Montrose, we claim to derive from a common ancestor with the celebrated
author of "Martinus Scriblerus." Indeed, the first of our name who
settled at Saxonholme was one James Arbuthnot, son to a certain
nonjuring parson Arbuthnot, who lived and died abroad, and was own
brother to that famous wit, physician and courtier whose genius, my
father was wont to say, conferred a higher distinction upon our branch
of the family than did those Royal Letters-Patent whereby the elder
stock was ennobled by His most Gracious Majesty King George the Fourth,
on the occasion of his visit to Edinburgh in 1823. From this James
Arbuthnot (who, being born and bred at St. Omer, and married, moreover,
to a French wife, was himself half a Frenchman) we Saxonholme Arbuthnots
were the direct descendants.

Our French ancestress, according to the family tradition, was of no very
exalted origin, being in fact the only daughter and heiress of one
Monsieur Tartine, Perruquier in chief at the Court of Versailles. But
what this lady wanted in birth, she made up in fortune, and the modest
estate which her husband purchased with her dowry came down to us
unimpaired through five generations. In the substantial and somewhat
foreign-looking red-brick house which he built (also, doubtless, with
Madame's Louis d'ors) we, his successors, had lived and died ever since.
His portrait, together with the portraits of his wife, son, and
grandson, hung on the dining-room walls; and of the quaint old
spindle-legged chairs and tables that had adorned our best rooms from
time immemorial, some were supposed to date as far back as the first
founding and furnishing of the house.

It is almost needless to say that the son of the non-juror and his
immediate posterity were staunch Jacobites, one and all. I am not aware
that they ever risked or suffered anything for the cause; but they were