the highest station of life in his line, has a good right to set
forth the particulars of the discretion and prudence by which he
lifted himself so far above the ordinaries of his day and
generation; indeed, the generality of mankind may claim this as a
duty; for the conduct of public men, as it has been often wisely
said, is a species of public property, and their rules and
observances have in all ages been considered things of a national
concernment. I have therefore well weighed the importance it may be
of to posterity, to know by what means I have thrice been made an
instrument to represent the supreme power and authority of Majesty
in the royal burgh of Gudetown, and how I deported myself in that
honour and dignity, so much to the satisfaction of my superiors in
the state and commonwealth of the land, to say little of the great
respect in which I was held by the townsfolk, and far less of the
terror that I was to evil-doers. But not to be over circumstantial,
I propose to confine this history of my life to the public portion
thereof, on the which account I will take up the beginning at the
crisis when I first entered into business, after having served more
than a year above my time, with the late Mr Thomas Remnant, than
whom there was not a more creditable man in the burgh; and he died
in the possession of the functionaries and faculties of town-
treasurer, much respected by all acquainted with his orderly and
discreet qualities.

Mr Remnant was, in his younger years, when the growth of luxury and
prosperity had not come to such a head as it has done since, a
tailor that went out to the houses of the adjacent lairds and
country gentry, whereby he got an inkling of the policy of the
world, that could not have been gathered in any other way by a man
of his station and degree of life. In process of time he came to be