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Memorie of the Somervilles.
[May
SELECT EXTRACTS.
MEMORIE OF THE SOMERVILLES.
This book was published last year from the original MS. in the possession of the present Lord Somerville. It is the composition of his ancestor, James Somerville, who died in the year 1690,—who is styled in the title-page, James Eleventh Lord Somerville, but who in reality never found it convenient, in the low state to which the affairs of his family were then reduced, to assume any higher designation than that of the "Laird of Drum." His father was an officer of considerable eminence in the Scottish army during the civil wars, but the author himself is of a different way of thinking, being indeed a great stickler for the Divine right both of kings and of bishops. He is, notwithstanding, a very worthy sort of person, and gives good advice to his children, for whose benefit only he professes to write, in a manner that does him much honour.
The history of the Somerville family, during the first ages of its appearance in Scotland, is extremely inaccurate; dates and facts are often jumbled in a most absurd manner; and indeed nothing can be more uninteresting than both the subject and the manner of this whole part of the work. When, however, the author comes to treat of events more near his own time, or when he favours us with the result of his own reflections upon any general topic, there is commonly a considerable admixture both of shrewdness and naivete. Some of the anecdotes which he relates are, moreover, singularly picturesque, and for this reason we have thought fit to present our readers with a few of the most interesting passages.
The first which we shall extract is the history of a domestic tragedy, which occurred in the reign of King Robert II. and about the year 1371. The story is told with much feeling, and requires no commentary.