The issue of a new edition of this work affords the Opportunity for making some slight alterations, chie?y in the correction of a few almost inevitable slips of the pen, the eye, or the memory, — two or three Of which have not escaped the notice Of friendly critics and of critical friends. It is necessary to respect and to possess those qualities of a literary and historical conscience, which the choleric Sir Arthur Wardour dreaded and despised in his friend, the laird of Monkbarns, as a pettifogging intimacy with dates, names, and tri?ing matters Of fact, and a tiresome and frivolous accuracy of memory. Occasional repetitions of facts in the course of this book are due to the desire to make each chapter describing special phases of social life as complete in itself as possible. Some reviewers have Observed and regretted the omission Of an account of the intellectual development of the country during the period. This want we may yet supply in a separate volume, treating of the literature and men of letters Of Scotland in the eighteenth century.