a lawyer could
attain in his own country; and he has left to the world such literary
productions, as will authorize his friends to place him, if not in the
highest, yet much above the lowest, class of elegant and polite writers.
He died in 1783, leaving to the world a proof, that an attention to the
abstrusest branches of learning, is not incompatible with the more
pleasing pursuits of taste and polite literature." He was kind-hearted
and humane. His pure taste in landscape scenery, is acknowledged by Mr.
Loudon, in p. 81 of the Encyclopaedia of Gardening. _Blair Drummond_ will
long be celebrated as having been his residence, and he there displayed
his superior taste in planting and improving.

In his "Elements of Criticism," (a truly original work) there is a
distinct chapter on architecture and gardening. He therein thus
addresses the reader:--"These cursory observations upon gardening, shall
be closed with some reflections that must touch every reader. Rough
uncultivated ground, dismal to the eye, inspires peevishness and
discontent: may not this be one cause of the harsh manners of savages? A
field richly ornamented, containing beautiful objects of various kinds,
displays in full lustre the goodness of the Deity, and the ample
provision he has made for our happiness. Ought not the spectator to be
filled with gratitude to his Maker, and with benevolence to his fellow
creatures? Other fine arts may be perverted to excite irregular and even
vicious emotions; but gardening, which inspires the purest and most
refined pleasures, cannot fail to promote every good affection. The
gaiety and harmony of mind it produceth, inclineth the spectator to
communicate his satisfaction to others, and to make them happy as he is
himself, and tends naturally to establish in him a habit of humanity and
benevolence."

JOHN ABERCROMBIE'S manly and expressive countenance is best given in the
portrait prefixed to an edition in 2 vols. 8vo. published Feb. 1, 1783,
by Fielding and Debrett. He is also drawn at full-length at his age of
seventy-two, in the sixteenth edition, printed in 1800, with a pleasing
view of a garden in the back-ground, neatly engraved. This honest,
unassuming man, persevered "through a long life of scarcely interrupted
health," in the ardent pursuit of his favourite science. The tenor of
his life exemplified how much a garden calms the mind, and tranquilly
sets at rest its turbulent passions. Mr. Loudon's Encyclop. of