harles II for Scotch affairs, and
for many years had the government of that kingdom entirely entrusted to
him. Whoever is acquainted with history will be at no loss to know, with
how little moderation he exercised his power; he ruled his native
country with a rod of iron, and was the author of all those disturbances
and persecutions which have stained the Annals of Scotland, during that
inglorious period.

As the duke of Lauderdale was without issue-male of his own body, he
took our author into his protection as his immediate heir, and ordered
him to be educated in such a manner as to qualify him for the possession
of those great employments his ancestors enjoyed in the state. The
improvement of this young nobleman so far exceeded his years, that he
was very early admitted into the privy council, and made lord justice
clerk, anno 1681. He married the daughter of the earl of Argyle, who was
tried for sedition in the state, and confined in the castle of
Edinburgh. When Argyle found his fate approaching, he meditated, and
effected his escape; and some letters of his being intercepted and
decyphered, which had been written to the earl of Lauderdale, his
lordship fell under a cloud, and was stript of his preferments. These
letters were only of a familiar nature, and contained nothing but
domestic business; but a correspondence with a person condemned, was
esteemed a sin in politics not to be forgiven, especially by a man of
the Duke of York's furious disposition.

Though the duke of Lauderdale had ordered our author to be educated as
his heir, yet he left all his personal estate, which was very great, to
another, the young nobleman having, by some means, disobliged him; and
as he was of an ungovernable implacable temper, could never again
recover his favour[1]. Though the earl of Lauderdale was thus removed
from his places by the court, yet he persisted in his loyalty to the
Royal Family, and, upon the revolution, followed the fortune of King
James II, and some years after died in France, leaving no surviving
issue, so that the titles devolved on his younger brother.

While the earl was in exile with his Royal master, he applied his mind
to the delights of poetry, and, in his leisure hours, compleated a
translation of Virgil's works. Mr. Dryden, in his dedication of the
Aeneis, thus mentions it; 'The late earl of Lauderdale, says he, sent me
over his new translation of the Aeneis, which he had ended before I
engaged in th