valier; my friend was a Roundhead: I was
a Tory, and he was a Whig. I hated Presbyterians, and admired Montrose
with his victorious Highlanders; he liked the Presbyterian Ulysses,
the dark and politic Argyle: so that we never wanted subjects of
dispute; but our disputes were always amicable. In all these tenets
there was no real conviction on my part, arising out of acquaintance
with the views or principles of either party; nor had my antagonist
address enough to turn the debate on such topics. I took up my
politics at that period, as King Charles II. did his religion, from an
idea that the Cavalier creed was the more gentlemanlike persuasion of
the two.

After having been three years under Mr. Fraser, our class was, in the
usual routine of the school, turned over to {p.026} Dr. Adam, the
Rector. It was from this respectable man that I first learned the
value of the knowledge I had hitherto considered only as a burdensome
task. It was the fashion to remain two years at his class, where we
read Caesar, and Livy, and Sallust, in prose; Virgil, Horace, and
Terence, in verse. I had by this time mastered, in some degree, the
difficulties of the language, and began to be sensible of its
beauties. This was really gathering grapes from thistles; nor shall I
soon forget the swelling of my little pride when the Rector
pronounced, that though many of my schoolfellows understood the Latin
better, _Gualterus Scott_ was behind few in following and enjoying the
author's meaning. Thus encouraged, I distinguished myself by some
attempts at poetical versions from Horace and Virgil. Dr. Adam used to
invite his scholars to such essays, but never made them tasks. I
gained some distinction upon these occasions, and the Rector in future
took much notice of me; and his judicious mixture of censure and
praise went far to counterbalance my habits of indolence and
inattention. I saw I was expected to do well, and I was piqued in
honor to vindicate my master's favorable opinion. I climbed,
therefore, to the first form; and, though I never made a first-rate
Latinist, my schoolfellows, and what was of more consequence, I
myself, considered that I had a character for learning to maintain.
Dr. Adam, to whom I owed so much, never failed to remind me of my
obligations when I had made some figure in the literary world. He was,
indeed, deeply imbued with that fortunate vanity which alone could
induce a man who has arms to pare and burn a muir, to submit