Chest_, and Mrs. Stewart Smith's _Grange of St. Giles_.

[18] See Appendix III.

The following estimate of his character in Forbes's Preface to the _Journal
of the Session_ (1714), a rare book, is quoted by Mr. Laing, but is too
much in point to be omitted here. 'The publick and private character of
this excellent judge are now so well known that I need say no more of him
than that he signalized himself as a good patriot and true Protestant in
the Parliament of 1686 in defence of the Penal Laws against Popery. This
self-denyed man hath taken no less pains to shun places that were in his
offer than some others have been at to get into preferment. Witness his
refusing to accept a patent in the year 1692 to be the King's Advocate, and
the resigning his place as a Lord of Justiciary after the Union, which Her
Majesty with reluctancy took off his hand. In short, his lordship is (what
I know by experience) as communicative as he is universally learned and
knowing. He hath observed the decisions of the Session from November 1689
till November 1712, which I have seen in Manuscript; but his excessive
modesty can't be prevailed on to make them publick.'

There are no materials for expanding Mr. Laing's sketch of Fountainhall's
life, except in so far as the notes of his travels and his expeditions into
the country, and the accounts, here printed, give some glimpses of his
habits and his domestic economy in his early professional years. He lived
in troubled times, but his own career was prosperous and comparatively
uneventful. The modesty which Professor Forbes truly ascribes to him
disinclined him to take a part, as a good many lawyers did, in public
affairs, except for a short period before the Revolution, as a member of
Parliament; and, together with his prudence and strong conscientiousness,
preserved him from mixing in the political and personal intrigues which