Maitland Club > Works of Sir Thomas Urquhart

INTRODUCTION. xi
ness of Montaigne. 19 " There were not three books therein,"
says he, " which were not of mine owne purchase, and all of them
together, in the order wherein I had ranked them, compiled like
to a compleat nosegay of flowers, which, in my travels, I had
gathered out of the gardens of above sixteen several kingdoms." 2
No misfortune ever affected XJrquhart so deeply as the " seques-
tration" and removal of his books from Cromarty by his creditors.
All his efforts to recover or repurchase them were unavailing, and
he mentions that none were ever restored to him, except a few
volumes which had been accidentally dispersed through the neigh-
bouring country.
A considerable part of our author's works is occupied with a
detail of the various difficulties and hardships which he en-
countered in his unwearied efforts to relieve his paternal estates.
He complains that his tenants were slam and plundered — that
a garrison was placed in his house to his utter undoing — that
troops of horse were quartered on his lands without any allow-
ance — that his library was rifled — that old stipends were un-
reasonably augmented, and new stipends unnecessarily created
by the disuniting of parishes — that the Kirk had denuded him
of his heritable right to the patronage of the whole churches in
the shire of Cromarty — and that his creditors had been " iron-
handed" in the use of " hornings and apprisings." In all this
there may be some exaggeration, but there is no reason to doubt
that XJrquhart was harshly dealt with by his father's creditors.
They oppressed him by legal proceedings ; they interrupted and
disappointed all his splendid plans for the improvement of agri-
culture, trade, manufactures, and education in his native shire ;
and above all, if we are to believe his own story, they pre-
19 Essais, B. III. ch. 3. 20 Logopan. B. VI. p. 43.