I have an uncle in Cromarty, now an elderly man, who, when residing in Glasgow in the year 1792, walked about ten miles into the country to attend a sacramental _occasion_, at which he was told Mr. Russel was to officiate, and which proved to be such a one as Burns has described in his “Holy Fair.” There were excellent sermons to be heard from the _tent_, and very tempting drink to be had in an ale-house scarcely a hundred yards away; and between the tent and the ale-house were the people divided, according to their tastes and characters. A young man preached in the early part of the day--his discourse was a long one; and, ere it had come to a close, the mirth of the neighbouring topers, which became louder the more deeply they drank, had begun to annoy the congregation. Mr. Russel was standing beside the tent. At every fresh burst of sound he would raise himself on tiptoe, look first, with a portentous expression of countenance, towards the ale-house, and then at the clergyman; who at length, concluding his part of the service, yielded to him his place. He laid aside the book, and, without psalm or prayer, or any of the usual preliminaries, launched at once into a powerful extempore address, directed, over the heads of the people, at the ale-house. I have been assured by my relative that he never before or since heard any thing half so energetic. His ears absolutely tingled, as the preacher thundered out, in a voice almost superhuman, his solemn and terrible denunciations. Every sound of revelry ceased in a moment; and the Bacchanals, half-drunk, as most of them had ere now become, were so thoroughly frightened as to be fain to steal out through a back window, and slink away along bypaths through the fields. Mr. Russel was ultimately appointed one of the ministers of Stirling. A Cromarty man, a soldier in a Highland regiment, when stationed in Stirling Castle, had got involved one day in some street quarrel, and was swearing furiously, when a tall old man in black came and pulled him out of the crowd. “Wretched creature that ye are!” said the old man; “come along with me.” He drew him into a quiet corner, and began to expostulate with him on his profanity, in a style to which the soldier, an intelligent though by no means steady man, and the child of religious parents, could not but listen. Mr. Russel--for it was no other than he--seemed pleased with the attention he paid him; and on learning whence he had come, and the name of his parents, exclaimed with much feeling, “Wae’s me! that your father’s son should be a blackguard soldier on the streets of Stirling! But come awa.” He brought him home with him, and added to the serious advice he had given him an excellent dinner. The temper of the preacher softened a good deal as he became old; and he was much a favourite with the more serious part of his congregation. He was, with all his defects, an honest, pious man; and had he lived in the days of Renwick or Cargill,