polite answer in course of post, in which you express great pleasure in
complying with my request, and are so obliging as to conclude with the
assurance that at any time you will be happy to elucidate my researches
into my ancestors' curious and most valuable Manuscripts with such hints
as your local knowledge may supply.

'Since the period to which I have just alluded, I have continued to
prosecute the work, but only at intervals, having met with frequent
interruptions, among which I may mention an excursion to Italy; and
after having finished about two-thirds of it in my own handwriting, it
is only now that I have been able to complete it, by the aid of an
amanuensis. I do not much wonder that, employed as you are in
administering fresh draughts of enjoyment from the exhaustless spring of
your genius to the ever-increasing thirst of a delighted public, you
should have forgotten my humble labours. But whilst I regret that they
should have been so forgotten, inasmuch as they might have contributed
to aid or lessen yours, I beg to assure you, that every other feeling is
absorbed in that of the satisfaction I am now impressed with in learning
that you have taken Lord Fountainhall under your fostering care, as I am
well aware that, independent of the honor done him and his family by his
name being coupled with that of Sir Walter Scott, there does not now,
and perhaps there never will, exist any individual who could elucidate
him so happily as your high talents and your deep research in the
historical anecdote of your country must enable you to do. I am
naturally very desirous to see your publication, of which I cannot
procure a copy from the booksellers here. I should not otherwise have
intruded on you until I had seen the book, as I am at present ignorant
how far it clashes or agrees with the plan of the work I have prepared.
As business calls me to Edinburgh, I can now have no opportunity of
perusing it before my departure, as I leave this on Tuesday the 28th