Spottiswoode Society > History of the affairs of the Church and State of Scotland from the beginning of the reformation to the year 1568 > Volume 1

RIGHT REVEREND BISHOP KEITH. lv
Justiciary my book was called for, and plentiful use was
made of it by lawyers on both sides, so that your Excellency's
name has made its appearance at the bar. I am particu-
larly honoured by his Majesty of Prussia in condescending
to thank me for a copy of my book, which meets with ap-
probation from the public, particularly among the curious,
and the more so as it bears your Excellency's name, with
which some persons are particularly delighted, both in Scot-
land and in England. I am just now drinking in a glass of
claret all health and happiness to your Excellency, and all
your connections, whom may God long preserve ! I am
entei-ed upon the seventy-sixth year of my age, and am
obliged to use the hand of another in writing ; but I thank
God I keep health surprisingly well for my age, though I
am much failed in my feet. I am much pleased that your
Excellency is recovered of your asthma, and I hope you shall
count more years than I have done yet. I have the honour
to subscribe myself, Sir, your Excellency's very much obliged
and most humble servant — Robert Keith. P. S. — I am
to send in a present to your Excellency a copy of my History
of the Affairs of Scotland, &c. put up in a box, and ad-
dressed to the care of Mr Stevens, by whom it shall be sent
by some Hamburgh vessel. As Bob Keith is to study history,
it will not be amiss that he should look into my History,
especially as it relates to the troubles and distresses of the
much injured Mary Queen of Scots. Do me the honour to
let me know when the said copy of my History comes to
your Excellency's hand, for I intend to dispatch it by the
first ship that offers. — Adieu."
The Bishop's wish — that the Field-Marshal might " count
more years than he had himself done yet" — was not fulfilled.
He fell at the battle of Hochkirchen, fought on the night of
the 13th of October 1758, between the Prussians under
Frederick III. and the Austrians under Count Daun. On
the morning of the 14th, the Field-Marshal, after for some
hours keeping the Austrians at bay, and maintaining a
Acts passed in William III. 'a Scottish Presbyterian Parliament after the
Revolution.