[178:2] Matthew Sharp, born 18th Feb. 1693, was the second son of John Sharp of Hoddam, by his wife Susan, daughter of John Muir of Cassencarrie, ancestor of Sir John Muir Mackenzie of Delvin, Bart. Mr. Sharp joined the Jacobite insurgents in the year 1715, and made his escape to Scotland, after the rout at Preston, in the disguise of a pig-driver. He then repaired to France, where he finally took up his residence at Boulogne. In the year 1740 his elder brother George died, and Mr. Sharp succeeded to the estate of Hoddam. He returned to his native country, and died, unmarried, at Hoddam castle, in the year 1769. [179:1] Charles Erskine of Tinwald, third son of Sir Charles Erskine of Alva, Bart., a Lord of Session, with the style of Lord Tinwald. His first wife was Grizel, daughter of John Grierson of Barjarg, by Catherine, eldest sister of Matthew Sharp of Hoddam. Lord Tinwald's third daughter Jane, married to William Kirkpatrick, second son of Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick of Closeburne, Bart. was mother of Charles Kirkpatrick, to whom Matthew Sharp bequeathed his estate of Hoddam. [180:1] Original in the possession of Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, Esq. This letter is printed in _The Edinburgh Annual Register_ for 1809, p. 552. [196:1] So much had it been considered a legitimate object of the education of a young gentleman to bring him up to the expectation of a government office, that in the "Institute of the Law of Scotland," the posthumous work of John Erskine, who had been appointed professor of Scots law in the university of Edinburgh in 1737, it is mentioned as one of the duties of the guardian of a young man of good family with a small patrimony, to "advance a yearly sum, far beyond the interest of his patrimony, that he may appear suitably to his quality, while he is unprovided of any office under the government by which he can live decently." B. i. Tit. 7. § 25. [197:1] Walpole gives a curious illustration of the poverty of the Scottish nobility, before "the forty-five," saying of Lord Kilmarnock, "I don't know whether I told you that the man at the tennis court protests that he has known him dine with the man that sells pamphlets at Storey's gate, and says he would have often been glad if I would have taken him home to dinner. He was certainly so poor that in one of his wife's intercepted letters, she tells him she has plagued their steward for a fortnight for money, and can only get three shillings. Can any one help pitying such distress?" Walpole's Letters, ii. 144.