pofe; nothing lefs will fo much as command the attention of the public.

Becket tells me that he is to give us a new edition of your Differtation, accompanied with fome remarks on Temora. Here is a favourable opportunity for you to execute this purpose. You have a just and laudable zeal for the credit of thefe poems. They are, if genuine, one of the greatest curiofities in all refpects, that ever was difcovered in the commonwealth of letters; and the child is, in a manner, become yours by adoption, as Macpherson has totally abandoned all care of it. Thefe motives call upon you to exert yourfelf, and I think it were fuitable to your candour, and most satisfactory also to the reader, to publifh all the anfwers to all the letters you write, even though fome of thefe letters fhould make fomewhat against your own opinion in this affair. We fhall always be the more affured that no arguments are ftrained beyond their proper force, and no contrary arguments fuppreffed, where fuch an entire communication is made to us.

Beck

et joins me heartily in this application; and he owns to me, that the believers in the authenticity of the poems diminish every day among the men of sense and reflection. Nothing lefs than what I propose can throw the balance on the other fide. I depart from hence in about three weeks, and fhould be glad to hear your refolution before that time.

COPY

COPY OF ANOTHER LETTER FROM THE SAME TO

THE SAME.

:

MY DEAR SIR,

I am very glad you have undertaken the task which I ufed the freedom to recommend to you. Nothing lefs than what you propofe will ferve the purpofe. You need expect no afiftance from Macpherfon, who flew into a paffion when I told him of the letter I had wrote to you: But you muft not mind fo ftrange and heteroclite a mortal, than whom I have fcarce ever known a man more perverfe and unamiable. He will probably depart for Florida with Governor Johnftone, and I would advise him to travel among the Chickifaws or Cherokees, in order to tame him and civilize him,

I should be much pleafed to hear of the fuccefs of your labours. Your method of directing to me is under cover to the Earl of Hertford, Northumberland Houfe. Any letters that come to me under that direction, will be fent over to me at Paris.

I have no prefent thoughts of publishing the work you mention; but when I do, I hope you have no objection of my dedicating it to you.

I beg my compliments to Robertfon and Jardine. I am very forry to hear of the ftate of Ferguson's health. John Home went to the country yefterday, with Lord Bute. I was introduced the other day to

that

that Noble Lord, at his defire. I believe him a very good man; a better man than a politician.

Since writing the above, I have been in company with Mrs Montague, a lady of great distinction in this place, and a zealous partizan of Offian. I told her of your intention, and even ufed the freedom to read your letter to her. She was extremely pleafed with your project; and the rather, as the Duc de Nivernois, fhe faid, had talked to her much on that fubject laft winter, and defired, if poffible, to get collected fome proofs of the authenticity of thefe poems, which he propofed to lay before the Academie de Belle Lettres at Paris. You fee, then, that you are upon a great ftage in this inquiry, and that many people have their eyes upon you. This is a new motive for rendering your proofs as complete as poffible. I cannot conceive any objection which a man even of the graveft character could have to your publication of his letters, which will only atteft a plain fact known to him. Such fcruples, if they occur, you must endeavour to remove; for on this trial of yours will the judgment of the public finally depend.

Lord Bath, who was in the company, agreed with me, that such documents of authenticity are entirely necessary and indifpenfable.

Please to write to me as foon as you make any advances, that I may have fomething to fay on this fubject to the literati of Paris. I beg my compli ments to all those who bear that character at Edin

burgh.

burgh. I cannot but look upon all of them as my

friends. I am,

6th October 1763.

Yours fincerely,

DAVID HUME.

I depart hence in eight days.

It is flattering to the Committee, that the line of conduct here chalked out for the Doctor by his illuftrious friend, is not diffimilar to that which, without the advantage of knowing Mr Hume's advice to Dr Blair, the Committee followed, when it published and circulated the fet of queries, of which a copy is given above.

Dr Blair, whether in purfuance of Mr Hume's advice, or from his own previous determination on the fubject, procured from a variety of correfpondents, chiefly clergymen in the Highlands, letters, fetting forth what they knew or believed with regard to this matter. Thefe letters one of Dr Blair's executors has been fo obliging as to put into the hands of the Committee, and the moft material of them will be found in the Appendix, No. I. Among thofe, the Committee recommends to the attention of the Society the letter from Sir James M Donald, (a name of the higheft authority in any literary queftion), App. p. 3.; thofe from Dr John Macpherfon, App. p. 5. & 9.; and that from Mr Angus M'Neill, minifter of Hopemore, App. p. 18. Several individuals of the Committee, as well as other members of the Society who occafionally at

tended

ཏྟཝཱ ཝཱ༎

tended its meetings, were obliging enough to correspond with their friends and acquaintance in the Highlands, on the fubject of its inquiry, in order to procure from them fuch facts and documents as their situations afforded opportunity of knowing or collecting, with regard to the poems in question.

The refult of fuch inquiries, correfpondence and information, the Committee is now to fubmit to the Society, fhortly stating what it fuppofes to be the general produce of its refearch, and fubjoining in an Appendix fome of the moft remarkable of thofe documents from which its information was drawn, or on which its opinions are founded.

Previously to this statement, the Committee must take the liberty of mentioning fome difficulties under which it laboured, in the course of this investigation. It was early foreseen that fuch difficulties must arife, from the change of manners in the Highlands, where the habits of industry have now fuperfeded the amusement of liftening to the legendary narrative or heroic ballad, where confequently the faculty of remembering, and the exercife of repeating fuch tales or fongs, are altogether in difufe, or only retained by a few perfons of extremely advanced age and feeble health, whom, in those diftant parts of the country, where communication and intercourfe is, from many local caufes, very difficult and tedious), it is not eafy to difcover, or when they are difcovered, to receive or to get tranfmitted the information they can give; for though the Gaelic or Erfe (as it is vulgary called) is the fpoken language of thofe diftricts,

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