The Highland madman is described by his pedantic patron, to be “a poor simpleton, neither _fatuus nec naturaliter idiota_, as is expressed in the brieves of furiosity, but simply a cracked-brained knave, who could execute any commission that jumped with his own humour, and made his folly a plea for avoiding every other.” This entirely agrees with the character of Jock, who is thought by many to possess much good common sense, and whose talents of music and mimicry point him out as at least ingenious. Yet to us it appears, that all Jock’s qualifications, ingenious as they may be, are nothing but indications of a weak mind. His great musical and mimetic powers, his talent and willingness of errand-going, his cunning and his excessive devotion to the humours and fancies of the fair sex, are mere caricatures of the same dispositions and talents in other men, and point out all such qualifications, when found in the best and wisest characters, as marks of fatuity and weakness. Where, for instance, was the perfection of musical genius ever found accompanied with a good understanding? Are not porters and chairman the smallest-minded among mankind? Is not cunning the lowest of the human faculties, and always found most active in the illiberal mind? And what lady’s man, what _cavaliere serviente_, what squire of dames, what man of drawing-rooms and boudoirs, ever yet exhibited the least trace of greatness or nobility of intellect? Jock, who has all these qualifications in himself, may be considered as outweighing at least four other men who severally possess them.