Series 1 > Journals of Sir John Lauder, Lord Fountainhall, with his observations on public affairs and other memoranda, 1665-1676

xxii JOURNAL OF JOHN LAUDER
Historical Notices of Scottish Affairs, had actually proceeded
to press to page 304 in 1825, when the misfortunes of the
publisher put a stop to the enterprise. After an interval of
several years the greater portion of Sir Thomas’s transcripts
was placed at the disposal of the Bannatyne Club.’ The
result was the publication of the Observes and the Historical
Notices. Mr. Laing adds, ‘ If at any subsequent time some
of his missing mss. should be discovered, another volume of
Selections, to include his early Journal and extracts from
his smaller notebooks, might not be undeserving the atten¬
tion of the Bannatyne Club.’ The Journal in France, though
never printed, was reviewed by Mr. Cosmo Innes in 1864
in the North British Review, vol. xli. p. 170.
OUTLINE OF FOUNTAINHALl’s LIFE
A short relation of Lord Fountainhall’s life is given in
Mr. David Laing’s preface to the Historical Notices. He
was born in 1646. His father was John Lauder, merchant
and bailie of Edinburgh, of the family of Lauder of that
Ilk.1 He graduated as Master of Arts in the University of
Edinburgh in 1664. He went to France to study in 1665,
and returned from abroad in 1667. He was ‘ admitted ’ as
an advocate in 1668. He was married in 1669 to Janet,
daughter of Sir Andrew Ramsay of Abbotshal],2 Provost of
Edinburgh, afterwards a Lord of Session. In 1674, along
with the leaders of the bar and the majority of the profes¬
sion, he was ‘ debarred ’ or suspended from practising by the
1 ‘Sir John Lauder of Fountainhall is deschended of the Lauders of that ilk,
and his paternall coat is immatriculate and registrate in the Lyons Book of
Herauldrie.’—Unprinted MS. by Lauder, in possession of Sir T. N. Dick Lauder.
A Genealogical Roll in MS., of the Lauder Family, compiled by Sir T. Dick
Lauder, also in the present baronet’s possession, has afforded much useful
information; and for Lauder’s family connections, I have also consulted Mrs.
Atholl Forbes’s Curiosities of a Scottish Charter Chest, and Mrs. Stewart Smith’s
Grange of St. Giles.
2 See Appendix hi.