History of the Fife Pitcairns

DR WILLIAM PITCAIRN. 429
character. I therefore quote the following extracts ver-
batim. He says : —
" In 1758 Robertson and I went to London, — he to offer
his ' History of Scotland ' for sale.
" He had never been there before, so we went to see
the lions together, and had for the most part the same
acquaintance.
" Dr William Pitcairn, a very respectable physician in
the City, and a great friend of Dr Dickson's, was a cousin
of Dr Robertson's, whose mother was a Pitcairn ; we be-
came very intimate with him. Drs Armstrong and Orme
were also of their Society.
" Dr William Pitcairn was a very handsome man, a
little turned of fifty, and of a very gentlemanly address.
When he settled in London, he was patronised by an
Alderman Behn, who being Jacobite, and not doubting
that Pitcairn was of the same side, as he had travelled
with the Duke of Hamilton, he set him up as a candidate
for St Bartholomew's Hospital. During the canvass the
alderman came to the doctor, and asked him, with im-
patient heat, ' if it was true that he was the son of a
Presbyterian minister in Scotland ? ' which Pitcairn not
being able to deny, the other conjured him 'to conceal
that circumstance like murder, otherwise it would in-
fallibly blow them up.' He was elected Physician to
that Hospital, and soon rose to great eminence in the
City of London.
" Dr Pitcairn was a bachelor, and lived handsomely,
but chiefly entertained young Scotch physicians who had
no establishment. Of these, Drs Armstrong and Dickson
were much with him. As our connections drew Robert-
son 1 and me frequently to the City, before my sister's
house was ready, we both took up our lodging at his
house. We never saw our landlord in the morning, for
he went to the Hospital before eight o'clock; but his
housekeeper had orders to ask us at breakfast if we in-
tended to dine there, and to tell us when her master
1 Dr William Robertson.