procurator in the Sheriff Court of Glasgow for many years occupied a deservedly high position. Of a most logical and argumentative mind, he left no loophole of escape for his opponent; one thought he elaborated his argument to too fine a point, but, with it all, he never was guilty of irrelevant statement. His firm of Borland & King, as it was called at its inception, had a phenomenal career. Mr. John Y. King was a gentleman of different style and mind, but also highly respected. He died early (20th February, 1899), and, together with Mr. Borland, he gained a position among the practitioners of the past thirty years which showed that merit will ultimately secure its reward. Mr. Borland was for a time honoured with the patronage of the Provost and Magistrates in relation to certain Parliamentary work, and, if he had survived, was by many thought likely to be a future town-clerk of Glasgow.

Mr. Alexander Foulis, of the firm of J. M. Taylor & Foulis, was esteemed for his suavity and character. He in his early years was recognised in the Court as thorough and fair, but in later years he cultivated the quieter walks of the profession in a chamber and trust practice of importance. Mr. Foulis, trained in the office of Messrs. M'Clures & Hannay, was a president of the Legal and Speculative Society, and held several public positions. At his death, on 2nd March, 1897, he was Master of the Prince's Lodge of Freemasons a post occupied at times by many Glasgow lawyers, among others by Sheriff F. W. Clark, Messrs. James Boyd, J. Duncan Dalrymple, James A. Reid (the muchrespected Dean of Faculty), and J. Guthrie Smith.

In drawing these personal reminiscences to a close, we refrain from sketching the careers or characteristics of those who presently frequent the Sheriff Court and are in daily contact with the activities and duties of legal procedure. They are well known to most of our readers, and respected for their attainments and worth. It would be invidious, if not bad taste, to praise their good qualities, and still worse form it would be to point to their deficiencies and weaknesses. To our successors or to later writers is reserved the task of continuing these local life sketches: in the revolving years the men of the present time will, we doubt not, be held in as kindly remembrance and appreciative respect by a later generation as the worthies whose names and virtues have been commemorated in this and the preceding papers.

But one who formed a final link in the chain of the past here deserves special recognition-we mean the Auditor of the Sheriff Court at Glasgow, the late Mr. Peter Taylor Young-

who was familiar and beloved for more than two generations as one of the staff of the County Buildings.

Mr. Young was born in Edinburgh on 29th May, 1807-nearly a century ago and lived a long and useful life until 13th November, 1896. Educated in George Heriot's Hospital, he vividly remembered in his old age the stirring times of Waterloo, the five points of the Chartist League, and the great Reform agitation which ended in the Act of 1832. As dux of his class he had the honour of reciting the opening lines of Virgil's "Georgics" when Heriot's school was visited by Prince Leopold, who married the beloved Princess Charlotte and ultimately was known as Leopold, the first King of the Belgians. Many a story did he tell of the great Sir Walter Scott, whom he remembered and conversed with as one of the clerks of the Court of Session, and at whose house 39 Castle Street he had occasion to call on an evening when, as a Parliament House clerk, he lodged papers often at a very late hour.

Trained at first in the office of an S.S.C., Mr. Thomas Baillie, he left his service and became clerk to Archibald Alison, then a rising junior counsel and an early hope of the Tories. When the Sheriffship of Lanarkshire was offered by Sir William Rae, the Lord Advocate, to young Alison, Mr. Young was asked to accompany him to the western metropolis, and there he began his official life in February, 1835. Between that time and the year 1842 he was the amanuensis of the historian, and often for spells of several nights at a time the two worked hard at the colossal task of the History of Europe, the author and his clerk diligently spending many nights of labour and on to early hours in the morning.

In his autobiography Sir Archibald Alison thus pays a tribute to Mr. Young" To a sound legal head and remarkable common sense he united an industry which nothing could weary and a suavity of temper which nothing could ruffle. This last quality was of inestimable importance, worried as he was both in his situation as my confidential secretary and in that of Auditor of Court, to which I promoted him. Never had a man a more faithful and attached assistant; he owed his success in life, as he thought, to me, and his whole soul was wrapped up in my service. During eight-and-twenty years that he has now (1861) been in my employment, there never was an angry word passed or an angry thought harboured betwixt us. All he required were notes of the facts of the case and of the findings in law, written out by me when the debate was going on, and from these materials he made

out in the evening or next day a formal interlocutor, which I always found correct."

On the death of Mr. George Salmond, Sir Archibald appointed Mr. Young procurator-fiscal along with the late Mr. William Hart, and they were joint prosecutors for about two years, the memorable trial of Madeleine Smith for poisoning her lover being a cause célèbre during Mr. Young's term of office. But the work was not congenial, and Mr. Young returned to his old duties, which he discharged till the Sheriff's death in May, 1867. Immediately on that event his life-long friend, Mr. John M. Hill, who was demitting office, recommended him as his successor, and Mr. Young was accordingly appointed one of the police assessors, an office which he retained till his resignation in 1894. He acted as auditor of accounts from 1844 till his death in November, 1896, and no official in the County Buildings was more highly respected by the legal professional gentlemen of Glasgow and the vicinity and their clerks. To the latter he was always a favourite and friend.

Mr. Young in his old age often spoke with happy recollections of the many Sheriffs and law agents whom he had known, with occasional touches of humour, and with good cause for reflection he could speak of the initiation of the Glasgow Juridical Society in 1847, of which he was a leading founder. By all with whom he did business he was appreciated for his kindly friendship, and to the young and inexperienced he was never patronising, but sympathetic and obligingly helpful.

Such estimable public servants and Glasgow has had many serve to render professional life and its working routine far from disagreeable, and it is due to their memory that in these retrospective reviews we should include their names on the roll of the worthies of the past.

We men, who in our morn of youth defied

The elements, must vanish-be it so,

Enough if something from our hands have power

To live, and act, and serve the future hour,

And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,

Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower
We feel that we are greater than we know.

Literature.

TRIAL OF DEACON BRODIE.

Edinburgh. Notable

G. B. Y.

Edited by William Roughead, W.S.,
Scottish Trials Series. Glasgow:

William Hodge & Co. (58. net.)

This volume is sure to find a foremost place among the "Notable Scottish Trials" series. It takes us away from the

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66

sordid details of horrible crime and presents a fascinating record of a remarkable trial. There are already in existence several publications on the subject, but these are more or less incomplete. It is not saying too much to affirm that everything which can now be learned regarding the trial is to be found in this book. It is nearly one hundred and twenty years ago since William Brodie, Deacon of the Wrights of Edinburgh, played, and with for a considerable time conspicuous success, his twofold part, by day a considerable house carpenter" and member of the Town Council; by night a housebreaker and the companion of thieves. For R. L. Stevenson the career of Brodie had a peculiar attraction, and not without considerable show of reason. Roughead hazards the idea that "it may even be the conception of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was suggested to Stevenson by his study of the dual nature so strikingly exemplified in his earlier hero."

Mr.

For both the general reader and the lawyer of to-day the trial as here narrated has much to interest and instruct.

For the theft by housebreaking of £16 Brodie and his associate, George Smith, on being found guilty, were sentenced to death and subsequently hanged. Five judges tried the case, presided over by Lord Braxfield (the prototype of "Weir of Hermiston "). The Crown was represented by the Lord Advocate, Solicitor-General, and two Advocates-depute; the Dean of Faculty (Hon. Henry Erskine), with two junior counsel, appeared for Brodie; while the defence of Smith was conducted by John Clerk (afterwards Lord Eldin), then only three years at the bar, and Robert Hamilton. The outstanding feature during the trial was the 'scene" between the bench and Clerk, during the latter's speech to the jury, which ended as thus recorded by Mr. Roughead-"Clerk started to his feet and, shaking his first at the bench, said, Hang my client if you daur, my lord, without hearing me in his defence.""

Here new

The editor's introduction reads like a portion of a first-class novel. It is not confined to a mere outline of the trial, but gives a vivid account of the social life of the time (including the Cape Club, of which Brodie was a member), which is necessary to properly appreciate the Deacon's strange career. facts are brought to light concerning his life and doings, e.g., a connected account of the robberies committed by him and his associates, his appearance as a juryman in the High Court about six months before his own trial, and an authentic account of the introduction of the "drop," which has been erroneously attributed by several writers, among them Robert Chambers, in his "Minor Antiquities of Edinburgh," to Brodie. In the report of the trial the blanks in the declaration of Smith are for the first time filled up and printed in full, as also the state of affairs of Brodie. The appendices exhibit a large amount of research, and embrace an account of the judges and counsel engaged in the trial, excerpts from the records of the Cape Club, from the Guild registers of the burgh of Edinburgh, from

the records of the Edinburgh Town Council, copies of two autograph letters of Brodie, &c. The illustrations are numerous and enhance the value of the work. They include all the judges, counsel, and leading persons of the trial after "Kay's Portraits," Lord Braxfield after Raeburn, various drawings of Brodie's Close, the Excise Office, &c., by Bruce J. Home, and facsimiles of the first page of the MS. register in the Brodie Family Bible, and Brodie's letter to the Duchess of Buccleuch.

THE WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION ACT, 1906. With Explanatory
Notes and Index. By W. Ellis Hill, M.A., of the Inner
Temple and Northern Circuit, Barrister-at-law. London:
Waterlow & Sons. (3s. 6d. net.)

This Act does not come into operation until the 1st of July of the present year; but it is undoubtedly well to be forearmed a good bit ahead, and the panoply provided by Mr. Hill ought to commend itself to the three classes to whom he appeals--(1) the employers, (2) the insurers, and (3) the earners of wages or salaries. The scope of the Act being very much wider than that of the old Act, he may justifiably expect a very large number of readers. The Scotch reader will, of course, require to remember that the writer is not a Scots lawyer, and so does not profess to deal with the Scottish aspect of the Act. With its good index and informative notes, the book well fulfils its purpose of enabling any one "whether in the legal profession or not, to ascertain the extent of the benefits conferred upon employees and the liabilities imposed upon employers by the provisions of the Act."

Obituary.

At Brechin, on 6th January, Mr. James Don, of Messrs. Shiell & Don, solicitors, Brechin. Mr. Don, who was seventy years of age, was able to attend to his business until about ten days before his death, although he had been in failing health for some time. A native of Brechin, Mr. Don, after serving his apprenticeship as a solicitor, commenced business on his own. account in Brechin. Ultimately he entered into partnership with Mr. John Shiell, S.S.C., the firm in addition acting as agents for the National Bank of Scotland. Like his partner, Mr. Don was a man of the highest integrity and probity. The firm soon acquired an extensive family practice and factorial business. For many years deceased acted as clerk to the District Board of the Southesk Fisheries, and in the discharge of that office, as well as of all his other work, he commanded the respect and esteem of all who came into contact with him. He is survived by a widow and one daughter.

At Tayport, on 6th January, after a long illness, Mr. William C. Dickson, solicitor, Dundee. Deceased was born in Tayport, where he spent his early days. Choosing the law as his profession, he eventually settled in Dundee, where he