But they could not stand the numerous slips
in prosody. Lord Monboddo shocked the ears of the men of Eton and of
Winchester by dreadful false quantities--verse-making being, in
Scotland, then quite neglected, and a matter little thought of by the
learned judge.
Lord Monboddo was considered an able lawyer, and on many occasions
exhibited a very clear and correct judicial discernment of intricate
cases. It was one of his peculiarities that he never sat on the bench
with his brother judges, but always at the clerk's table. Different
reasons for this practice have been given, but the simple fact seems to
have been, that he was deaf, and heard better at the lower seat. His
mode of travelling was on horseback. He scorned carriages, on the ground
of its being unmanly to "sit in a box drawn by brutes." When he went to
London he rode the whole way. At the same period, Mr. Barclay of Ury
(father of the well-known Captain Barclay), when he represented
Kincardineshire in Parliament, always _walked_ to London. He was a very
powerful man, and could walk fifty miles a day, his usual refreshment on
the road being a bottle of port wine, poured into a bowl, and drunk off
at a draught. I have heard that George III. was much interested at these
performances, and said, "I ought to be proud of my Scottish subjects,
when my judges _ride_, and my members of Parliament _walk_ to the
metropolis.
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