors were
millers, and had occupied the mill for several generations. His father, James
Hall, a man of education and intelligence greatly superior to his rank, was one
of the original seceders from the Church of Scotland, and feued the site of the
first Secession Church in Glasgow ; and his mother, Isabella Bulloch, whose
paternal property lay in the vicinity of Kirkintilloch, presented the Seceders
of that place with the ground on which their church is erected.
DR. HALL had the misfortune to lose his father at a very early age ; but the
pious deportment and acquaintance with Scripture which Characterised his
1 He had three sisters and two brothers, four of whom were older thar. himself. The Rev.
Robert Hall, his younger brother, was long a minister in Kelso. His sisters were all married to
clergymen of the Secession-Mary, to the Rev. John Lindsay, of Johostoue ; Helen, Rev. Jam-
Illoir, of Tarboltoil ; and Isobel, to the llev. Dwid Walker, of Pollockshaws.
