From this period till his death on the 4th of October 1755, his life was occupied with his official duties; with planting and improving his various estates; with the classical studies to which he continued faithful all his days; with the composition of various learned pamphlets, several of which have been published—his “Historical View of the Forms and Powers of the Court of Exchequer in Scotland,” written in conjunction with Baron Scrope, having been edited by Sir Henry Jardine in 1820; in the enjoyment of the society of his friend Allan Ramsay, the poet; and in correspondence with Roger Gale, and with Alexander Gordon, in the subscription list of whose “Itinerarium Septentrionale” he is entered for “five books,” in company with such well-known names as “Mr. Adams, Architect”; “The Right Hon. Duncan Forbes, Lord Advocate of Scotland”; “James Gibbs, Esq., Architect”; “The Right Hon. The Lord Lovat”; “Richard Mead, M.D.”; “The Hon. Sir Hans Sloane, Bart.”; and “Mr. John Smibert,” the portrait-painter. Gordon styles him “not only a treasure of learning and good taste, but now one of its chief supports in that country,” and pronounces that “among all the collections of Roman antiquities in Scotland, that of Baron Clerk claims the preference, both as to number and curiosity.” It was one of the Baron’s antiquarian experiences at a supposed Roman camp on his property of Dumcrieff, in Dumfriesshire, which, narrated to Scott by his son, John Clerk of Eldin, suggested the episode of the “Prætorium” in “The Antiquary.” Occasionally across the quiet and characteristic pages that narrate his daily doings there falls the shadow of larger national events: of the Rebellion of 1715,—“The Earl of Mar was not only my acquaintance but my particular friend”; of the South Sea Scheme, in connection with which Clerk held stock, and was a consequent sufferer; and of the Rebellion of 1745, when the Highlanders in occupation of Edinburgh visited Penicuik House, demanding food and drink. As a poet—or, at least, a rhymester—the Baron is known by the really vigorous verses which he added to the single surviving stanza of the old Scotch song “O merry may the maid be That marries the miller,” which will be found in Johnston’s “Musical Museum,” but were first published anonymously, in 1751, in “The Charmer”; and by the lines beginning “Harmonious pipe, how I envye thy bliss When pressed to Sylphia’s lips with gentle kiss,”