The conduct of John Erskine, Earl of Mar, has afforded a subject of comment to two men of very different character, John Lockhart of Carnwath, and the Master of Sinclair. Neither of the portraits drawn by these master-hands are favourable; and they were, in both instances, written under the influence of strong, yet transient impressions of disappointment and suspicion. The mind naturally seeks for some safer steersman to guide opinion than the intemperate though honest Jacobite, Lockhart, or the sarcastic and slippery friend, Sinclair. The worst peculiarity in the career of Mar was, that no one trusted him; towards the latter portion of his life he had even lost the power of deceiving: it had become impossible to him to act without mingling the poison of deception with intentions which might have been honest, and even benevolent. The habits of a long life of intrigue had warped his very nature. When we behold him fleeing from the coasts of Scotland, leaving behind him the trusting hearts that would have bled for him, we fancy that no moral degradation can be more complete. We view him soliciting to be a pensioner of England, and we acknowledge that it was even possible to sink still more deeply into infamy. With principles of action utterly unsound, it is surprising how much influence Lord Mar acquired over all with whom he came into collision. He was sanguine in disposition, and, if we may judge by his letters, buoyant in his spirits; his disposition was conciliatory, his manners were apparently confiding. At the bottom of that gay courtesy there doubtless was a heart warped by policy, but not inherently unkind. He attached to him the lowly. Lockhart speaks of the love of two of his kinsmen to him:--his tenantry, during his exile, contributed to supply his wants, by a subscription. These are the few redeeming characteristics of one made up of inconsistencies. He conferred, it must be allowed, but little credit on a party which could number among its adherents the brave Earl Marischal, the benevolent and honourable Derwentwater, and the disinterested Nithisdale. When we contrast the petty and selfish policy of the Earl of Mar with the integrity and fidelity of those who fought in the same cause, and over whom he was commander, his character sinks low in the estimate, and acts like a foil to the purity and brightness of his fellow sufferers in the strife. FOOTNOTES: [7] See Wood's Peerage of Scotland. [8] Histories of Noble British Families by Henry Drummond, Esq. Preface to Part I. [9] Robertson's History of Scotland, ii. 32. [10] Wood's Peerage. The year of his birth is not stated. [11] Cunningham's History of Great Britain, i. 326. [12] Dalrymple's Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 100. [13] Chambers's Biography, art. Erskine. [14] See Dr. Coxe's MSS. in the British Museum, vol. iii. [15] Dalrymple's Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 98. [16] Lockhart's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 114. [17] Lockhart, vol. i. p. 45.