Among the picturesque figures that walked the streets of Edinburgh in the middle of last century, one that often caught the notice of the passer-by was that of a man of good height and broad shoulders, clad in a suit of rough tweed, with a shepherd's plaid across his chest and a stout stick in his hand. His shock of sandy-coloured hair escaped from under a soft felt-hat; his blue eyes, either fixed on the ground or gazing dreamily ahead, seemed to take no heed of their surroundings. His rugged features wore an expression of earnest gravity, softening sometimes into a smile and often suffused with a look of wistful sadness, while the firmly compressed lips betokened strength and determination of character. The springy elastic step with which he moved swiftly along the crowded pavement was that of the mountaineer rather than of the native of a populous city. A stranger would pause to look after him and to wonder what manner of man this could be. If such a visitor ventured to question one of the passing townsmen, he would be told promptly and with no little pride 'That is Hugh Miller.' No further description or explanation would be deemed necessary, for the name had not only grown to be a household word in Edinburgh and over the whole of Scotland, but had now become familiar wherever the English language was spoken, even to the furthest western wilds of Canada and the United States. A hundred years have passed since this notable man was born, and nearly half that interval has elapsed since he was laid in the grave. The hand of time, that resistlessly winnows the wheat from the chaff of human achievement, has been quietly shaping what will remain as the permanent sum of his work and influence. The temporary and transitory events in his career have already, in large measure, receded into the background. The minor contests in which, from his official position, he was so often forced to engage are mostly forgotten; the greater battles that he fought and won are remembered rather for their broad and brilliant results than for the crowded incidents that gave them such vivid interest at the time. His contemporaries who still survive him--every year a sadly diminishing number--can look back across the half century and mark how the active and strenuous nature whose memory they so fondly cherish, now 'Orbs into the perfect star We saw not when we moved therein.' A juster estimate can doubtless be formed to-day of what we owe to him than was possible in his life-time. That the debt is great admits of no dispute, and that it is acknowledged to be due could hardly be more fittingly shown than by the wide-spread desire which has brought us here to-day from so many distant places in order to raise in the town of his birth, which he has made a place of pilgrimage to many a lover of English literature, a visible memorial of him in an institution of which he would himself have heartily approved.