< Page:Footsteps of Dr. Johnson.djvu
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THE COUNTESS OF EGLINTOUNE.

��for many years gave the laws of elegance to Scotland. She is in full vigour of mind, and not much impaired in form. She is only eighty-three. She was remarking that her marriage was in the year eight ; and I told her my birth was in nine. ' Then,' says she, ' I am just old enough to be your mother, and I will take you for my son.' She called Boswell the boy. ' Yes, Madam,' said I, ' we will send him to school.' ' He is already,' said she, 'in a good

���OLD AUCHANS.

��school ; ' and expressed her hope of his improvement. At last night came, and I was sorry to leave her." " She had been," writes Boswell, " the admiration of the gay circles of life, and the patroness of poets." To her Allan Ramsay had dedicated his Gentle Shep- herd, and Hamilton of Bangour had addressed verses. With his reception Johnson was delighted, so congenial were their principles in church and state. " In her bed-rooms," says Dx. Robert Chambers, " was hung a portrait of her sovereign dc jure, the ill- starred Charles Edward, so situated as to be the first object which met her sight on awaking in the morning." 1 She who

1 R. Chambers's Traditions of Edinburgh, ed. 1869, p. 217.

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