The Sun.
London, England, 1865-10-31 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

SIR,—In the remarks made in your leading article
of yesterday evening, on the dinner given' to Pio-
iessor Masson, in anticipation of his departure for
Scotland to enter on the Professorship of English
Literature in the University of Edinburgh, you re-
present that gentleman to have said, in acknow-
ledging the complimentary toast of the evening,
"that from beginning of time until now, never had
there been a precedent for what was about to occur
in his person ; for at last a Scotchinan was going
back again."
If this interesting statement was made more for the
pleasantry it might create over the wine than from
ignorance of its error, I would consider it almost a
pity to disturb the conceit of the Professor, who is
about " to smash and reduce to extinction" " all
previous prophecies" in the example thus set to his
countrymen ; but I beg to inform him what is about
to occur with him is not a precedent, insomuch that
within a recent period the late Sir George Cornewall
Lewis, when Home Secretary, conferred the Chair
of Astronomy in the University of Glasgow on the
present distinguished Professor, who was for many
years attached to that science in London, and whose
distinction in it was acquired under the illustrious
Airy. And yet I think another could be added in
the person of the eminent Professor Syme, of Edin-
burgh. Did he not "go back again" from Uni-
versity College of London?—l am, yours obediently,
October 31. A SCOT.

[Does not our correspondent remember Doctor John-
son's half-sly, half-surly taunt in reply to Boswell, when
they were first introduced to each other by _Davis, the
bookseller, in the back parlour behind the shop ? When—
Boswell, stammering out in his confusion that ho came
from Scotland, but that —he couldn't help it !—" Sir,"
says Johnson, "That happens, I find, with many of
your countrymen." " A Scot" might also recall to
mind the old Doctor's all-but extenuation else-
where of that same national habitude on the
part of Scotchmen, that he was so fond of railing
at thus, in season and out of season : namely, where, be-
fore the close of his Tour through the Hebrides, he declares
that the finest view of all in Scotland is the road leading
out of it! Our correspondent, one might think, ought long
since to have got accustomed (as the eels to skinning) to
the flinging of this gibe by jesting Englishmen in the teeth
of Scotchmen generally. It was a joke old and thread-
bare long before Professor ,Masson had begun to
dream of making himself a reputation. It was ono
of the earliest hits of pictorial fun that came, at
the turn of the century, from the pencil-point of
young George Cruikshank now our veteran Colonel
Cruikshank of the Rifle Volunteers. Ex. gr., that comical
sketch of his representing the canny Scotch trespasser, just
met, in the act, after clambering over the garden wall, on
his way towards the fruit trees, and 'answering, in reply to
the Gardener's indignant inquiry, " Rollo, Sandy ! where
aro you going ?"—" Bock again !" says Sandy, coolly
retracing his footsteps ! Long before that, even, we
may conjecture, the witty paradox had been penned—
by whom we wonder ?—in that wonderful list of paradoxi-
cal witticisms, which says among other things while touch-
ing off the various National Characteristics, and, by the way,
we should like to know where the complete catalogue may
bo discoverable :
The Englishman is never happy unless he's miserable.
The Seotchman is never at home unless he's abroad.
The Frenchman is never at peace unless he's at war.
And so on, by a like whimsical definition, through the
whole of the Nationalities of Christendom.—ED. Stmi
J

NEWI,IAVEN HARBOUR OF REFUGE AND DOCKS:
—A public meeting has been convened by the high con
stables of Lewes for Thursday next, 'Toil a requisition a
the inhabitants of Lewes, to receive the address of Capt.'
Julius Roberts, R.M.A., and a detailed description of plans
for a harbour of refuge and docks at liewhayen.